What Are Your "Pro-Tips" for Safety, Redundancy, and Accident Handling

[Jai Bar]

First and foremost, use the computer. The gray one between the ears. Common sense is probably more important than the rest.

Second, which is derived from the above: the ability to tell yourself when it is time to abort dive or skip it altogether. Surprisingly many divers fail to do that. Better live to dive another day and all those cliches are sometimes true. If you dive a lot it won't matter to you one more or one less dive.

Training. If you can do a basic tech course- do it. Even if you won't do tech diving, you'll learn a lot and gain experience.

Ditto for Dive Master and beyond. Again, even if you won't work in the industry, these are fun learning and experiencewise are the best courses.

If you dive a lot from boats, safari etc. Learn and practice to deploy SMB never rely on divemaster's one . Actually never rely on others- it is fine to be able to get help, but better be always self reliable and able to help others.

 

[Divemaster_Mark]

This is good advice. I think I do the same thing, but never really thought about it "as a thing".

Before I do something "different" it makes sense to pause for a moment, check air, check deco status etc, and THEN decide if this is something that should be attempted. I always glance at the spg before I go in an overhead, even if I "know" the tank is full.

I remember a long time ago, I found an anchor at the end of the dive and proceeded to recover it, sending it up on a lift bag, I was so embarrassed and disappointed, to then decide to look at my pressure gage and find that I had way less than I wanted. Simply because I didn't consider the consumption of air the lift bag represented. It is nothing at the beginning of the dive, but pretty stupid not to consider it at the very end.

Good thinking.

A tip I learned way back when is to use my exhaust to inflate SMB & Lift bags.

 

[johndiver999]

You want to stick your head between something heavy and a lift bag? Doesn’t sound smart to me.

 

[Boarderguy]

You want to stick your head between something heavy and a lift bag? Doesn’t sound smart to me.

They're slow to inflate and you hold onto the line. Once it gets a bit less heavy you can move it. I do that when getting anchors a little more buoyant so I can hold them while I swim or scoot back. Sometimes I grab my air2 and fill. Sometimes I detach my drysuit inflator. It all depends on how big the item and bag are and how deep I am.

 

[John C. Ratliff]

First and foremost, use the computer. The gray one between the ears. Common sense is probably more important than the rest.

Second, which is derived from the above: the ability to tell yourself when it is time to abort dive or skip it altogether. Surprisingly many divers fail to do that. Better live to dive another day and all those cliches are sometimes true. If you dive a lot it won't matter to you one more or one less dive.

Training. If you can do a basic tech course- do it. Even if you won't do tech diving, you'll learn a lot and gain experience.

Ditto for Dive Master and beyond. Again, even if you won't work in the industry, these are fun learning and experiencewise are the best courses.

If you dive a lot from boats, safari etc. Learn and practice to deploy SMB never rely on divemaster's one . Actually never rely on others- it is fine to be able to get help, but better be always self reliable and able to help others.

That first sentence is interesting to me, as sometimes there is no “common sense.” The brain is often tricked, or distracted, and that is why some here say to set the audible alarms on the dive computer. Those reminders are there for a reason.

Concerning looking at the computer/SPG, one time I had looked at it, but without my correction lenses and did not realize it was telling me I was really low on air. I actually did go out-of-air (OOA), but at only about 10 feet (3 meters) in a river. I was using a very old BCD, called a hard-shell Dacor Nautilus CVS (Constant Volume System), and had to orally add air to the unit (you cannot “inflate” this unit, as actually you are displacing water in the hard shell).

I’ll add more here probably tomorrow as I have some ideas others haven’t tapped into yet.

SeaRat

 

[andrespp]

I follow two procedures that are common in aviation:

1. Never try more than one new item (If have to try/change something new of some significance) in the same dive. For example, if I have to start using a new DPV and a drysuit, I will go with one of the two first, and then would add the second in a later dive.

2, When pushing out my previous limits, do that on a calculated risk analysis and do not worry canceling in absolute if for some internal or external reason if am not feeling confortable. The old known saying of “In flying, I have learned that carelessness and overconfidence are usually far moredangerous than deliberately accepted risks.” — Wilbur Wright, is absolutely right to me.

 

[John C. Ratliff]

A lot has been covered in this thread, but I'm going to let you in on a dive secret; dive logs are very valuable. I developed my own, and for a long time I filled them out with handwritten entries, along with diagrams. You can see several examples below, and these allow me to go back in time and relive my dives in detail. This has proven to be invaluable, as it is allowing me to write a book on dives I made in 1984, which helped the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife to evaluate and ultimately shut down the Winchester Dam Hydroelectric Project, and spelled the end of what is known as "low-head hydroelectric power" in Oregon, and perhaps elsewhere, due to fish kills.

My dive logs have a section titled "Special Problems and Proposed Solutions" which has allowed me to re-evaluate my diving, resulted in equipment redesign, technique alterations, and tracking of problems that could lead to actual accidents before they get to that stage. I have found that section invaluable. By the way, I haven't found a dive which was "perfect," as dives are complex activities and there's always something that goes a bit sideways, or actually wrong, during the dive. Recording these is really valuable for tracking trends.

Now, one other bit of advise that I haven't yet seen. That is that if you ask the question in your head about whether you should dive, then automatically you should not make that dive. My buddy and I spent a half hour evaluating the breakers and seas off the Oregon coast in the 1970s, and ultimately convinced ourselves that it was divable. It was not, and we got out, got rolled by a huge set of waves which started while we were out, and spent 3 and a half hours in the water, floating around after dropping our weights, and ultimately a U.S. Coast Guard pickup of us. The Coast Guardsmen were so happy to get us up and out of the water because we were their first live pickups of the year (and it was December). So if that little voice gets in your head about whether you should or shouldn't dive, then abort!

SeaRat

 

[justspacelover_]

Now I need to bookmark this tips on this thread. Thank you for this!