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

[mmatthias]

I am curious if you know how these out of air situations came about?

 

[DiveLikeAMuppet]

Dive guides don't make a dive safe

Dive guides - DMs and instructors - are not gods. The sad reality is that they are mostly underpaid, often under-skilled hospitality workers who depend on tips and need to work 6+ days a week. They cannot afford to refuse poor divers or to not dive because they are not dive-fit that day. Dive guides don't "take" you on swimthroughs or deeper than your training because you looked good and experienced underwater, they do it because they decided that you will more likely than not survive the dive and give them a decent tip.

Always be able to exit a dive safely by yourself

Don't depend on someone else as they might not be there. If you need to deploy a DSMB because there is boat traffic, you need to carry a DSMB and be able to deploy it - it's not enough that other people in the group carry it. If you can get into deco due to depth, you need to carry your own computer. Plan the dive. Check your own gas.

Dive with safe operations

A broken engine or a dingy boat on the way to a dive site is fun and part of the adventure in a tropical paradise. A broken engine, no radio and no emergency plans become a problem when some slips onboard and needs to get to a hospital.

Is the weather safe to dive? Can the boat still pick you up if the weather worsens or if there is an accident?

You don't know what you don't know - always discuss procedures on the surface

People dive differently in different places. There are unspoken rules and habits. Risk perception differs. Training and experience differs - other divers may be happy to dive a dangerous site because they have thousands of dives or because they are insane. Return to shot might mean it's easier to pick up divers when they don't drift all over the place but it could also mean we are diving shipping lanes and the nearby container ship will turn you into fish feed if you drift on deco.

Skills fade

You need to practice skills frequently.

 

[Angelo Farina]

Dive guides don't make a dive safe

Dive guides - DMs and instructors - are not gods. The sad reality is that they are mostly underpaid, often under-skilled hospitality workers who depend on tips and need to work 6+ days a week. They cannot afford to refuse poor divers or to not dive because they are not dive-fit that day. Dive guides don't "take" you on swimthroughs or deeper than your training because you looked good and experienced underwater, they do it because they decided that you will more likely than not survive the dive and give them a decent tip.

Well that was not my experience when I did work as DM/instructor in holidays resorts for 5 years.
First, we were paid decently by the tour operator (Club Vacanze, in my case)
Second, NO TIPS EVER. It had been highly offensive to tip me or my wife.
Third, we operated under strict safety protocols (which indeed included a max depth of 50m and deco stops at 6 and 3m).
Fourth, OOA accidents were frequent, as some customers are air hogs. We were equipped and trained for this (large tank, 2 complete regs with 3 second stages, two of them with long hose dedicated to be donated - and of course additional tanks hanging at the deco bar under the boat).
FIFTH: we were Gods! Or, at least, customers considered us as such, as we were part of the "staff", wearing our colourful uniforms and taking care of them. But this is hard to understand, not having seen how the social interaction was in those holidays villages in the eighties. We were really capable to do everything to our customers! Making them jumping out of the window, if we wanted...

 

[DiveLikeAMuppet]

Well that was not my experience when I did work as DM/instructor in holidays resorts for 5 years.
First, we were paid decently by the tour operator (Club Vacanze, in my case)
Second, NO TIPS EVER. It had been highly offensive to tip me or my wife.
Third, we operated under strict safety protocols (which indeed included a max depth of 50m and deco stops at 6 and 3m).
Fourth, OOA accidents were frequent, as some customers are air hogs. We were equipped and trained for this (large tank, 2 complete regs with 3 second stages, two of them with long hose dedicated to be donated - and of course additional tanks hanging at the deco bar under the boat).
FIFTH: we were Gods! Or, at least, customers considered us a such, as we were part of the "staff", wearing our colorful uniforms and taking care of them. But this is hard to understand, not having seen how the social interaction was in those holidays villages in the eighties. We were really capable to do everything to our customers! Making them jumping out of the window, if we wanted...

There are exceptions to any rule. I had in mind the standard liveaboard in Egypt. Also, I doubt that you would advocate for divers to depend on the average DM/instructor to be so well trained and prepared as you were .

 

[Kharon]

Having once very nearly drowned from a boat dive in the Keys I came up with a set of strict personal rules. They may seem draconian, but they would have kept me from a near death experience.

SCUBA Rules​

You are always diving solo no matter how many divers are in the water, or how many buddies you have, or what certifications they have, or how much experience they have, or what you discussed during the dive plan, or how well they are equipped.

If you make a non-trivial mistake gearing up or on a dive - abort. If you aren’t focused enough to gear up perfectly. or aren’t focused enough to avoid non-trivial mistakes during the dive, you aren’t focused enough to dive solo. Two mistakes in one day means you are way off and need a time out – no more dives that day.

Never enter the water if you can’t comfortably do a long surface swim in full gear on snorkel. This is an easy way to decide if the conditions are too harsh not an intention to do that.

Always take a compass bearing from the entry point (boat or shore) to the reef* and know the distance to the reef. Failing to do so is a non-trivial mistake.

Always check for current as soon as you hit depth. Make a current check at each third of your air. Failing to do so is a non-trivial mistake.

If the conditions are different or worse than what you expected (surge, current, topography etc.) or if there is any uncertainty immediately abort.

On a boat:

If the dive briefing does not cover emergency diver recall and diver in distress protocols, ASK. Should they not describe acceptable procedures don’t dive. NOTE: Prior to booking this should be asked of the dive op. On the boat, this is a check to make sure the crew is competent in emergency situations and aware of procedures.

If the dive briefing does not cover distance to reef, direction to reef, size and shape of reef, depth of reef, special features of reef and all conditions including visibility, surge, and current, ASK. If they are unable to answer you should consider not diving, depending on observable conditions. If you dive be ready to abort.

* Reef = a specific objective or area in salt or fresh water, not just a coral reef.

 

[peeweediver]

I am curious if you know how these out of air situations came about?

Most serious one was the diver who spent the entire first dive of the trip (after the check-out dive) playing with his new camera. As he tried to pull the last breath from his tank, the DM saw him with his wide, panicked eyes and gave the diver his octopus (buddy had long since left him because of his fixation on his new toy). The diver admitted back on deck that he had not looked at his SPG during the dive.
The other two incidents were more "extremely low on air"; one was at 300 psi at 90 feet and the other was at 400 psi at around 70-80 feet. In both cases they talked after the dive of just following the group and assuming that everything was fine from an air standpoint and a nitrogen loading standpoint. Neither factored in their own air consumption by simply looking at their SPG. Going forward they were much better monitoring both psi remaining and nitrogen loading. As an instructor, these experiences created great teaching discussions. First, don't play with new toys until you are very comfortable with your abilities and, even then, don't let the toy distract you from your primary concern, air and nitrogen status. Also, just because all your friends jumped off a cliff, would you? In other words, what the group is or is not doing is not as important as how you are doing. Make sure you are always ok, then pay attention to the group so you don't get separated and you get to see the cool stuff they might see.
In short, all three were operator error in a big way.

 

[Angelo Farina]

There are exceptions to any rule. I had in mind the standard liveaboard in Egypt. Also, I doubt that you would advocate for divers to depend on the average DM/instructor to be so well trained and prepared as you were .

That was the standard at the time in any similar organization: Club Med, Francorosso,, Alpitour, Club Vacanze, etc...
Just Club Med had more than 20 villages, with villages all around the world, including Caribbean, South-East Asia, Africa, Mediterranean, cruiser boats, etc.

 

[Litefoot]

This is a great thread. Thanks to @SlugLife for getting it going. Bookmarked.

 

[crofrog]

Don’t dive solo.
Always analyze your gas.

 

[mmatthias]

Most serious one was the diver who spent the entire first dive of the trip (after the check-out dive) playing with his new camera. As he tried to pull the last breath from his tank, the DM saw him with his wide, panicked eyes and gave the diver his octopus (buddy had long since left him because of his fixation on his new toy). The diver admitted back on deck that he had not looked at his SPG during the dive.
The other two incidents were more "extremely low on air"; one was at 300 psi at 90 feet and the other was at 400 psi at around 70-80 feet. In both cases they talked after the dive of just following the group and assuming that everything was fine from an air standpoint and a nitrogen loading standpoint. Neither factored in their own air consumption by simply looking at their SPG. Going forward they were much better monitoring both psi remaining and nitrogen loading. As an instructor, these experiences created great teaching discussions. First, don't play with new toys until you are very comfortable with your abilities and, even then, don't let the toy distract you from your primary concern, air and nitrogen status. Also, just because all your friends jumped off a cliff, would you? In other words, what the group is or is not doing is not as important as how you are doing. Make sure you are always ok, then pay attention to the group so you don't get separated and you get to see the cool stuff they might see.
In short, all three were operator error in a big way.

Thanks for this info! I am a new diver- 80 dives and certified less than 2 years. I am always trying to learn. The more I learn the less I worry since it seems the vast majority of accidents are avoidable by following what we learned in our training. My husband and I always do a buddy check and it surprises me how few people appear to do that.