What to do if you lose your buddy on a deep dive???

[beezwax]

This is an interesting thread-- one of the things I like most about scubaboard is that you get to see how different diving is around the world. So much depends on who and where you are. I've had this lost buddy thing happen to me several times this week actually. It's the first week of ice out here in northern MN, and I've been able to go diving four times with at least one or more buddy, and three of these times we've been separated. All of the dives were in mine quarries, and once you get below a hundred feet the visibility is only a foot or two right now (very dark down there because of layers of suspended silt from meltdown that haven't settled yet). But I have every confidence in myself and my buddies, and if/when we get separated we just continue the dive solo. Doesn't anyone else do that?

 

[landlocked]

When vis gets down to just a food or two, you need to have a buddy tether, hold hands (if your friends) or have one lead while the other hangs on to his tank, etc. There needs to be some way of keeping together. Solo dives with 2 feet of vis and no surface tender sounds unwise to me. How would you signal for help and/or if you went missing, how would you be found?

 

[beezwax]

When vis gets down to just a food or two, you need to have a buddy tether, hold hands (if your friends) or have one lead while the other hangs on to his tank, etc. There needs to be some way of keeping together. Solo dives with 2 feet of vis and no surface tender sounds unwise to me. How would you signal for help and/or if you went missing, how would you be found?

Well, we're all on the county dive team, so if something bad actually happens, we'd be the ones called out to find the lost sheep anyway. But I guess we don't exactly subscribe to the buddy system doctrine. Most of the time we're able to stay together of course, but if it happens that one gets separated (due to visibility) we don't stress about it. I think there's a lot to be said for facing the need to be self-sufficient underwater and consciously taking (sole) responsibility for your own well-being, because a lot of the time people are solo diving whether they realize it or not. By the way, I'm the FNG on the team, all the other divers have many hundreds of dives.

(There would be an entirely different response if someone got "lost" while ice diving of course)

 

[Jason B]

that's why i use the Insta-Buddy Zap-O-Matic

it attaches to the insta-buddy's tank via magnet. it is the size of a quarter, and
thus impossible to detect, and it zaps the insta-buddy if they ever stray
over a certain distance from you. The zap can also be administered by
pushing a button.

it has three settings:

--Tough Love: a gentle zap. insta-buddy will stop to figure things out,
giving you time to catch up. recommended setting.

--You will be assimilated: zap is strong enough for buddy to realize they are
at your mercy. zap them a few times to get the point accross: "We do it my way, or you gonna be in constant payne."

--Kamikaze: the zap is strong enough to incapacitate. use only to save
insta-buddy from him or herself in extreme circumstances. suggested uses:
insta-buddy is about to stick his/her hand into a moray eel's cave

Andy, you do everything the hard way my friend.
Here goes my solution to most of diving's misadventures (works great!).