Question What's your safety stop depth?

[tursiops]

It's complicated

1) No, I don't do

I only meant that I do not want to get into the bad habit of ignoring any kind of stop the computer or deco plan asks me to do.
-> Ignoring a safety stop would be pretty safe if there is no marine traffic
... although a friend of mine got skin bends from a 20m/60ft 45min recreational dive with no risk factors whatsoever - we were many and knowledgeable and we could simply not understand it as anything else than the tail of a statistical distribution ...

If I start ignoring some stops, then what if I start cutting mandatory deco too? Bad habits develop easily! I know people how have done that e.g. as a result of group pressure.

2) Yes, I do it

When the mandatory decompression stops (last stop at 6m) are done, then I will use a minute or two to ascent from 6m to 3m and dwell a short while there, maybe two minutes or even more, and then I will slowly resurface, take it easy on the surface, avoid strenuous exercise after the dive and drink water.

Sometimes I have added and extra 5...10 minutes to the last stop just because diving a bit longer is great (unless there are waves) and because DCS would suck. Near freezing water is a risk factor that the deco models might not accurately account for. People also tend to forget that a dive computer only runs a model, it's not the real thing, and while the computer keeps you 99,99% safe, there is always that 0,01% chance to get bent. It's very very small but I HAVE SEEN IT HAPPEN. So, a few extra minutes in the shallows never hurt.

Three more minutes of off-gassing or three more days at the hospital - you choose. And yes, I was the guy who had to go to the hospital to deliver a phone charger to my bent friend (he was deco-cleared and he then had a middle-ear bend). Told him strictly to do extra deco in the future

Most folks do a SS for a recreationally dive, and deco stops for a deco dive, but not both on the same dive. Just wondering what you do.

 

[Joneill]

I dive shearwater computers so I get credit for anything between 10 and 20 feet for my safety stop.

You actually get credit for anything between 7 and 23 feet!

 

[Subcooled]

Most folks do a SS for a recreationally dive, and deco stops for a deco dive, but not both on the same dive. Just wondering what you do.

Read my longer answer.

In short:
- Safety stop for rec dives (sometimes but rarely I do skip it).
- Mandatory decompression stops for deeper dives are just that - MANDATORY. I usually also extend the last stop a bit and I do an overtly slow resurfacing after that (maybe with some extra minutes at 3m/9ft too). It is a small price indeed to pay for the added safety. I do have deco-cleared bent friends (two of them), so I do know the limits of computer algorithms. And please do remember, after-dive weight lifting (double tanks...), sweating etc. are a risk factor that have landed my friends in a hospital.

Strangely, my dive club considers me as a risky diver because I do report all my incidents (I believe it is important to tell what when wrong, how, when, why and how it was resolved). I do my diving, I report my incidents, I don't care of my reputation. Hope it saves someone from DCS or worse. Some of those "safer" divers that criticized me, got bent, so...

 

[tursiops]

Read my longer answer.

In short:
- Safety stop for rec dives (sometimes but rarely I do skip it).
- Mandatory decompression stops for deeper dives are just that - MANDATORY. I usually also extend the last stop a bit and I do an overtly slow resurfacing after that (maybe with some extra minutes at 3m/9ft too). It is a small price indeed to pay for the added safety. I do have deco-cleared bent friends, so I do know the limits of computer algorithms. And please do remember, after-dive weight lifting (double tanks...), sweating etc. are a risk factor that have landed my friends in a hospital.

I read it. More words does not mean more clarity.
On rec dives (no deco) you usually do a SS.
On deco dives, you sometimes extend the last deco stop.

 

[boulderjohn]

On deco dives, you sometimes extend the last deco stop.

I know lots of people with that attitude. "OK, I should be OK to surface now, but I'm doing OK, there's no hurry, I think I'll hang out a little longer to be safe." Having a SurfGF reading is, I believe, going to make that even more common. ("I think I'll hang out until it hits 60.")

 

[Subcooled]

I read it. More words does not mean more clarity.

True

On rec dives (no deco) you usually do a SS.
On deco dives, you sometimes extend the last deco stop.

True, and add one at 3m.

 

[tursiops]

True, and add one at 3m.

One advantage of deco'ing on pure O2; best possible washout of tissues, and you can do it all at 6m. No need to do anything up in the wave/propellor zone.

 

[Subcooled]

One advantage of deco'ing on pure O2; best possible washout of tissues, and you can do it all at 6m. No need to do anything up in the wave/propellor zone.

Not true.

Best possible washout of tissues is correct.
Wave/propeller zone is correct.

What is omitted however, is ambient pressure and saturation and supersaturation. One can get swiftly rid of supersaturated gas other than oxygen by breathing oxygen. When one ascends however, supersaturation reoccurs. Time is still needed to cut that. Else there is a small risk of the bends, small but not zero.

 

[tursiops]

Not true.

Best possible washout of tissues is correct.
Wave/propeller zone is correct.

What is omitted however, is ambient pressure and saturation and supersaturation. One can get swiftly rid of supersaturated gas other than oxygen by breathing oxygen. When one ascends however, supersaturation reoccurs. Time is still needed to cut that. Else there is a small risk of the bends, small but not zero.

The point is to extend the 6m stop to include at least the time you would have spent at 3m.

 

[Marie13]

20ft. When you’re Great Lakes wreck diving with some chop, even 5ft can make some difference in how much you’re getting bounced around.