when to 100'?

[Web Monkey]

Probably won't be a popular response, however... If you and your buddy have your essentials under control, ie: buoyancy, trim, gas sharing, equipment deployment, comfort level, etc., *and* if the conditions are calm, relatively warm, good viz, *and* if you're with an experienced diver the first time (DM on up), I don't see a problem with it. In fact, those are the conditions you *do* want for your first deeper dive.

I'd still say to wait for more training (deep) and experience.

Going deeper brings on a conspiracy of things that are really difficult to bring together on an Al 80 in shallow water. for example,

It's possible (easy) to incur a decompression obligation that you don't have sufficient gas to handle, leaving you with these choices:

• Surfacing and getting bent
• Not surfacing and drowning
• Trying to explain to your buddy (using sign language) that you need another tank with a reg, and an extra 30 minutes (or even knowing how much more time you need)

Even better, this will happen while you're really narced, so if you're not carefully watching (and understanding) your air and turn-pressure, you might not even notice that you're running out of air, leading to an OOA and an attempted emergency air-share while really stuipd from narcosis, or a bolt to the surface, which will probably leave you dead (or severely bent if you're lucky).

These are all easily manageable with more training and appropriate equipment. In fact, part of the training involves calculating your gas usage and turn pressures, so you can select appropriate equipment.

This doesn't necessarily mean that you need doubles, a tech-diving ninja buddy and years of training to go to 130', but it does mean learning approprate techniques and using approproate equipment.

Terry

 

[Thalassamania]

Cousteau tried diving with pure oxygen early on and had a seizure underwater --- pure luck kept him from dying.

And had Cousteau read a bit more he’d not have had that problem, but consider that his guys were diving pure oxygen to 30 feet as late as the early 1970s.

The point of training is to avoid repeating the lethal and near lethal mistakes of others without experiencing them first-hand.

Absolutely, but that can be accomplished by someone who has good water skills by reading and some controlled condition practice. In point of fact I’d suggest that someone with ten years of surfing experience and a copy of say, “The New Science of Skin and Scuba,” will turn him or herself into a better diver than most of those produced by the abbreviated courses that are being taught today.

I'm still a little perplexed by people being somehow offended by my comment that those who, today, seek to train themselves to dive may not be using good judgement.

Most of who learned without benefit of the courses that are out there today take offense at the idea that these courses would have been of any particular value.

The adequacy or inadequacy of training is another issue. I don't get how current training is woefully inadequate yet no training, at least for the elite few, is acceptable. This seems paradoxical to me.

It’s not a paradox at all. Show me a strong ocean swimmer, who surfs, handles a sailboat, maybe does a little free diving and I’ll show you someone who can teach themselves to be a better diver, in rather a short time, than many of the instructors who are out there. Would they benefit from appropriate instruction? Sure. Would a weekend class teach them anything that they couldn’t learn on their own? Doubtful.

If some middle-aged father of two decides, on a lark, to buy scuba gear and jump into a lake to 60 feet with no training at all, am I wrong for thinking he may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer?

No, he’s an idiot, unless he happens to resemble a middle-aged father of two who spent ten years as an LA County Lifeguard, who now surfs most mornings and coaches swimming at UCLA. Do you see what I’m getting at? It’s the incredible self deception of the diving industry that not only is it doing a good job, but that it should be recognized by everyone for the value of it’s product. There are some great instructors out there, who teach great courses and turn out really good life-long learner type divers. But they are, I’m sorry to say, exceptional and exist, at least in part, in spite of the agencies rather than because of them.

 

[Tigerman]

I'd still say to wait for more training (deep) and experience.

Going deeper brings on a conspiracy of things that are really difficult to bring together on an Al 80 in shallow water. for example,

It's possible (easy) to incur a decompression obligation that you don't have sufficient gas to handle, leaving you with these choices:

• Surfacing and getting bent
• Not surfacing and drowning
• Trying to explain to your buddy (using sign language) that you need another tank with a reg, and an extra 30 minutes (or even knowing how much more time you need)

Even better, this will happen while you're really narced, so if you're not carefully watching (and understanding) your air and turn-pressure, you might not even notice that you're running out of air, leading to an OOA and an attempted emergency air-share while really stuipd from narcosis, or a bolt to the surface, which will probably leave you dead (or severely bent if you're lucky).

These are all easily manageable with more training and appropriate equipment. In fact, part of the training involves calculating your gas usage and turn pressures, so you can select appropriate equipment.

This doesn't necessarily mean that you need doubles, a tech-diving ninja buddy and years of training to go to 130', but it does mean learning approprate techniques and using approproate equipment.

Terry

On an AL80 at 100 feet, you can go straight to the surface pretty fast without being bent, MOST LIKELY.
It wouldnt be the best thing to do, but ive seen 3-4 divers come feet first to the surface from 100 feet with no stops and too fast ascent rates.. They where also diving with HP117 bottles, to make things worse..
None of them showed any signs of bends whatsoever, fortunately.
No, its not a good thing to do, but you MOST LIKELY wont die or get severely bent..

 

[Web Monkey]

On an AL80 at 100 feet, you can go straight to the surface pretty fast without being bent, MOST LIKELY.
It wouldnt be the best thing to do, but ive seen 3-4 divers come feet first to the surface from 100 feet with no stops and too fast ascent rates.. They where also diving with HP117 bottles, to make things worse..
None of them showed any signs of bends whatsoever, fortunately.
No, its not a good thing to do, but you MOST LIKELY wont die or get severely bent..

Sure, anybody can sucessfully do an uncontrolled ascent. Except those that don't make it.

Personally, I'll take training and the right equipment over the possibility of being lucky anyday.

Terry

 

[Tigerman]

Sure, anybody can sucessfully do an uncontrolled ascent. Except those that don't make it.

Personally, I'll take training and the right equipment over the possibility of being lucky anyday.

Terry

I think you missed the point dude.. Its not lucky if you survive an uncontrolled ascent from 100 feet having been down there as short as you will have on a AL80 tank.. Its bad luck if youre able to get killed (or even hurt) from it..

No, Im not encouraging anybody to go diving to 100 feet without the proper qualifications, nor to not dive by the tables, but realisticly its not likely to get bent or killed from such an ascent.

 

[jon m]

Hmmmm ... food for thought ...

- How much air would you need to do a dive to 100 feet for (let's say) 20 minutes and make a "by the book" ascent?

- How long should that ascent take?

- How much air should you have in reserve when you leave the 100-foot depth to begin your ascent?

- How much would you need if your buddy lost his air supply at 100 feet to get the two of you safely to the surface?

When you can answer those questions quantitatively you'll be ready (from a gas management standpoint) to go to 100 feet.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

o-k, these are thing i would like to learn so i'll bite- where would one go to get this info? thanks!
-me

 

[Tigerman]

o-k, these are thing i would like to learn so i'll bite- where would one go to get this info? thanks!
-me

You go take NWGratefulDivers course

 

[Walter]

Not to the typical AOW course. It does not really teach much of anything about deep diving.

 

[Tigerman]

Not to the typical AOW course. It does not really teach much of anything about deep diving.

It dont teach much of anything really, does it?
Its more a intro to more advanced diving than an actually advanced course in my experience. Might of course be some instructors that take it a bit further than what the organizations require them to tho.
Some topics are more elaborate than others tho.

 

[Walter]

Exactly, which is why requiring AOW to exceed 60ft is silly at best. AOW is not education, it's a joke.