When/where to practice solo skills? And what to practice?

[Aloha Joe]

I posted in the beginner forum that I did a couple of solo dives w/o proper training and equipment. So now I want to start practicing and acquiring the right gear. So, for example, when/where did you practice mask changes? What else can I start practicing?

It seems like not the best idea to practice on a chartered boat where I’m showing up alone and diving with a (generally low experience) group. Hopefully I’ll meet someone soon who lives around here and is also interested in practicing skills, but it hasn’t happened yet.

 

[Single]

Rule #1 - Don't talk about solo diving with divers who've never done it.

Practice in a swimming pool or your living room. Switch to your spare mask/air supply/light/knife with your eyes closed. Practice dropping your weights and surfacing with an empty BC, then manually inflating on surface. Practice removing your BC underwater and then putting it back on underwater.

Start treating every dive as if you're solo (being self-reliant). Find experienced solo divers to talk to. See how they mount their pony bottles and route their hoses. See where they carry their spare mask/compass/light/knife.

Go through the emergency scenarios in your head and how you'll react. Consider hiring a private dive instructor who also dives solo.

Save the photography until...next year.

 

[KenGordon]

Join a club. I understand that that is practically communism in your part of the world and they may be hard to find, but google suggests https://www.meetup.com/Honolulu-Dive-Club. I have only googled it and it might be a front for a shop, who knows.

If you want to solo dive either get very experienced or do a course and then get very experienced. It isn’t for people having difficulty finding buddies, it is for people who have to deal with less useful buddies or dive in situations where a buddy isn’t a help.

If you want to teach yourself then do it first of all with a buddy. If you can’t put an SMB on your own while being watched by a buddy then you still will not be able when actually alone but with more serious consequences. Same for mask swapping or any other physical skill.

Some of the skills are not physical but mental. Are you going to be happy at 30m,alone in the dark, when you run into some monofilament net?

See Mark Powell’s video, also know that SDI have a useful course.

 

[Aloha Joe]

Thanks, I joined that meetup and will dive with them. I’m interested in solo (self reliant) diving because I feel that ‘buddies’ on the dive charters here provide a false sense of security - they’re out of reach, not paying attention, or poorly qualified. Maybe this is a generalization, but it’s also my life and safety. Plus the added bonus of absolute freedom. That said, I am learning from all of you and am taking this seriously.

 

[halocline]

I would just find some very shallow, pool-like conditions to practice in. Maybe you can find a partner who is also interested in solo diving to practice with. Basically, one diver would watch the other do things like switch mask, deploy alternate air source, maybe remove gear to simulate entanglement, etc.... all in very easy shallow conditions.

Just get more solid with skills and more confident in your ability to problem solve under water, then at some point when you're ready you can take a course. I would lean more towards the technical agencies than the PADI course, but that's just my opinion.

 

[Olariuas]

Rule #1 - Don't talk about solo diving with divers who've never done it.

This is exactly what few divers I met in real life told me about it. Even if you start to have nice debate some opinions can't be changed because of buddy-system-better-than-solo and you will have higher interests to speak directly with solo divers.

Go to a popular place (such as lake, etc) and notice if some divers do solodiving / or go together for logistic purposes then separate once in water- and do not forget also photographer. Kindly come to them to engage new conversation and make new friends. Honestly I do not have current level for solodiving but all divers I spoke with were talktative and were interested to meet my friend and I another day. Even if they were already solo diving that day.


Now do we have something similar than this wikipedia article ?
Any place where divers do share their tips and advices ?

List of diving hazards and precautions - Wikipedia
Solo diving - Wikipedia

 

[tomfcrist]

Personally I don’t believe there are such things as solo dive skills...so what are you wanting to practice?

Being self reliant is important if you are alone, but is just as important if you are with a buddy or a group.

Most “solo” divers started out diving with instabuddies on charters...as those buddies proved unreliable, they became “same ocean” buddies.

Basically they/we were jaded by the quality of buddies and just started planning to be alone. So really, all you need to add is a redundant air source which my dog could operate reliably.

So what skills exactly do you need to practice that are specific to diving alone?

 

[Schwob]

Navigation is easy to practise and having decent nav skills may matter solo even more then when buddied up. Either way, it's a somewhat good idea to be sure to find that boat again even if it's the first time you dive a place.

 

[Steve_C]

You can always find dive buddies that just like to tag along. I have had several over the years. Then you just conduct your dive as if you are solo and they will follow you. This works assuming the viz is decent and you have skillful buddies.

 

[Olariuas]

So what skills exactly do you need to practice that are specific to diving alone?

I'm more concern to know what kind of risks It's possible to encounter (even if it's rare)
to know their causes and consequences
and to found solutions to prevent and reduce risks.

I'm trying to found some WHAT IF ... and I found it nice to know about it.