Who actually used a "safety sausage"

[Rubis]

Used in every drift dive except in the St Lawrence, where I use the eddies to come back to the boat, so no need for the boat to pick me up.
I always have one except in a cave.

 

[JimC]

I carry one every dive I do in OW. I use one almost as often.

 

[Scubaroo]

Used one in Fiji recently - drift dive turned nasty and we popped up about 100 yards from the boat in current. Here's the one I used:

http://www.scubaroo.com.au/images/catalog/smb_in_use.jpg

 

[paolov]

i carry one all the time, at times i carry two sausages. I can tell you i have used two sausages a couple of times.

In some places here, every group has to have one sausage, especially where there is high traffic of small and large boats.

training to use sausage and bring one at all times (on locations) where there are high traffic, and undercurrents are very much recommended.

 

[donacheson]

I'm reading a thread about the best place to secure a safety sausage to your bc and I got to thinking. :06: I've done many dives and have never actually seen someone use one. I am SURE there are divers out there who have needed to use one.

Fill me in.

Tell me what type of circumstance required the use of the sausage. What happened? What would you do to prevent it?Also, what was the result.

Add one more user to your list.

The circumstances? Pretty much like many others - surfacing well away from the liveaboard/chase boat. It's an attention-getter when there's someone looking for divers on the surface. Combined with a a big "O" formed by clasping one's hands overhead and a similar response from the boat, it's reassuring to everyone.

 

[String]

Assuming "safety sausage" == DSMB then i use one on roughly 95% of my dives. Its incredibly rare to have boats anchored or return to shot lines after dives and nearly all dives end by a diver popping up a DSMB and doing their deco under it, when they surface boat is waiting for them.

For a drift dive you can use a DSMB OR a proper SMB inflated on the surface (tend to be bigger, more spherical things).

Once ive surfaced and the boat wasnt where it should have been so we had to wave our markers - the surface cover had been following what they thought were our bubbles but had gone north instead of south leaving them over 1/2 mile away.

 

[Stevtt]

Carry one all the time in the ocean and seen them used quite a bit in West Palm. I actually think the yellow is hard to see and prefer orange.

 

[No Fish]

I'm glad this was posted. I told my boyfriend we needed to get one of these this past weekend and he said no, because "we would just have to avoid putting ourselves in a situation where we would actually need one"... :shakehead

(Some men think they know better)

You should get one anyway, and practice using it too. I have used mine many times and have seen a couple times where folks have drifted off and let me tell you.....They wanted one when we finally picked them up. They are a must for any drift or river diving. I guess if your boyfriend only dives in a pool .........

 

[ScubaJW]

That is my question too, I am curious if it is necessary. I think that it is enough that I have a "Diver Below" float.

 

[detroit diver]

With no intentions of hi-jacking the thread, which color is preferrable, red or neon yellow???? BTW, mine is always attached to my BC.

Do you mean it's attached for storage, or when you're actually using it?