Why does everyone say the snorkel is useless?

[DA Aquamaster]

When I am required to have one along, I take a folding model that can be stuffed in a pocket out of sight and out of mind. The only circumstance where one is useful is if you have to do a long surface swim face down when you are out of air.

But even then you still have the option of swimming on your back and with a BP and wing that is more comfortable and equally efficient. It is the single most useless pice of equipment in the dive bag.

 

[ScubaK-Dawg]

If your going to be surface swimming a long way, I guess a snorkel could possibly come in handy, but you still wouldn't catch me using one. I'd probably swim on my back. the diving I do is mainly off a boat, or in a quarry assisting with classes. I usually wear the snorkel when assisting with classes to be a "good" example. I have no use for a snorkel when boat diving, it just gets in the way. I can't imagine any situation where a snorkel would save my life. If I'm lost at sea and the water is that rough where i'd "need" a snorkel, I'd bet it's not gonna do much good. Otherwise if I have a long swim I'd breathe from my reg or swim on my back (if I was out of air in my tanks) to the boat. I can testify that a snorkel can be a major inconvienence though. I dive a long hose, try deploying it with a snorkel on, it will invariably get caught up in your snorkel (it happened the other day when I was with a student on a checkout dive and gettin ready to do the octopus ascent). It also creates drag. Since it is situated right around where my power inflator lies, I've accidently grabbed the snorkel before to dump air and got a mask full of water. It's just another thing to get caught up on a wreck during a dive and create problems. If a snorkel works for you and aids in your surface swims, be all means, use one. I'm trying to stay as simple as I can in my gear configuration, and a snorkel does not fit into my equation.

 

[pw1981]

Please please please do a search and read those threads

BTDT... do you know how many topics come up when you type "snorkel" into the search box? It quits searching at 500.


As to the issues stated above, these are what confuse me:

1. gets caught in your hair
Hair? Mine is less than a half inch long at all times. Not an issue in the least.

2. creates drag
It is ROUND? how much drag can something which allows water to flow freely around it can it create?

3. unneeded on surface swims
I think thats going to be a personal thing. I use mine all the time on surface swims.

4. looks ugly in photographs
I look ugly in photgraphs :11ztongue

5. useless unless snorkeling
It is a snorkel afterall, so when you use it, you are snorkeling, no?

6. assists in ripping your mask off in large surge
Now this represents the only non-opinion reason I have seen in all the snorkel discussions and worth considering.

I was hoping to discover some of the reasons people are against them and I see that most of it seems like big personal preference rather than functional.

 

[Uncle Pug]

Snorkels on scuba divers are very useful... they help you spot the n00bs from a distance.

 

[ScubaK-Dawg]

Snorkels on scuba divers are very useful... they help you spot the n00bs from a distance.

I agree, in all honesty that's probably the most important thing a snorkel is used for, at least in my humble opinion.

 

[Sideband]

I did my first 2 non-training dives today and am ready to ditch it. My inflator hose and snorkel are about the same diameter and are both the corrugated texture. I know I looked like a complete idiot this afternoon as I placed my reg in my mouth, raised the mouthpiece of my snorkel over my head and proceeded to float in place. Later on during the dive I learned why we practice mask clearing. It is for when you try to dump air (supposedly) using your shoulder dump and pull the mask off of your face. As I was spending a lot of time trying to find and stay neutral I grabbed that blasted snorkel first about 10 times at least. Whose freaking idea was it to put it on the same side as your inflator hose anyway?

Joe

 

[diverrick]

I don't usually use a snorkel for diving, but I did have it on, while I tried out a back inflate B.C.once. I found that with the bouyancy device on my back, I rode so low in the water, that it rendered the snorkel useless. At least it did for me. I do however almost always tuck one into a pocket of my BC, or inside the BC against my chest, just in case I have to float around in a face down position for a long period of time. So far I have never had to do that, and hope I never do. I simply swim on my back, and enjoy the weather if I have to surface swim, or like the others said, use my reg.

 

[Al Mialkovsky]

Snorkels on scuba divers are very useful... they help you spot the n00bs from a distance.

So true. Today after my OWD classes final checkouts I went out with my wife for a fun dive. My snorkle promptly was tossed into the back of the truck along with a wad of used chewing gum and once again I felt free.

I have a little roll up snorkle that bends so much that when I swim it isn't very noticable, but for snorkling it sucks.

But why would anyone want to be a surface dweller anyhow??

 

[NewportDiving]

I agree with you they are very valuable, I have been diving a long time and I went with out my snorkel for the very first time on my last dive and will NEVER go without it again. I came up from the boat about 150 yards away and only 700 lbs of air and the current pushing at me and I tried to swim on my back towards the boat but it is hard to tell if your heading right for the boat so to say I was face down most of the time, I was getting a little worried as I was running out of air trying to get back to the boat, anyway I made it to the boat. Also I do like using them when making a dive where I have to find the right spot to go down on (in clear water) and not waist air.

 

[O2BBubbleFree]

OK, so I'm a, what was it? Noob?

On a surface swim, long or short, I’d rather have my face in the water. Better than a sunburn, and who knows? Maybe a really cool fish will pass by... Or I’ll spot that surfacing diver before he bonks me.

And I’ve never felt it got in the way while under the surface.

But that’s just my humble opinion. And I don’t care what others think of me. I’m not diving to impress the old timers.

The first thing I learned on this board is that with a 3 minute search you can find 30 people adamantly against your favorite piece of gear, no matter what it is.