Will I look stupid with a DAN safety sausage?

[bbarada]

Bigger is always better!

 

[Doc]

The size debate being settled...

The single most important thing is to learn to deploy it from a 20' depth and not blowing your safety stop. Not as easy as it may sound.

OMS sold me an 8' model. Sometimes I take a 3' instead. Conditions dictate.

If you don't know how to deploy it from depth, it's just an ornament. I've seen a lot of ornaments.

 

[DandyDon]

If you don't know how to deploy it from depth, it's just an ornament. I've seen a lot of ornaments.

It's best to be able to deploy it from the safety stop without problems, however - if you're lost on the surface, it'll also help you with being found.

I also carry a PLB in a dive canister, and I wear a snorkel vest boarding the boat. No, I don't care what people think.

 

[Pedro Burrito]

I'm going to be diving in GCM and Belize next month. I have the DAN safety sausage, and a somewhat smaller one. My hesitation in using the DAN one is that not only is it kind of big, I get the feeling in certain dive spots that people are wondering just what I expect to go wrong that would require a sausage that might (possibly) be visible from any near Earth orbit. (E.g. this kind of sausage is overkill when you're doing the Catalina dive park...)

Is the typical boat diving on GCM such that this kind of sausage is way overkill and I should use my regular (still large) but not over the top sausage? Or are currents/other events a reasonable possibility in GCM and in fact I won't look quite as dumb with it as I fear? (If you want to chime in for the same question diving in AC in Belize, including the Blue Hole, please do so.)

I've taken my DAN SMB everywhere I've gone diving, including the quarry. I had to deploy it twice in Cozumel. After the boat crew saw me, I used it to prop my feet up while I relaxed and waited for the boat.

 

[chillyinCanada]

Dandy, what's with the snorkel vest?

 

[Scared Silly]

My feeling is that as long as the gear does not make yer butt look big yer good to go.

 

[DandyDon]

Dandy, what's with the snorkel vest?

It's my personal choice, as I float better with it than without it - and there is always a chance of me falling off of a boat or it sinking. Very few boaters worry about such, and the death counts show that.

My feeling is that as long as the gear does not make yer butt look big yer good to go.

It makes my ass look bigger probably, but I don't care.

 

[chillyinCanada]

Dandy, it just never ceases to amaze me that you've been able to become a scuba diver, even wanted to be in the first place and simetimes even that you are zble to leave your house.

 

[DandyDon]

Dandy, it just never ceases to amaze me that you've been able to become a scuba diver, even wanted to be in the first place and simetimes even that you are zble to leave your house.

Eh, sometimes I shudder thinking about all the dumb actions I've survived over the years. It's just logical to wear some sort of floatation aid boarding a small boat or riding any moving boat, but most don't - and I didn't for decades, but do now. I once boarded a boat in Roatan that was going to cross the channel twice with no life vests on board, so I grabbed some from my usual dive boat - and others thought that odd, like boats never sink and people never fall overboard, right.

 

[Scubagolf]

If you don't know how to deploy it from depth, it's just an ornament. I've seen a lot of ornaments.

I disagree. You should be able to surface safely and then inflate the sausage. Clearly not the best practice, but beyond merely ornamental. I have done this on 2-3 occasions and survived, even wearing split fins!