Definition of a loggable dive

[Sam Miller III]

Regarding logging dives -

Some how I am reminded of the last sentence uttered by Clark Gable in the classic movie
~~~~~~~~~~ Gone with the Wind ~~~~~~~~~~~
"Frankly my dear I don't give a damn"

SDM

 

[Lorenzoid]

Agree w/ all folks who say log as you wish.

For example, I logged a dive that lasted all of 6 minutes.

Local boat dive to Aumentos Rock in Monterey, dropped in to ~ 50 feet, couldn't see my hand at arms length (red tide). Did the 1 minute lost buddy search, then a slow ascent & SS, all with gauges right in front of my eyes, the only way I could barely read them.

I figured that 6 minute dive was more challenging and exercised more of my skills than any of the hour long dives Ive had.

Definitely worth logging. And not inconsistent with what I thought was the best definition in this thread:

I think it would take a long time to formally define a dive, but common sense suggests that it's a sequence of steps that 1) starts with the descend, 2) proceeds to achieve a certain meaningful dive goal/purpose 3) ends up with the ascend and a surface interval.

You began with a descent, proceeded toward achieving some goal or purpose, but aborted the dive before you achieved it. That's a clear conclusion to a dive. It was worthwhile to log it regardless of how relatively few minutes the dive lasted in relation to what was planned. It was "a dive."

 

[TheCoolBeans]

Personally I’m more focussed on cumulative dive time than quantity of dives

 

[Scuba-74]

You began with a descent, proceeded toward achieving some goal or purpose, but aborted the dive before you achieved it. That's a clear conclusion to a dive. It was worthwhile to log it regardless of how relatively few minutes the dive lasted in relation to what was planned. It was "a dive."

Agreed. If you proceeded towards the goal but something outside your control prevented you from achieving it, it is a dive nevertheless.

 

[Blackcrusader]

del

 

[TMHeimer]

Personally I’m more focussed on cumulative dive time than quantity of dives

Agree. If you dive regularly and accumulate at ton of dives you will also have a very meaningful total dive time. I I average only a tad over 30 mins. per dive but on my next dive I'll pass 400 hours.

 

[martincohn]

I’m looking for a definitive “authoritative” answer to a question we’re debating. What constitutes a “dive”?

Your log your rules

 

[potato cod]

I don't know how to define a logged dive, but like pornography, I'll know it when I sea it. (Like what I did there?)

But seriously, I tend to log anything in the open water, even if it is short if I learned something. And short dives pretty much always have some interesting reason for being short. Case in point: Dive 200.

Dive 200 was a night dive on Osprey Reef, some 230 km off the coast of Australia. The late afternoon dive had been a shark attraction dive, so there were several reef sharks in the water when my husband and I and couple hilarious Aussie guys splashed. Also, it was raining so there was no moonlight. The water was like driving in a snowstorm with loads of organic particles and we never managed the not-completely-straightforward navigation to the reef. Instead, we got pushed WAY off the the dive site in the current during the time it took us to realize we weren't going to find the site and do a safety stop. Okay, that safety stop wasn't really necessary, but we did one to be, well, safe. It was a liveaboard and we were logging lots of bottom time. We surfaced after maybe 12 or 15 minutes (I'd have to go back to check--and I can because I logged it), and roughly a quarter to a third of a mile from the boat. We signaled the boat, they signaled back, and they already had the zodiac in the water to pick us up. It's the only time I've had to be hauled out of the ocean. When I got onboard, I joked about how I, as the only woman was the last one "rescued" and how that was a memorable 200th dive. The DM tried to convince me I didn't have to count it because it was less than 20 minutes, but my reaction was "hell, no. I'm counting it." I learned some things and it was super memorable--carried out to sea on a stormy night in shark-infested waters.

 

[Neilwood]

Agree w/ all folks who say log as you wish.

For example, I logged a dive that lasted all of 6 minutes.

Local boat dive to Aumentos Rock in Monterey, dropped in to ~ 50 feet, couldn't see my hand at arms length (red tide). Did the 1 minute lost buddy search, then a slow ascent & SS, all with gauges right in front of my eyes, the only way I could barely read them.

I figured that 6 minute dive was more challenging and exercised more of my skills than any of the hour long dives Ive had.

I have a similar dive in my log.

It was my 13th dive and first boat dive (as part of my AOW). We signalled to descend, and I lost them about 1.5m down. I continued descending until about 9m (as per the plan), looked about (as far as I could in 2ft vis) and proceeded to surface. Turns out my buddy had an issue with his drysuit and never descended. We agreed on the basis of my report that doing a proper dive was a waste of time and effort as well as potentially dangerous (the only way to know the boats location was by sound).

Definitely worth logging as you learn a hell of a lot on dives like this.

 

[mafi]

Personally I’m more focussed on cumulative dive time than quantity of dives

I agree with you, but this gets more complicated with tech dives. There, the number of times you went through the whole hassle of planning the dive and preparing makes more difference than how much time you spent hanging at 6m