Diving Communications

[readlaura]

Hi,
Im woking on a project which concerns improving underwater communications. I would be very grateful if you could take some time to help me out by answering some questions and describing how you communicate underwater.

What is your primary communication method whilst diving?
What are you mostly communicating about underwater?
Does it involve long streams of communication (such as speech) or short set communications (such as hand gestures)?
Do you use any additional equipment to aid communication?
Does this equipment integrate well with the primary diving equipment?
What advantages and disadvantages do you find with your primary forms of communications?
Are you communicating with other divers or people on the surface?
How much training did the primary form of communication take for you to become proficient in it?

Any other information that you think may be relevant to the topic will be greatly appreciated. If you are interested in the aim of the project, I can either email you with prototypes and concepts if you provide me with your email or I will put them up on here if it is possible.

Thanks!

 

[Storker]

What is your primary communication method whilst diving?
Hand signals

What are you mostly communicating about underwater?
"OK? OK!", "Up/down", "What's your tank pressure?", "Let's go that way", "Come here!", "Look!"

Does it involve long streams of communication (such as speech) or short set communications (such as hand gestures)?
See (1). Besides, it's quite a relief to get underwater and away from the blabbing

Do you use any additional equipment to aid communication?
A slate

Does this equipment integrate well with the primary diving equipment?
Sure. I hang it on my BCD, and it integrates very well with all the other stuff that's dangling from it

What advantages and disadvantages do you find with your primary forms of communications?
Advantages: To the point and otherwise it's quiet.
Disadvantages: Relies on a set of signals, so if there's anything unforeseen or requiring more elaborate communication, it has to wait until we surface. Or we can do it on the slate.

Are you communicating with other divers or people on the surface?
Um, how should we do that?

How much training did the primary form of communication take for you to become proficient in it?
Learned it in OW class, been practicing regularly since then.

 

[TSandM]

What is your primary communication method whilst diving? I have a hierarchy of communication. Basic, expected things are communicated with light signals. "Okay? Look at me. Go this way." There is a limited repertoire of things that can be conveyed with the lights, so other things are done with hand signals. "I'm cold. Let's move up to 40 feet. Where's the *&^%ing BOAT?" If hand signals do not suffice, I carry a set of wetnotes in my pocket. If the wetnotes have to come out, it's often a sign that the dive should be ended, because we are simply not on the same page (so to speak).

What are you mostly communicating about underwater? See above . . . Most of the communication is procedural (go this way, move up or go down, turn the dive) or related to pointing out something interesting to my buddy.

Does it involve long streams of communication (such as speech) or short set communications (such as hand gestures)? All short set. As above, if the dive requires long streams of communication, something has gone very much awry, and its probably time to think about going home.

Do you use any additional equipment to aid communication? I carry wetnotes. I have probably had to get them out less than a dozen times in the last 7 years.

Does this equipment integrate well with the primary diving equipment? They ride in my pocket. Unobtrusive, and easily deployed when needed.

What advantages and disadvantages do you find with your primary forms of communications? Advantages are that they are simple and reliable. Disadvantages are that any complex or terribly unexpected ideas become a little more cumbersome to convey.

Are you communicating with other divers or people on the surface? Primarily with other divers. The only communication I ever do with people on the surface is to send up a marker buoy to alert the boat to where my team is ascending.

How much training did the primary form of communication take for you to become proficient in it? Light signals were pretty simple to pick up. Hand signals were easy to learn, but it took time to learn to do them slowly and clearly, and it took time to get good at decoding signals from other people.

 

[DivemasterDennis]

Debbie and I communicate by gestures, some common some our own, and secondarily buy slate. We communicate most about observations, calling the other's attention to them, and continuously communicate regarding air supply and ndl time as well as each other's comfort and fatigue level, more so as the dive progresses. We don't use specialequipment, but are thinking that sometime we may give full face masks with verbal communication capabilioty a try. I'll be monitoring this thread to read comments about those things.
DivemasterDennis

 

[3D diver]

Storker pretty much sums it up.

Only other communication method's I'd mention are the frantic waving of lights, tank bang, and foot or hand blow to the buddy.

FWIW: A couple of buddies have experimented with beepers, crickets, and horns lately, and I never heard any of them.

 

[Trace Malinowski]

What is your primary communication method whilst diving? Light signals

What are you mostly communicating about underwater? Team position and status

Does it involve long streams of communication (such as speech) or short set communications (such as hand gestures)? Short sets

Do you use any additional equipment to aid communication? Diver's notebook

Does this equipment integrate well with the primary diving equipment? Yes, it is kept in a cargo pocket in the wetsuit or drysuit.

What advantages and disadvantages do you find with your primary forms of communications? The advantage of using light signals is that they may be projected in front of a diver. Buddies do not need to face each other to communicate. Having the lights on provides a way of referencing team position as well. The disadvantage is that there are only 3 basic light signals and then we must use secondary hand signals, or tertiary written notes.

Are you communicating with other divers or people on the surface? Primarily other divers. We can communicate with the surface by deploying different color markers. An orange marker generally provides our position for pick-up by a boat. A yellow marker means we have a situation that requires surface help.

How much training did the primary form of communication take for you to become proficient in it? Just a few minutes to learn the light signals. It takes several dives to learn how to enjoy the dive while maintaining awareness of light signals.

 

[GrimSleeper]

What is your primary communication method whilst diving?
Light and hand signals

What are you mostly communicating about underwater?
Light signals are very basic - 'OK?' 'Look here.' 'Go that way.' 'Aaargh it's all gone wrong!'
There is a fairly comprehensive set of standardized hand signals, which allow us to, for example, tell each other our gas pressures, deco status, or describe in more detail how it's all gone wrong (eg. you have bubbles coming from your isolator valve, I have somehow wrapped the guideline around my own head, we have no idea where we are, have we?).
There are also non-standard but (fairly) obvious hand signals that can be used to communicate things like 'Ooh, look, a shark.' 'Ooh, look, a big shark.' 'Yikes! Enormous *&%$ing shark!' Etc.

Does it involve long streams of communication (such as speech) or short set communications (such as hand gestures)?
Short set, unless my regular buddy and I are bored on long deco hangs, in which case we confuse each other by spelling out conversations using the British Sign Language alphabet.

Do you use any additional equipment to aid communication?
Wet notes - a notebook made from waterproof paper.

Does this equipment integrate well with the primary diving equipment?
Notebook sits in a cargo pocket until I need it.

What advantages and disadvantages do you find with your primary forms of communications?
Advantages: quick and to the point. If communication needs to be more complicated, the odds are the dive's gone too far wrong for communicating to be any help right now.
Disadvantages: can be a bit time-consuming/frustrating getting people to repeat hand signals, only this time with their black-gloved hand held out and away from their black wetsuit. And if you forget or misread some of the BSLan signals, conversations can get a bit surreal... Oh, and wet notes sit in a cargo pocket until I need them, at which point I discover that I've lost the pencil again.

Are you communicating with other divers or people on the surface?
Other divers. Comms with the surface are limited to firing a lift bag, so available messages are essentially 'Here I am, I'm on the way up,' or 'Oops. Something unspecified has gone wrong, but at least one of us hasn't died yet.'

How much training did the primary form of communication take for you to become proficient in it?
Very little. Most of the signals are sufficiently self-explanatory that one can cover the basics with a new diver in the course of a briefing. As Trace says above, it's actually getting comfortable enough in the water to NOTICE signals that takes most people a little time.

 

[snowdog]

There’s not much else that really needs to be added....
But I must say, someone gave my wife one of those underwater maracas, and she is always staking it, even when there’s nothing to communicate and I’m next to her……. “Chicken Little”

 

[HowardE]

My answer depends on whom I'm diving with, and what kind of diving I'm doing.

What is your primary communication method whilst diving?
1 Recreational diving / Instruction: Slate or hand signals
2 Diving with my regular dive buddy: "regulator talk"
3 Working dives: Hardwired or wireless communications with full face mask or helmeted divers.

What are you mostly communicating about underwater?
1 Instructional items, look at the fish
2 penetration points on a wreck, dive plans, lunch, shoot that fish, anything.
3 work stuff: dig here, send me a wrench, etc.

Does it involve long streams of communication (such as speech) or short set communications (such as hand gestures)?
1 No - mostly short set.
2 Sometimes
3 yes long streams of communication

Do you use any additional equipment to aid communication?
1 Sometimes
2 Maybe a slate or a light
3 yes, communication systems on boat and on diver

Does this equipment integrate well with the primary diving equipment?
1 Slate on wrist or in pocket - yes
2 I'm just talking through my reg, or removing it all together.
3 it's built in What advantages and disadvantages do you find with your primary forms of communications?
1 A disadvantage is Writing is tedious. Advantages are most people read.
2 A disadvantage is Some people can't understand us. Advantage is, most people can talk and hear.
3 Disadvantages are hardwired comms limit your radius of travel from the boat, wireless comms require full face mask. Advantages are full duplex communication in clear language.

Are you communicating with other divers or people on the surface?
1. Divers
2. Divers
3. Divers and/or Surface

How much training did the primary form of communication take for you to become proficient in it?
1. None
2. A little practice, no formal training.
3. Training with the full face mask and/or hard hat requires a little time, but it wasn't rocket science compared to regular diving.

 

[readlaura]

Thanks for all your help guys! It seems the main issues are when you need to communicate something that isn't a set phrase. How do you get people's attention when there is an emergency then?

HowardE, what are you doing when you are using a full face mask (what work are you doing?)? How do you find using one? What are the issues with it? Can you only communicate to other people who are wearing one?