Safety Equipment - Not really covered in OW course

[Banyan]

This is an awesome board and I appreciate everyone's response - it looks like most of y'all are saying yes (ha ha), I should have all this stuff (except the float).


So, it looks like I'll be making another trip to the LDS before I fly out. Since it's going to be rainy, I think the flashlight is a good idea. During my OW dives, I did see people getting stuck in kelp, so I don't know why I didn't already go out and buy a knife. But I can see how a knife could be really crucial. A whistle might be useful to get your buddy's attention, maybe? If not the boat, and it's cheap, so I might as well get that. And the dye, and maybe a sausage without the spool, for now.

Since you're a new diver on a vacation dive, I would say the priorities are the safety sausage and some sort of cutting tool. If you have enough time to learn how to shoot a DSMB from depth before your trip, that's great and you can get a reel as well. You can seriously injure yourself shooting a bag if the line gets entangled around your gear or arm and sends you up fast. Being able to inflate the sausage once you're at the surface is much better than nothing.

A lot of BCs have a small whistle attached to the inflator hose with a quick tie, which may be the case with your rental BC.

A cutting tool is just kinda standard. I personally started with trauma shears in a sheath and then added a small knife. People are free to get the leg machetes you see some divers strut around with, but should be aware that they may be required to use that giant blade around kelp or line entangled around their regulator first stage, which would be a tricky maneuver considering all the hoses.

I find a small backup light increases my enjoyment because I get to peek around in dark holes, but I wouldn't consider it absolutely necessary. Even I don't have that complete list; a mirror has been on my "things I need to buy" list for over a year now. It really all depends on your degree of risk tolerance and how much gear you want to carry that you may never need. I might use my DSMB and small light every dive, and find often some fishing line on the bottom that I decide to clean up using my knife, so those are no-brainers for me. Everything else is dependent on how I judge the risk of a particular dive and what I think the appropriate safety measures are.

What didn't occur to me before I started the PADI course was that diving is a really expensive hobby. Is there such thing as a poor diver? Including the course and the gear I have so far, I think I've spent around $900 in the last month.

All divers are poor because they've spent all their money on gear. You'd shudder to learn what people who get into underwater photography or technical diving spend.

 

[gsk3]

I consider the minimum to be:

• A 6-foot SMB. Little 3 foot jobbies are great for all sorts of things, but not for signaling the boat.
• Either a air horn (Dive Alert) or a signal mirror
• Cutting tool (if I had to pick only one I'd pick shears or a Z-knife)

A spool is extremely helpful as well, but I tried to keep the minimum list to a minimum . I would go with a spool over a reel, as reels are bulky and hard to work without training.

The reason for the air horn or signal mirror is to signal the boat when drifting away from it. That seems to be the most common scenario when people drift--they can see the boat for a while, but can't get the boat to pay attention.

If you're diving at night, you'll likely have a good light on you anyway to signal with. A strobe might not be a bad idea either.

And yeah, diving is expensive. If you're in CA you're a lot luckier than most, in that you've got world-class diving right at your doorstep.

 

[Edward3c]

I just got certified and already have trips planned for the Caribbean, Florida, and Thailand. I noticed that a lot of people here dive equipped with lots of different safety gear. A lot of this is unfamiliar to me as it wasn't really covered in OW course. How necessary is all this stuff if I'm diving with a guide (e.g., lights, whistle, float, sausage, flag, dye, knife, etc.)??? Is the larger stuff (i.e. float) provided by the boats and guide?

Also, is this something covered in advanced OW classes or something you just need to figure out on your own (e.g, using a reel with an SMB)? I'm getting nervous just thinking about it. I don't plan on doing anything crazy and want to be conservative, but I know for sure that the island I'm heading to next week is going to be rainy with t-storms.

I think is a very good question as it emphasises the situation for most new divers (any agency) and more so for potential divers. How do you learn what you don't know when you don't know it?

For commercial based recreational diver training, each additional skill is an income stream so if it doesn't have to be taught (for safety reasons) in the foundation level course it wont. Navigation, surface marker buoy or deep diving are additional courses. Nothing wrong, it allows individuals to pick-and-mix to suit their needs.

A club based recreational diver training approach is different in that individuals pay a membership fee to join a club and most training is then free (or run at cost). For example BSAC [1] include Nitrox, basic navigation and simple rescue in their foundation course. This is because we want new divers to integrate into the club's diving as soon as possible.

Regards

[1] British Sub Aqua Club

 

[cocoajoe]

Never, ever dive off a boat w/o a saftey sausage. At the very least, you can inflate it on the surface.....it will 'lay down' on you but you can still hold it up in the vertical.

 

[adurso]

A big honking knife is always appropriate....

 

[PhuketPaul]

Hi,

• Cutting Device - I use a combination knife and shears - I use the shears far more than the knife, but very rarely in an emergency situation, usually to open fish traps in protected parks, or on occasion to cut anchor lines when I have seen boats drop their anchors directly on the reef, and I want to stop it dragging across the reef and doing untold damage
• DSMB + reel or spool - I would never dive in a popular dive site without these, 2 uses; Firstly to show boats that there are divers surfacing to prevent you getting run over, and secondly so that your boat can find you!
• Light - Carried on every dive, for looking under rocks, or inside wrecks, but also useful for signalling the boat in dull weather, most modern LED lights have a strobe mode too
• Other Signalling Device - I carry a whistle (it's always been attached to my BCD, and I have used it on many occasions to try and signal the boat, but very rarely if ever is it ever heard!! And I carry a skystreme (An inflateable radar reflecting kite, that ways almost nothing) but I have never used this yet

Paul

 

[Diver0001]

One thing to keep in mind is that safety equipment can be rendered useless unless you're using it correctly.

Even something like a knife can be stowed in several places on your body and can have different loops or lanyards attached to them so you don't drop them while you're using it. Where is best for you and where should you *never* stow your knife?

I wouldn't get too up-tight about all the different possibilities. The majority of "safety" items are actually just gizmos or gimmickry to get people to buy gear they don't need by playing into fears. I'm one of those divers who believes that you should take the minimum amount of gear with you on your dives. Decide what to take (like Lynne said) based on what you think you might need on a given dive.

That said, there is one thing I would recommend having on every dive, namely a knife, and a few things that you should have on every dive where there is a risk of being swept offshore and/or away from the boat:

- a (closed system) DSMB and spool (not a reel, a spool)
- a signalling mirror (excellent for signalling when it's not dark)
- a small flashlight (excellent for signalling in the dark)
- a compass

And once again a bit of practice using them *before* you really need it is essential.

R..

 

[Agility]

Could somebody be so kind as to explain the difference between spool and reel to a non native speaker, they both traslate to the same word in German

 

[gsk3]

Spool:


Reel:

 

[D_B]

A reel has a wind up handle and is more complex than a spool that is just a cylindar ... Reels & Spools : Tech Diving Limited, a subsidiary of Scuba Training and Technology Inc.