Underwater navigation

[wcl]

Being a newbie to SCUBA, I have started my AOW, but my instructor dive masters and does the servicing for a dive resort in Rotan, and will be there for a month. On land, I have a pretty good sense of direction, but under water my sense of direction kinda stinks. Any tips? Would appreciate any helpful hints.
Lips

Hi,

All the tips here are good. The key is practice. Two things I found really helped:

1. Do nav practice in middling to low vis (But be careful, of course! Don't get lost in challenging vis!). I got better at compass navigation rapidly in the local quarry, doing decently long swims in lowish vis to find objects at known and well-defined headings, in a relatively controlled and safe environment (as long as you can at least keep a straight line, you can always swim to some edge and get out ...).

2. Do your own navigation checks on guided dives. Best time to practice is trying to keep track of navigation when you are following someone else. You have reasonable assurance of not getting lost if you don't get it right (at least one hopes the guide is capable), and the backup of having a shot of knowing where you are if your guide somehow loses it (our DM once had a sticking compass ... we were able to help that situation! Good to be self-reliant).


Cheers,
Walter

 

[mccabejc]

I know folks tend to focus on the directional/compasses part of the equation, but in my experience that's the easy part. The real challenge is the "distance travelled" part, figuring out your realtive postion at any point in the dive. Especially in low viz. You can count kick cycles, which in my view is pretty much useless ("Wow, look at that bat ray...hey, wait, was that 53 or 63 kicks?? DAMN !!!"), or you can check your time at a particular heading (easier, but start/stops can throw you way off). If viz is good enough that you can go by landmarks then you're lucky.

In my view, if you can draw a mental map in your head of your location, either by judging distance travelled at each heading, or by time travelled, or whatever works, you'll be much better off. It might save you the 40 minute surface swim we had yesterday due to being way off course.

But then again, take this with a grain of salt. You probably should listen to the advice of someone who is a GOOD navigator

 

[Mishelle]

I am going for my AOW also, and this is a conern of mine. I guess, just like I was worried about having to do free flow breathing underwater, I will get it! It just takes some time and some patience! Good Luck!

 

[suthnbelle]

Being a newbie to SCUBA, I have started my AOW, but my instructor dive masters and does the servicing for a dive resort in Rotan, and will be there for a month. On land, I have a pretty good sense of direction, but under water my sense of direction kinda stinks. Any tips? Would appreciate any helpful hints.
Lips

Until I get a lot better at u/w navigating I make sure to hold my elbows close to my sides so the compass stays level. After yesterday's dive I realize navigating is something I need to work on everytime I'm in the water...not just when I need to get to a specific point.

 

[Fishlips_1]

Thanks to all.
Hopefully it will come with time
Lips

 

[RIDIVER501]

Practice with your compass. You can even do this on land. Once you have a good handle on how your compass works and you trust it your nav will get better

 

[Fishlips_1]

I guess my biggest problem is not realizing the amount of travel in short/long strokes vursus (?) long or short steps which I've taken forever. I will just have too work on that. I'm thinking of taking a 100' rope and swim along the line for a tank or so and figure out an average time/kick count. This should work, yes?
Lips

 

[diver_paula]

Don't forget about natural navigation.

One poster in this thread mentioned the sand ripples being parallel to the shore. Other types of natural navigation include depth, direction of current, the time of day / what direction the sun's rays are hitting the water as well as what direction shadows are falling across the water's top. If it's a dive site you are familiar with, what does the bottom look like at different spots - large rocks, small rocks, sand, lots of plant or sea life, etc.?

If you are on a shipwreck dive - what directon do the metal plates of the ship's hul run? What direction do the beams of a wooden ship run? How is a typical ship built? (i.e. Rudder in the back, anchors in the front, captain's wheel, bilge pump, engine room location, etc.)

Navigation can be fun and will become second nature with time and practice.

Paula

 

[Diver Dennis]

Another thing to consider is drift. If there is a current you have to compensate for moving in the direction of the current even though you stay on the same heading. I think I might take a refresher course myself.

 

[talskeddy]

try
http://www.ukdivers.net/diving/uwnav.htm
for a decent set of instructions for navigation