Shooting a bag in AOW

My wife and I just got back from the first two dives in our AOW class. Learned to shoot a bag both kneeling on the bottom and while neutral in mid-water. While practicing the former skill, I somehow managed to get the line wrapped around my primary reg. It was a bit unnerving, particularly since I did not notice until my wife/buddy pointed it out and untangled me. Nothing bad happened, as the bag was not yet inflated, but we're doing the final two dives of the course as wreck dives off the Jersey coast and if it happens there it would not be so good!

Is this kind of thing common? I've read a decent bit about shooting bags in the last few hours, and the big problem people talk about seems to be with the reel not unspooling properly.

Do people normally learn to shoot bags in AOW? It wasn't listed in the course materials. Not that I'm complaining; it's been the most interesting/challenging part of the course so far.

Its up to the instructor and its a great skill to have.

With my certifying agency it's part of the AOW (equivalent) curriculum.

Anyway depending on the type of diving you do it's a great skill to have if you keep it up.

If you're going to do alot of wreckdiving this will become (or needs to become) bread and butter. Depending on the location and dive you'll be either doing an ascend on the anchor line or you'll be doing a free drifting ascend.

In case 1 you need this skill as a backup in case you miss the anchor line, in case 2 it's your normal operating procedure.

In the beginning it's not an easy skill to learn... specifically if you are deploying your SMB not from the bottom or wreck but while ascending or neutral in the watercolumn. You'll need to be aware of your buyancy while you are temporarily pre-occupied with something else (deploying your SMB).

Depending on the system you'll use and the way you dive (I'm assuming with buddy since you're OW) some tips:
- Make sure you are neutral to very slightly negative
- Keep an eye on your bottomtimer/computer to see if you are still neutral or plan with your buddy predive (you should decide anyway who will deploy the SMB) that he'll keep neutral so he can act as a reference.
- While deploying your smb don't waste time... the quicker you can do the better. Practice makes perfect... I did it 20 times before I was a bit proficient... and even then I need to keep doing it regularly or I become rusty.
- If using a reel make absolutely sure that it's in no way attached to you, so if it blocks you can just let go... instead of it dragging you up.
- If using a fingerspool make sure your fingers don't get stuck (happened to me once with thick gloves)
- Some people use a small leadweight attached to a length of rope attached to the SMB. When deploying they will just drop the weight and deploy... however this limits you to the depth at which you can deploy and could cause an entanglement hazard (rope getting entangled at your legs)...
- The deeper you deploy the less air needs to be in the SMB and the easier it is (both from buyancy pov and deploying pov).
-When inflating the SMB (doesn't matter if you do it by mouth, regulator or inflator hose) simultanously breath out to keep neutral (specially if you deploy relatively shallow)
- You can have a big discussion about what kind of reel you should use or what kind of SMB. Imo what's important is that it's not cheap plastic, that it has a overpressure valve and that it's closed or has a 'neck' in it that keeps it from deflating if it drops.

Good luck with practice!

I teach it as a part of my AOW and wreck courses.

pir8:

Its up to the instructor and its a great skill to have.

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I figured as much on both counts. Was just curious how common it was. I would guess it's more common up here than in the Caribbean. We were a bit surprised and very pleased to have learned it. I imagine our next few practice dives in the quarry will be mostly occupied with mastering the skill....

beester:

With my certifying agency it's part of the AOW (equivalent) curriculum.

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Out of random curiousity, which agency is that?

We did not learn this skill in our OW or AOW. It was mentioned in class, but not done on our dives.

we did it in intro to tech (tdi). i was so cold...

JoyfulNoise:

We did not learn this skill in our OW or AOW. It was mentioned in class, but not done on our dives.

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Thanks for chiming in. I'm starting to develop a sense that people who dive in the Northeast tend to learn the skill in AOW or fairly early on, whereas those in more tropical locations (you're in Florida, it appears) don't. I'm curious about Seattle or California, where it's cold but shore dives tend to be the norm....

It's probably quite unusual to see "shooting an upline" taught in an AOW course.

DMs in the Carib need to know the skill for drift diving.

And tech divers who go into deco and run the risk of losing the downline or anchor line also need to know it.

Other than that, you would probably never need to know it.

Note that SMBs are more often used these days, rather than "bags."

Bags are for lifing heavy objects off the bottom, such as boat motors or bicycles.

As far as AOW goes, the most appropriate skills for that course would be navigation, search and recovery (in which case you really use a real bag), night diving, deep diving to the limits of recreational scuba, nitrox, and photography. Gear maintenance is also a commonly taught and quite useful AOW segment.

Often times, you can talk to your instructor and tell him/her what topics you are interested in for an AOW course.

I'm starting to develop a sense that people who dive in the Northeast tend to learn the skill in AOW or fairly early on, whereas those in more tropical locations (you're in Florida, it appears) don't.

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You are painting with an awfully broad brush. Anyone who intends to dive the east coast of Florida will be well served to make sure to include this skill in their AOW since it's all drift diving. Since most all Floridians would make sure to dive around Palm Beach - some of the best diving in the state IMHO - it's fairly common to learn deploying a bag early on.

Later,

Willem