Interesting thoughts on safe buddies

I went for a charter a few weeks ago which was absolutely awesome... My first in cold water and in an excellent area for scuba. We literally had tropical visibility and could see ripples on the surface from 80ft down! Very nice.

Anyway, I was buddied up with someone who had less experience than myself (about 40 dives for me, 20 for her), but she was keen on scuba and had her PADI advanced (like myself) so we did the dive cautiously and had fun. Over the rest of the weekend we dove together and it was great, as she was very attentive as a buddy, calm underwater, patient about things, and alert. I felt quite safe, or at least as safe as one can be those things considered. She was by no means reckless, had a knife, and attentive enough that I felt I had a "buddy" while underwater.

During a night dive, however, I buddied up with someone else, as only a few of us were interested in going out. He was a PADI divemaster with over 200 dives, so I figured that would be great for me... I'd only done 2 night dives before. He brought his camera with him which was an expensive rig, and was intent on taking photos. Once underwater however, he completely ignored the rest of us and would constantly swim back to photograph something then catch up five minutes later, disappear off behind things, etc., etc. I kept an eye on him (he was definitely not doing the same) and did my best to stay in the field of vision of the other divers. Everything went fine, but it struck me as terribly irresponsible behaviour, rescue cert/divemaster or not.

I realize the buddy who only had 20 dives didn't know the particulars of diver rescue, but I still felt much safer with her than the "expert." An interesting thing to find out.

yeah, you have to be careful diving with us camera guys. we often make for bad buddies for the reasons you listed above, but I am surprised he didnt give you a heads up regarding his dive plan vs. what you were expecting.

One thing that makes a good dive buddy is communication. Start that on the boat and find out what your dive plan.. expectations are. If you are not compatible, don't share the same goals for the dive.. find a buddy that is more appropriate so everyone gets the dive they deserve.

Just because someone "assigns" you a buddy.. does not mean you should accept that buddy and dive with them. It is your life, your dive, your holiday and your dollars. I would can a dive before I dived with a few DM's I know!

bowlofpetunias:

One thing that makes a good dive buddy is communication. Start that on the boat and find out what your dive plan.. expectations are.

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+1

Was gonna type the same thing.

I treat EVERY dive as if it were a SOLO dive. The buddy is just there in case I need some air, which I never have, and I consider myself the same, an air carrier in case he/she need some. Nothing else.

IMO the only reason she was acting a good buddy is that she was freshly qualified and was adopting a by-the-book approach.

I dont belive the buddy system works as effectively in unknown buddy senarios. An unknown buddy can check you out and help in case of need but he wont know if you are consuming abnormally or acting funny. He would'nt know your limits or your interests except for that brief chat before the dive.

When I'm on a boat alone I opt to be buddied up as a third men then explain to my buddies I will dive solo and meet at deco. Luckily I always manage to drag a known buddy most of the times which is best of options.

You would'nt call a stranger down the road 'your buddy' so why we do it underwater?

I disagree with that. I'd hope the reason she was being a good buddy is that she had an instructor who required good buddy skills all through training. As for the DM I'm sure if he had not had the camera he'd have been better. Diving with a photog who is really into it is diving solo as far as you are concerned. But if you are a good buddy you can be right there and maybe see things you would not have otherwise. Also a good time to work on your buoyancy, trim, and propulsion skills.

Garrobo:

I treat EVERY dive as if it were a SOLO dive. The buddy is just there in case I need some air, which I never have, and I consider myself the same, an air carrier in case he/she need some. Nothing else.

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I can tell you are not an ocean diver. Diving in the ocean especially drift diving also involves freeing your dive buddy from fishing monofilament line sometimes, freeing your buddy from floatball line entanglements and lift bag line entanglements. I could go on and on but you get the point...

I believe #3 is spot-on. If dive plan is violated underwater words will be exchanged top-side with this diver...That being said, what Jimlap said above is the reality of diving with photobugs....

I really hate to blame the camera here. I dive with photographers a lot -- I actually really like doing it, because they move slowly and while they are taking a picture, I have time to really sit and look around in a small area, and find lots of camouflaged things. If the dive is well planned AND the photographer has good skills, it works JUST FINE.

The problem here sounds like it was that two people had totally different ideas of what being dive buddies were, and that happens. It's one of the reasons I really like the system in which I am trained, because the behavior of my buddies (even instabuddies) is predictable. But a good pre-dive discussion should help, although it doesn't always, because people don't always DO underwater what they SAY they are going to do on the boat.

But it's a nice post to remind us that new divers aren't bad divers, and can be very good buddies.

Some of my best dive buddies were good right from the start. Some with many dives aren't so good. That's just the way it is.

You can dive with a photographer buddy but they need to lead the dive and you need to be OK with the slow pace. If they just take off without letting you know then you effectively don't have a dive buddy.

I generally don't like diving with photographers unless I have my camera along as well or if they are just going to take a few pictures every now and then as opposed to nonstop for the entire dive.