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seaangel

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Location
Martinez, GA
Just a quick hello and it is off to my Navigation class tonight. I am hoping to get checked out Sunday on a two tank dive on my Nav course. Maybe alittle nervous wont hurt. But I feel like a real clutz with the compass. Well, it is time to go. Will check in with all later. One last thought keep the prayers coming for the victims families, it looks like it ain't over yet by way of tonights news.

Bottoms Up....Bubbles Up!!!!
Cindy
 
And if you thought you felt like a clutz with the compass...my instructor found way to much pleasure in shoving a towel over my head in an egyptian car-park and telling me to find my way around with my mum taking pictures....i have photo evidence!!!!!
 
Just remember a few things

N means North
S means South
E means East
W means West

The term "this way" usually is the opposite of the direction your buddy goes.


relax and enjoy
 
Hey Seaangel - best of luck with the class tonight. Mine was dreadful - viz no more than 1m, the sun kept getting clouded over which made me & my buddy think a huge boat or fish (?!?!) was passing overhead... but we made it, and it made diving afterwards a lot more interesting and involved for me as I was able to finally navigate my own way back to the boat! (DUH :loopy: )

When in doubt, keep practising with the compass!

Cheers
 
Have had two classroom sessions reviewing the material in the Navigation book. I have read the book and completed the review questions. I practiced on land with the instructor doing various navigation patterns and did ok, I really focused on the compass headings. But, I know when we get in the lake tommorrow it will be much harder. The visibility there tends to be about 5 feet, and we are expecting cloudy weather which will make it atleast that if not worse. The only thing that consoles me is that I won't be alone, I will have my buddy with me if I get lost, which I am going to really try to avoid. I understand how to get my headings and to make the turns on the different patterns, but I am concerned about the visibility disorientation feeling I have experienced before. My instructor told us to trust the compass not what our head feels. So you can bet I am going to be seriously watching my compass. I will let you all know how I do tommorrow. Thanks for being here with me on land.

Bottoms Up...Bubbles Up!!!!
Cindy
 
Another REALLY useful tip for navigation is once you are lined up on the bearing you want is to look ahead and spot something stationary (coral bommie, a rock, tree stump) that is straight ahead and swim toward that. This way, you don't have to continually watch the compass as you swim. And if this is a longer distance swim, just keep looking for other features along the same bearing as you reach each target.

This works wonderfully in decent to perfect vis, but is a bit more challenging at 5-8 feet. But with practice you should be able to swim the same heading for a long distance.
 
TM.......I tried your theory. I picked something ahead of me, but in low vis I couldn't make it out. Turns out to my dive buddy. That sucker kept moving on me. LOL :D

Actaully the navigation becomes smooth once you get used to it. The hardest I found was doing a nightime navigation. Lots to think about then.

Practice, Practice, Practice on land then in the water. I always even on simpl,e shore dives make contious effort to consult my compass.

Butch :peace:
 
I think that the harder the conditions,the better for your training.My nav training was in conditions below 5ft vis in mangrove areas with alot of mud and silt.You have no choice but to rely on your compass.The bottom line is to remember that it takes lots of practice to get good with a compass.It's a skill and as a famous golfer quoted..."the harder I practice...the luckier I get...." You'll do fine.Just have a sense of humour and don't be afraid to make mistakes.Best of success.
The Thunder from Down Under,
The Gasman
 
Man! I'm glad to talk about anything but you know what...

I thought the nav part of AOW was the best part. The natural navigation over a billion pieces of salt grass on the bottom with no distinguishable features other than more and more green blades, all about 8 inches long left me (on the simple 30 kick cycles out and back) off by about 15 degrees. Kind of embarassing, but a good lesson that natural nav has many limitations and is inappropriate in some conditions.

The use of the (damned) compass that seemed to lock up in spite of my best efforts to keep it level yielded much better results in the 30 KC square. Think there was no current at the time, which is a great help, but I was interested to see if I could get around the square solely by looking at the compass and not looking up to find a coral head or rock or whatever. The compass left me bang on at the end of the dock, but about 1 KC long - gave me a great deal of confidence that the compass actually works.

Couple questions - first what kind of requirements are there for the Underwater Navigator or equivalent? Do you do anything more interesting than go out in squares?
Second, I have a terrible sense of direction U/W! My son seemed to have a much better idea of where he was going and where the boat was. On the surface, like in a car, I do pretty well - even without a compass. I'd be really interested in learning how to surface somewhere near the target, especially if that's a boat floating on the ocean - even more especially in rough seas, where even seeing the boat is a problem when you're only 6" tall - that being the height of your eyes. Not to mention surfacing and going back down to avoid currents is probably not the best idea w/r/t calculating your dive time and avoiding DC problems.
Terry
 
My instructor told me that the conditions we did our Nav course in were the best because of the low viz and dark sky. We had to rely on the compass 100% as we couldn't even see any landmarks to focus on! It was tricky, but we managed... I'd still like to do a lot more practice though...

And Seaangel - you said it exactly, you've got to follow what the compass tells you, not what your body thinks is the right direction! It's a challenge...

:)
 
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