Drinking and Diving

Has anyone ever seen any recommended guidelines regarding drinking alcohol before diving?

Many tests have shown that even small amounts of alcohol can have a measurable negative effect of performance (judgement, coordination, impairment of memory, etc). There is also the dehydration effect that can increase the risk of decompression issues.

Many boats and resorts that I have stayed at have a rule, if you have a drink you're done diving with them for the day....it's their operation so they can set the rules. However, those same operations often do early morning dives and divers will board the boat who have been pounding many drinks until the wee hours, and still have a pretty high blood alcohol content.

US Navy aviation has a 12 hour rule, no drinking with 12 hours of a flight.

DAN website has some discussion about this Divers Alert Network
but unlike the diving then flying issue, seems to offer no recommended guidelines.

For the record, I and most of my buddies love a cold beer (or 2+). Don't want to see "scuba police" enforcing rules. This should be a judgement issue just like diving and flying.

However some reasonable reference guidlelines might be nice to help people make an informed judgement decision?

Whew..this thread is about to explode!

Valaika:

Whew..this thread is about to explode!

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Right. I think a different version of this thread already did explode. My own rule: No drinking at all until all the dives are done--for the day or for all the consecutive days. Then anything goes.

While I do adhere to and do advocate the no diving after the first drink of the day rule, I also want to extend some consideration for the night before.

I was on the jury for the case of a young woman who drive the wrong way down an expressway early one morning and killed a young man when they crashed head on. She clearly had the mistaken notion that the few hours of sleep she had had after the party the night before had cleared her of all intoxication. In truth, she was drunk as a skunk when she plowed into that young man's car.

In scuba, you don't have to be drunk as a skunk to create problems. You just have to have enough alcohol in your system to create problems. So don't go by the calendar day and the mistaken notion that a few hours of sleep make you whole again. The 12 hours rule mentioned above seems to me to be a minimum.

so are we talking predive or post dive?
I won't drink before I dive, that's just stupid imho. Two fold, one it can impair judgement, which could lead to death. that would be bad. two, it's a vasodilator which can increase the risk of getting bent, which is not quite as bad, but still pretty bad. Open all the blood vessels and you can ingas more nitrogen screwing up your deco calculations.

For post dive, I will not abstain from a few drink, but I wouldn't get drunk. Same vasodilator concept, if you open the blood vessels too fast, same thing with exercising, you can increase the risk of getting bent. Just not worth it for me

saxplayer1004:

so are we talking predive or post dive?
I won't drink before I dive, that's just stupid imho. Two fold, one it can impair judgement, which could lead to death. that would be bad. two, it's a vasodilator which can increase the risk of getting bent, which is not quite as bad, but still pretty bad. Open all the blood vessels and you can ingas more nitrogen screwing up your deco calculations.

For post dive, I will not abstain from a few drink, but I wouldn't get drunk. Same vasodilator concept, if you open the blood vessels too fast, same thing with exercising, you can increase the risk of getting bent. Just not worth it for me

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Good point. I must amend my post. I would say that if you dive 4-5 times daily for a week it would be wise to lay off even one beer for a fairly long while after the last dives. My diving almost never fits that category.

The only real guideline I can think of is: "If you can't spit, don't dive" - Lee Somers, 1986. In: Diver education series: drinking and diving. MICHU-T-86-010

The only study I can think of showed...

Trevett et. al. 2003 UHMS ASM abstract:

There is no evidence of any difference in the distribution of reported alcohol intake between divers involved in an incident and controls.

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The full abstract is here

As for post dive...
There was an interesting study on the use of ethanol in the treatment of DCS. That was debated obviously and another study showed no real difference in bubble growth with post dive ethanol.

Not a good idea.

1thumper:

Don't want to see "scuba police" enforcing rules. This should be a judgement issue just like diving and flying.

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By "scuba police", do you mean the people who choose to permit you to use their private facilities (boat, dive centre, equipment) to conduct your dives and who have the absolute legal right to deny those facilities to any diver they feel may pose an unreasonable risk to themselves, other divers, staff or the business operation?

Or do you mean the divers peer group, who may wish to decline diving with individuals they feel pose an unreasonable risk to themselves?

Or do you mean the individuals who feel that diving with alcohol-induced performance impairment constitutes a form of willful negligence and wish to freely express those opinions on a discussion forum?

Or do you mean some ultra-secret legal organisation that exists in a covert capacity to monitor and enforce a system of equally ultra-secret laws pertaining to the conduct of scuba diving?

TMHeimer:

I think a different version of this thread already did explode

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http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/advanced-scuba-discussions/377484-drinking-diving.html

Gene_Hobbs:

MICHU-T-86-010

The only study I can think of showed...

The full abstract is here

As for post dive...
There was an interesting study on the use of ethanol in the treatment of DCS. That was debated obviously and another study showed no real difference in bubble growth with post dive ethanol.

Click to expand...

Interesting