What would you do in this situation?

[dlwalke]

So I'm on a dive boat in WPB. I was not officially with anyone and the operators are generally content, as am I, to not be paired off with anyone. In this particular case, the divemaster asked if I could buddy up with one individual who had some new equipment and wanted to be paired off with someone. He was kind of overgeared IMO and I soon got the impression that he was the kind of guy who wanted to present himself, and maybe saw himself, as a better diver than he really was because he had lots of equipment (e.g., pony bottle and so on). In any case, that's sort of an aside. So we get in the water and as soon as we get to the bottom he gets on his knees and starts futzing with his equipment. I didn't know what was going on...if he was having a major problem or a minor problem that needed to be attended to, but I stuck with him. During this time, the rest of the group was swimming/drifting off. The water was uncharacteristically murky (maybe 35 ft) and I soon lost sight of our group as I was waiting for this guy to do whatever he felt he needed to do. A few sharks appeared as it was a shark dive, so that was kind of neat, but I wasn't to thrilled to have lost contact with the group while this guy who I didn't ask to dive with in the first place just sat in the sand and tinkered with his equipment. After a few minutes, he waved me on....like, "go ahead, I'm fine and want to sit here for a while and connect snapbolts or whatever". Well, as I wasn't sure what his situation was, I wasn't inclined to leave him, nor for that matter did I have anywhere to go other than the general direction that the group had gone off in. He kind of did some swimming and then stopped and...I don't know what he was doing. He again indicated that I should head off and that he was OK, however. But I just sat there looking at him waiting for something to happen and to render any assistance if he needed it. After a while, several elements of the larger group of divers again appeared. I was surprised and rather relieved and thought that the two of us would join them. Instead, he made some half-hearted attempts to swim in their direction but they again began to swim out of view and he apparently had little interest in joining them. At this point, I felt that since he was not in any obvious danger (e.g., it wasn't as if he was having an air problem or anything like that), and I did not feel comfortable for my own well-being in losing the group that I had fortuitiously found, that I would rejoin them. I thought that he too would be happy at this turn of events. I signalled him that I was swimming to join the group and waved him on but he just didn't seem that interested in joining them, so I just let him be and joined the main group. After surfacing, he was the last person to pop back up and had me quite worried. I even said something to the captain while we were waiting that I was quite worried. After he got back on board, I said something to the effect that he had scared the crap out of me while I was waiting to see if he'd show up on the surface or not. He didn't really have anything much to say and didn't seem to think it was any big deal or that I should have been worried.

Anyway, on the one hand, I felt like once we were buddied, I should have stuck with him no matter what barring some sort of direct and clearcut danger to my personal safety. On the other hand, he signalled me to take off and I wasn't too excited about spending the whole dive sitting in the sand missing out on the sights and being disconnected from the main group which included the dive leader, so when they re-appeared I figured I personally would be better served by re-joining our group and if he refused to join up, then so be it. I'm basically comfortable with my decision, but was extremely apprehensive while waiting an extra 5 or so minutes on the surface after every one but he was back onboard and was thinking that maybe I had made a bad decision. What do you think?

Thanks,
Dave

 

[usmc4x4]

Even though it sounds like this guy was a class A terd I think you should have stayed with him or called the dive if you were worried about being seperated from the group. He put you in a bad position but to leave someone on their own could prove disasterous and lead to life long guilt. If something would have happened to him there would have been a whole lot of "Well you were his buddy" talk.

 

[HowardE]

An insta buddy who doesn't care to stick with the dive plan?

I would have left him too probably... But I would be comfortable diving alone in that situation.

I especially wouldn't be concerned, since he could care less once you were back on the boat.

Why ruin your dive because of someone who could care less about YOUR dive?

 

[Wildcard]

Stick with your "buddy" then never dive with him again....

 

[ChrisA]

Just for this kind of thing I always cary slate now. Makes communication easy. I like that curved Diterite slate that fits on the arm, very streamlined and out of the way. I've found that most little problems underwater are rooted in miscomunication slates can prevent that

Sounds like this guy was more interrested in a gear checkout dive then anyhting else. Funny to do that on a boat. I wait for a calm day at the beach where a dive is just the cost of an airfill.

 

[Damselfish]

I would have stuck with him but certainly not dove with him again. Probably not someone that should be left alone.

I always have a slate, I might have written "what is wrong" to remove any vagueness from the situation. Maybe something was wrong that wasn't obvious. But if all he could reply was "I want to sit here and play with my gear" then, well I'm not sure. Maybe I'd write back "if you won't go diving you're going to reimburse me for this dive" would get the point across. Or if we weren't too deep I might have tried to get him to surface and had a brief discussion like, "I declare this dive over since you're not diving anyway. I'm going back down to join the group for my next dive - you can do that with me or get back on the boat." Assuming it seemed possible to find the group in the viz. (If he wouldn't surface with me when I wanted to, then he was abandoning me, right?) Or when the group reappeared, if the dive leader was there I might have tried to pawn the guy back off on the leader and see where they got with him.

 

[TheRedHead]

I agree with damselfish. I would have written him a note and asked him what was wrong, then hand him my wetnotes and wait for a response. I wouldn't have left him, but I would have been pissed.

Did you guys discuss the plan before you splashed in?

 

[PerroneFord]

At what point on the boat (pre-dive) did you discuss the dive plan, how much air to come back to the line with, etc? I think that would have been the time to find out what kind of plan he had for conducting a dive.

 

[HowardE]

From reading - it sounds like the other guy didn't want to have a buddy. He signaled to go ahead, without distress... Why stay with him? You're not obligated, you're not a DM or instructor.

If the other guy was worried about losing a buddy, shouldn't he have surfaced? In standard "lost buddy" protocol?

They probably didn't have a pre-dive "meeting"

 

[ZenDiva]

You did not mention in your original description if you did discuss a dive plan prior to hitting the water w/ this person....as a new diver to me that would be something of importance....how deep I expect to go, how long I expect to stay down....etc...

was it possible for you to get the attention of the dive leader to let him/her know what was going on? guess this would've been a good situation to have golem wet notes handy to better communicate what was going on...by both of you...

I may be niave, but I thought there was a rule about not leaving your dive buddy?
since the dive operator paired you up w/ this person...and it ruined your dive...perhaps they would've given credit for future dives? do they do that? I have no idea....