Solo Diving- Absolute No-No?

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

dmentia

Guest
Messages
65
Reaction score
0
Location
Winthrop Harbor, Illinois
Hello all,
Looking for thoughts about solo diving. Is it an absolute no-no or a recommended no-no? As a newbie diver, I certainly would not want to dive alone while I am still learning (and I want all the help I can get with the learning part!), but is a point reached where, when you just want to jump in and dive a bit, you may not need a buddy?

I am not thinking about 100 Ft night dives, etc. but just 20-30 ft dives in a familiar place, and so on. Scuba is certainly not something to get complacent about, but a careful plan, and attention to detail seems to make solo diving "sound" reasonable, especially when you hear so many stories of dive buddies that don't plan anything!

Anyway, stray thoughts from a newbie...
dmentia
 
Define solo diving!

IMHO when I am DM'ing a class I am solo diving, simply because I don't have a reliable buddy. there is very little difference between taking a pair of novices on the potter part of their open water dives, and diving solo, it's not exactly as if they are going to be a lot of use in an emergency.

I usually take my pony cylinder with me for redundancy, and try to be as self suficient as possible.

When I am diving with another experienced diver I trust how far apart do we have to be before we are in effect solo? 10m apart? 20m apart? What happens if I am with a photographer who wants to wait for 1/2 hour to get a photo? If I wander off by 30m to look at something more interesting, in effect I am diving solo as I probably can't get back to them in an emergency.

I've had dives where as a DM I have supervised (qualified) people, I've just hung back and let them get on with it. They won't notice if I have a problem - is that solo diving?

Personally, I think that a lot of what I do is in effect solo diving, so I take the relevent precautions (redundancy!!!), and if I'm diving with a suitably experienced diver I will discuss what they want in a buddy. If they want to follow me then they can, if they want me to follow them then fine. If they want to be left alone under water and meet up at the end for the sake of appearences when we surface then fine.

Tricky subject, and some people have very strong views on it!

Jon T
 
My opinion is that the more you dive - especially with many different people - the more you tend to think of every dive as a solo dive and improve your preparedness (does this word exist?) to be solo and self reliant. However, as turnerjd wrote: in reality the limit is floating (pun intended)

DSAO
 
My original thoughts about solo were to grab your gear, go to a dive site, plan the dive, and dive it alone. I can see that there are a number of other instances where "solo" doesn't mean alone... especially with a buddy you may not know, or a buddy whose experience may be significantly less than your own.
 
Dmentia,

For me there is a line I haven't crossed yet. I acknowledge that I regularly do what is in effect a solo dive, but so far, all the training saying YOU WILL NOT SOLO DIVE has been effective.

There is a thin line I haven't crossed yet.

I know there is very little difference between planning and executing a solo dive, and diving 'solo' but accompanied. For me at the moment, that is a very fine line that I am up against, but haven't yet crossed - one day I am sure I will cross it.

As for agency approval, I don't know if it will ever happen for main stream agencies, PADI etc.. put far too little in the basic courses as it is, and I can't immagine them putting solo dives on the TecRec sylabus. There again I couldn't immagine PADI allowing decompression dives, but I think these will be allowedin the TecRec deep specialty.

Jon T
 
There is a great controversy raging over "solo" diving, with some folks even claiming that buddy diving is dangerous compared to it.
While most folks tend to think in terms of "out-of-air" situations, that's not really a problem for solo divers so long as they plan to either remain within their personal CESA limits or carry a truly redundant air supply. But there are two scenarios one must risk as a solo diver - entrapment and incapacitation.
Two recent (this past summer) true stories:
1. Boyhood friend of mine was out cleaning his pond in chest deep water. Had some kind of incapacitating attack (we suspect either stroke or CVA) and drowned. Had he been with someone he wouldn't have drowned. (the incapacitating event may have killed him anyway, but we'll never know, will we, 'cause he drowned)
2. Spearfisherman speared a big fish (we know it was big 'cause of what it did.. don't know what kind 'cause we never saw it) - the fish wrapped him up, pinning his arms and tearing the regulator from his mouth. He both drowned and embolized. A buddy could have saved him.
As long as you're willing to accept the risks of entrapment or incapacitation, I see no reason to avoid a dive just because you can't find an acceptable buddy. I dive solo myself, but rarely (usually a dawn dive when no one else is willing to roll out at 4 AM)
Rick
 
Solo Diving is truely one of those explosive debate type of issues. In my opinion solo diving can be done with a relatively good margine of safety as long as the diver in question has the proper experience and gear.

Virtually anyone can go out on a solo dive. Coming back is the trick. Redundancy and self sufficiency is the key.

I'm in the water so much, Remora's attach themselves to me. In one way it's real cool that they have accepted me as a creature of the deep, on the other hand they can be quite annoying if the leach onto something they shouldn't be :wink: Like Rick said, not everyone has the motivation to roll out of a warm bed at 4 am to dive the same dive spot over and over again. For this reason I plan and execute solo dives on a regular basis. Sometimes the only clue that I've left the house is the absence of my dive gear from the garage.

Disclaimer: I've been diving for year's and have many dives under my belt. Solo diving is ill-advised regardless of how long you have been diving, and how many dives you've done.

There's no Police out there, you'll have to evaluate just how prepard you are to survive a solo dive and go from there...

 
Demtia,

Like Mario said above, redundancy and self sufficiency is the key to solo diving. Never attempt to do it unless you are completely comfortable underwater alone. You must be "at one with the sea and your environment".

Personally I think we are taught not to solo dive is the liability issue. But then I'm kinda cynical anyway.

Hope this and the others have answered your question

ID

 
What do you do when you run out of air, or your BCD would not keep air inside the bladder and keeps leaking out, or... blah blah blah. With a buddy, or even as a professional taking out students or conducting fun dives, I am sure you will agree that you'll be in better position to go back to dryland alive.

Nope, solo diving is a no-no.

 
There is always a flipside to every discussion. Solo diving is practiced day in and day out on a regular basis without incident, then there are those whom dive with their dive buddies of many years and unexplainably there's a double fatality. Many things just can't be explained logically. One thing is for sure, there is no excuse for running out of air. Today's dive computers are downright annoying when you're low on air. As for buoyancy, you should never be so negative that you can't make a (semi)controlled buoyant ascent by either ditching your weight or at least part of it from your B.C.

Disclaimer...
Solo diving: Not advisable, and if you have to ask if you are ready, you most certainly are not.
 

Back
Top Bottom