Treat every dive like a tech dive

[Skulmoski]

I am new to diving but approach this activity from a risk management perspective informed from 15 years of mountaineering, ice climbing and rock climbing and an academic background. Risk management includes risk prevention and mitigation. When applied to diving, I think about the risks that could occur and then I think about ways to prevent the risk from occurring and if it does occur, what can be done to reduce the impact of the risk. I hope this type of thinking will serve me well in my recreational diving exploits.

"There are old divers and bold divers, but few old, bold divers."

GJS

 

[Storker]

safe is a relative term. For me, I want to be comfortable that I am very likely to survive ANY (single) gear failure that might occur. If you are diving in 20 feet of water, 50 ft from the lake shore... I really don't need much gear to ensure that I will survive if my BC fails or my tank fails or my regulator hose explodes or my mask strap falls off, or my weight belt pops off etc,

A somewhat related anecdote: Earlier this fall I was on a weekend trip to the coast here. One member of the group had his neck seal rip almost completely when he was donning his suit for his first dive. Naturally, he didn't dive that day. That evening, I lent him my patch kit and watched him glue together his seal and spend more than half of the patches to secure the seam. The next day he inspected his job, pulled the seal and decided he'd use the suit to get in at least one dive from the trip. The first thing that was decided was that we would choose a benign and shallow site close to shore, where the bottom would allow him to just walk up on the shore if his seal had a catastrophic failure again. Secondly, we went in threesomes to ensure that if SHTF, he could get ample assistance. Thirdly, his two buddies were to keep an extra eye on him in case he had misjudged the tightness of his seal (not very likely, since he was pretty experienced) and blacked out.

Would we have done it like this on a dive on a reef far from land? No, because a free water ascent - not to mention climbing back aboard - with a completely flooded suit could be rather difficult in such conditions.
Would we have done it like this if we had planned on diving deep, skirting the NDL? No, because a suit flood could compromise his offgassing.
Did we perform a risk analysis, identifying major risk factors and take steps to mitigate those? Yes.
Was it an unsafe dive? I don't think so.

 

[doctormike]

I'm surprised that this is so controversial. Is there some sort of "tech" branding or marketing issue here that I'm not aware of? Seems like just a semantic argument.

The OP didn't say that every dive was a tech dive, he just said treat it like a tech dive. To me, that just means think about the plan ahead of time and make sure that you have appropriate equipment for reasonably foreseeable failures.

Not such a terrible concept, sort of like saying that every dive is a decompression dive.

If you really want to be precise with your language, if you aren't getting paid, it's by definition a recreational dive.

 

[chillyinCanada]

"Plan your dive, dive your plan "
"Know your limits, dive within your limits and training"
"Check your gear"
"Check your air/gas"
"Watch your gauges "
Etc etc etc

 

[Hawkwood]

"Plan your dive, dive your plan "
"Know your limits, dive within your limits and training"
"Check your gear"
"Check your air/gas"
"Watch your gauges "
Etc etc etc

Having never planned, done, or even had an interest in, a "tech dive", I'll go with that.

 

[Diver0001]

Many a diving question I've pondered, not just here but in real life, has been shut down with some variation on "that only matters for tech dives." I'm struggling to understand the mindset. To me it's like getting in your car and leaving your seatbelt off because the weather's nice and you're not driving fast.

Most of the equipment, training, and practices that make a cave or deco dive safer is going to improve safety for looking at the pretty fishies at 60 feet. The risk of a rapid ascent from "recreational depths" is not zero. Why not think about gas planning, and carry a second primary regulator, and focus your mind on solving problems in a way that allows a deliberate ascent?

Any dive can turn into a solo dive. Any dive can turn into a tech dive (no immediate access to the surface because of entanglement or the needs of a buddy). Many dives, e.g. wall dives, can turn into deco dives, with just a momentary loss of buoyancy control.

In other activities that have inherent hazards, the norm is to expose people to information and training that is beyond the boundaries of what they can do without qualified supervision, while still reinforcing the boundaries.

I believe that your are absolutely correct when it comes down to an attitude of safety and how you approach preparing yourself and your gear for a dive. You can drown in any amount of water, after all.

However, obviously not all dives carry the same risk factor. If you're diving well within the NDL's at 15m on a coral reef in 28C water and 40m viz you have a very different dive than when you go to 50m in a Dutch lake at 6C where you are 1/2 hour over the deco limits in anywhere between 3-10m of viz. These are not the same types of dives and even though I've done both, I'll approach one of those much more ... "tightly" ... than the other.

The main differences are in equipment and planning.

On the first dive I would be wearing an AL80 and probably one regulator. I may have flopped off a Zodiac and decided to bimble around until my tank pressure was X. On the second dive I would have been working out how much gas and mix I needed for various contingencies and linked that to my navigation plan. Due to the cold, my plan would also be linked to water temperature and maximum exposure time. My gear may have looked a little different too (see foto below) and my ascent plan would have planned well before the dive started.

So yeah, in terms of "attitude" I think you're totally on the same page as I am and well aware that ANY dive should be taken seriously.

on the other hand, the risks in technical diving are hard to compare to those in a recreational context.

R..

P.S. the terms "recreational" and "technical" in this post are related to having a (virtual) overhead.

 

[AdivingBel]

If the OP just means "don't be complacent," O.K....sounds good...another bumper sticker platitude like "plan your dive, dive your plan." Could say "if you have to have someone hold your beer so you can put your reg in your mouth, you probably shouldn't be diving" (don't think that will fit on a bumper sticker). We can always use another reminder that diving can be inherently dangerous, so be careful. If the OP means you should approach each 30 ft. reef bimble with the gear and planning rigor of a tech (overhead environment) dive, well...IMHO, that's just silly, but if you want to, by all means go for it. While you're gearing up and planning, I'll be diving. Just don't make me wait too long on the cattle boat 'cause you're the last one in the water. Lunch is being served back at the dock.

 

[boulderjohn]

IANTD World Headquarters - Technical Programs

Please read each technical programs course "purpose". This pretty much backs up my point about gas.

It is good to know that you can achieve such in-depth knowledge of the world of technical diving from reading a brief course description. I see from reading all your posts that you are putting this vast knowledge to good use in your determination of the value of technical training as compared to casual reef diving.

Meanwhile, I'll just blunder along with the mistaken impressions I get from teaching technical diving. I look forward to your further help in telling me what is happening in the courses I teach.

By the way, I thought I was pretty much on top of the diving world when I had accumulated hundreds of dives beyond my instructor rating. I then started technical training. It was one of the most humiliating experiences of my life when I realized what a beginner I truly was. Today I have a better idea of how many divers are truly beyond me in skills and experience, and I feel a lot less sure of my place on that spectrum than I did back then.

 

[CuzzA]

It is good to know that you can achieve such in-depth knowledge of the world of technical diving from reading a brief course description. I see from reading all your posts that you are putting this vast knowledge to good use in your determination of the value of technical training as compared to casual reef diving.

Meanwhile, I'll just blunder along with the mistaken impressions I get from teaching technical diving. I look forward to your further help in telling me what is happening in the courses I teach.

By the way, I thought I was pretty much on top of the diving world when I had accumulated hundreds of dives beyond my instructor rating. I then started technical training. It was one of the most humiliating experiences of my life when I realized what a beginner I truly was. Today I have a better idea of how many divers are truly beyond me in skills and experience, and I feel a lot less sure of my place on that spectrum than I did back then.

Apparently you and I can't have a constructive conversation without you feeling like I'm insulting you. You making assumptions and putting words in my mouth makes it difficult to continue this conversation with you.

You're correct that I have no technical diving experience, although not long ago I believe Nitrox was considered "technical". With that said, I have done research, my LDS instructors and employees are technical instructors, cave instructors, rebreather instructors and my conversations with them about advancing my diving into "technical" diving in open water (no desire to dive caves) has always came back to gas planning and gas management. Naturally new skills will be taught with the virtual ceiling as well as equipment configurations, but in this thread we are talking about applying technical diving to recreational diving and I've asked what skills are taught in technical courses that could be applied to recreational dives. You even said I was correct that basic open water teaches you how to handle the majority of problems one could experience while diving basic open water dives.

Furthermore, my point about experience is backed again by the fact that many technical courses have a minimum required amount of dives prior to taking the course. Why? Well, I'm sure the theory is the more you dive the better you are to take on more challenges. We can also start making this conversation really complicated by determining what level of a tech diver is and how that compares to a very experienced diver. Let's go back to the era when Nitrox was considered technical. I'm a Nitrox diver with less than 50 dives, am I a better, safer diver than the guy who is not Nitrox certified but has dived a thousand dives. No way.

I'm not sure why you put so little value on experience and call it absurd. Nevertheless, if we can't have a good conversation without the sarcasm then let's keep the thread alive and ignore each other.

 

[kr2y5]

It must feel really exhausting, uncomfortable, and ungratifying, to have to go to such great lengths to spin every word of your opponent in a way that fuels the disagreement. You must realize there is no merit badge for having the most intense disagreement, and writing in an abrasive, offensive manner mostly hurts the writer. There is another way. Try to look hard for everything you agree on, then see what's left... You may be in for a surprise.