Planned deco on a recreational dive?

[Rred]

"I don't understand why are people so afraid of doing simple deco dives, or refuse to do deco on air."
The answer is FUD. Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. Most often intentionally engendered by someone with an economic reason to create fearful illusions, like the dive industry.

Basic decompression diving is covered in the standard USN tables, and at least when I was certified, either you learned the tables and you learned how to calculate (or read) decompression times and stops, or YOU WEREN'T CERTIFIED. Period. No "advanced", no "tech", no "open water", you either were or weren't certified at all. It has been PADI's great contribution to the industry to break diving into bite-sized nuggets so many courses can be sold, with minimal learning in each one, to generate repeat business with 100% certification rates.

Now, if someone is doing advanced decompression, real technical diving that requires mixed gasses, gas changes, complicated timing beyond "my tank(s) will last this long, and I'll need a hang bottle at ## feet) that's something else again. That's getting into what we used to simply call technical diving, because it required special skills and precautions.

The hardest part of my first decompression dive? Was getting a waterproof dive time. The old Princeton Techtonics "stopwatch" was all we had before those great folks at Casio came long. (Unless of course you were Rolex rich.)

And the legal liability issues for businesses, charter operators, etc. are a totally separate issue.

Decompression? Heck, some folks can't read a gas gauge in their cars. Private pilots keep falling out of the sky, #1 cause of crashes turns out to be "ran out of fuel". DAN can't understand why the #1 cause of diver deaths still appears to be "ran out of air". For some folks...running the numbers for safe decompression diving is too complicated. OK, maybe they should have a "resort beach diver C card". (PADI sells that, right?(G)

 

[Beau640]

Although that may be how it was back when you got certified, it's not the way it's taught now through most agencies. Most agencies do not teach decompression procedures at the time of OW training, and a lot of agencies don't even teach tables anymore. Many people come out with OW certification not knowing about gas planning or SAC rate. Most people dive just following whatever their computer says blindly without a true dive plan ensuring they have enough for what they want to do. They just come up when their air is low and end the dive which you obviously can't do with back gas decompression (Most people on here are not representative of the average dive population over all).

Telling people it's okay to deco dive without training is seriously going to get people hurt. Just because you were trained to do it and have been fine doesn't mean the average dive population now a day can.

 

[sheeper]

requested a 45 meter dive and plan to go into deco (aiming for 10 minutes deco stop max). .

by definition a recreational open water dive does not have any deco. Technical diving is another level of training within recreational diving. Operating beyond your level of training is a good way to make it into the Accidents and Incidents forum

 

[eelnoraa]

\Basic decompression diving is covered in the standard USN tables, and at least when I was certified, either you learned the tables and you learned how to calculate (or read) decompression times and stops, or YOU WEREN'T CERTIFIED. Period. No "advanced", no "tech", no "open water", you either were or weren't certified at all. It has been PADI's great contribution to the industry to break diving into bite-sized nuggets so many courses can be sold, with minimal learning in each one, to generate repeat business with 100% certification rates.
\

By your definition, 99% of the divers today is NOT CERTIFIED. The dive industry will cease to exist.

 

[wbatten1]

Honestly, if I was going on a recreational charter and the operators decided they would turn the dive into a deco dive @ 45M, or even suggested to recreational divers that they could do it without training, I'd be pulling out my cell phone and recording the conversations. Then I'd be calling the shop's training agency and reporting them. Yep, I'm that guy.

Tech diving is more than breaking recreational diving limits. Think of it it this way... There are folks out there advocating that they don't need any special training in order to go scuba diving- that is, they believe they need zero training because their swim skills are good enough. (Afterall, they go snorkeling all the time) No certifications, no briefings, no training, no research; just give them a tank and they swear they'll be fine.
Those of you advocating that it's okay to break recreational limits are no different than the people described above. Your ignorance is going to get you or someone else killed, just like the dive shop in question. And I'm sure their insurance company / training agency would LOVE to hear about them intentionally violating their policies...

Am I just looking to get scuba shops in trouble? Of course not! But I do expect them to have a level of professionalism and integrity.

Rant Over.

 

[Storker]

A steel 15l found in Europe is usually 232bar, rarely 300bar.

Yes, the standard 15L sold these days is 232 bar and since 15L 300 bar tanks are a real b*tch to lift and carry, you won't see many of those. If at all.

However, many European dive centers still use 200 bar tanks since the lifespan of a decently treated steel tank easily can exceed a decade, and it's not that long ago that 200 bar was the norm. Until I'm proven wrong, I always assume that the tanks I'm planning to rent while on vacation are rated for 200 bar. And a 15L 200 bar tank is about 100 cuf in 'murrican units. To me, that's OK for a bimble down to 30-ish meters within rec limits, but not for any kind of deco.

 

[Diver0001]

"I don't understand why are people so afraid of doing simple deco dives, or refuse to do deco on air."
The answer is FUD. Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. Most often intentionally engendered by someone with an economic reason to create fearful illusions, like the dive industry.

I find this cynical and I disagree. Most people tend to shy away from things that are potentially dangerous if they "don't know what they don't know". There is nothing wrong with that. You might call it "fear, uncertainty and doubt" but I would call it wisely respecting your limits and comfort zone.

So why do *I* think most people avoid doing simple deco dives? I think they do so because they recognize, perhaps passively, that it's a complication with (to them) unknown risks and they probably estimate that "it's not worth it".

If someone decides that they want to take the limits of their current training and experience seriously then it's really rude to mockingly say (at least that's how I read it) that they must be suffering from Fear Uncertainty and Doubt. Personally, as an instructor and a technical diver, I fully respect people's choices in these matters.

R..

 

[boulderjohn]

Some people misunderstood some posts I made on this topic few weeks ago. In them, I said that I used a Shearwater computer in tech mode while doing recreational dives, and in that mode with the settings I use or technical dives, it will put me into deco when others are still within NDLs. I also said that when it puts me into deco, it is telling me I need to do a 1 minute stop--less than a standard safety stop. If I go a couple more minutes into deco, I get to stop for the full 3 minutes. I don't worry about it. The worst thing that could happen is that I might have a catastrophic gas loss while doing that stop (highly unlikely) and have to surface before it is done. Under those circumstances, I will almost certainly have no ill effects.

That is for unplanned deco. If I am planning to go into deco, then I have the opportunity to deal with the potential for a catastrophic gas loss ahead of time by having a redundant gas source. That's a pretty simple precaution to take, and it would be silly not to take it. I have the training to do decompression, and all I need is the appropriate equipment to do it safely.

 

[tursiops]

"I don't understand why are people so afraid of doing simple deco dives, or refuse to do deco on air."
The answer is FUD. Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt. Most often intentionally engendered by someone with an economic reason to create fearful illusions, like the dive industry.

Basic decompression diving is covered in the standard USN tables, and at least when I was certified, either you learned the tables and you learned how to calculate (or read) decompression times and stops, or YOU WEREN'T CERTIFIED. Period. No "advanced", no "tech", no "open water", you either were or weren't certified at all. It has been PADI's great contribution to the industry to break diving into bite-sized nuggets so many courses can be sold, with minimal learning in each one, to generate repeat business with 100% certification rates.

Now, if someone is doing advanced decompression, real technical diving that requires mixed gasses, gas changes, complicated timing beyond "my tank(s) will last this long, and I'll need a hang bottle at ## feet) that's something else again. That's getting into what we used to simply call technical diving, because it required special skills and precautions.

The hardest part of my first decompression dive? Was getting a waterproof dive time. The old Princeton Techtonics "stopwatch" was all we had before those great folks at Casio came long. (Unless of course you were Rolex rich.)

And the legal liability issues for businesses, charter operators, etc. are a totally separate issue.

Decompression? Heck, some folks can't read a gas gauge in their cars. Private pilots keep falling out of the sky, #1 cause of crashes turns out to be "ran out of fuel". DAN can't understand why the #1 cause of diver deaths still appears to be "ran out of air". For some folks...running the numbers for safe decompression diving is too complicated. OK, maybe they should have a "resort beach diver C card". (PADI sells that, right?(G)

I wasn't going to reply to this, but it keeps nagging at me.
You seem to equate deco diving with learning how to use the tables. I wish it were that simple. Thank heavens a lot has been learned about equipment and physiology and risk reduction since you (and I) were trained. The difference seems to be that you have ignored all that, and others haven't. You are living in the past.

 

[Rusty Roo]

I have done deco dives on 12L tank but only about 5 minutes. Have done slightly more on a 15l.

I wouldn't advise new divers to do it, but I personally don't see it as an issue. Dive computers aren't completely accurate and manufacturers actively say their algorithms aren't flawless.
So whats the difference between 1 minute of ndl and 1 minute of deco?