Safety stop when losing buddy

[BlueTrin]

do you guys do a safety stop when you surface after being separated but you couldn’t find your buddy.

I have been told two contradictory things:

• One person told me that you should surface without doing the non-mandatory stops as they aren’t necessary
• One person told me, you should do the safety stop as it is not really an emergency

I guess there isn’t a hard rule and you should agree with your buddy. I think I would probably do the safety stop for a deeper dive now and tell my buddy that I will do it if we get separated ?

 

[Manatee Diver]

I'd do the safety stop, it isn't an emergency and if something goes wrong you can easily swim the last 20 or so feet to the surface on a single breath.

 

[WarrenZ]

I'd go with the safety stop. Especially if you were deep it is better to add the safety padding than rush to the surface because of an imagined emergency of losing your buddy.

 

[Streydog]

I say no safety stop, how do you know if it is an emergency?

 

[NAM001]

First never engage in an unacceptable risk yourself to save another. one loss is better than 2. That said you have to have a firm definintion of what an uacceptable risk is.

Next specifically in regards to teh safety stop. IT IS NOT REQUIRED....... Next one of 2 outcomes will result . they are onthe surface or they are not. If they are then its no problem. If not then look for bubbles. if there are bubbles then , if the bubbles are moving, then no problem..... or if not. stay there because if they do things right they will be hitting the surface very quickly. if they are moving then follow them and wait for them to surface in a short period. The only bad combination is not seeing bubbles at all or seeing bubbles that are not moving and no one is surfacing. If if the latter then still no problem ( they have air). You go down after them. A flashlight and squaker is very helpful in cases like this to reunite divers or notify intentions. This is all location dependant. Each dive local is different in regards to snags and tangles etc. Many a time i have been with a buddy who was using a compass and in a blink of an eye made a wrong turn in Kansas and went off trucking. You can sit at the surface and watch just what happens. I would in no way go down and try to find a set of moving bubbles. I would track and follow on the surface and wait for the moment movement stops. ( they realized they were alone) and wait for their next actions which should be surfacing. The last thing you want is to go down to find them and they surface find themselves alone and you both end up doing a up & down waltz to find each other contributing to the problem..

 

[TMHeimer]

First never engage in an unacceptable risk yourself to save another. one loss is better than 2. That said you have to have a firm definintion of what an uacceptable risk is.

Next specifically in regards to teh safety stop. IT IS NOT REQUIRED....... Next one of 2 outcomes will result . they are onthe surface or they are not. If they are then its no problem. If not then look for bubbles. if there are bubbles then , if the bubbles are moving, then no problem..... or if not. stay there because if they do things right they will be hitting the surface very quickly. if they are moving then follow them and wait for them to surface in a short period. The only bad combination is not seeing bubbles at all or seeing bubbles that are not moving and no one is surfacing. If if the latter then still no problem ( they have air). You go down after them. A flashlight and squaker is very helpful in cases like this to reunite divers or notify intentions. This is all location dependant. Each dive local is different in regards to snags and tangles etc. Many a time i have been with a buddy who was using a compass and in a blink of an eye made a wrong turn in Kansas and went off trucking. You can sit at the surface and watch just what happens. I would in no way go down and try to find a set of moving bubbles. I would track and follow on the surface and wait for the movement movement stops. ( they realized they were alone) and wait for their next actions which should be surfacing. The last thing you want is to go down to find them and they surface find themselves alone and you both end up ding a up down waltz to find each other contributing to the problem..

That about covers everything. Regarding risk, I would agree with Streydog and skip the stop if it was very early in the dive and nowhere near your no-stop time, possibly because the dive was to 60' and not 120'. Otherwise I'd probably do the stop. As KWS said, you check bubbles. If there are none you don't know where the buddy is anyway and it may be too late (assuming you already did the one minute search before ascending and came up empty).

 

[Diving Dubai]

As always there are no clear cut answers to the question. You have to make a personal judgement call based on your circumstances.

If you are shallow and lose your buddy in the very early part of the dive, then you may decide that you're willing to accept the (small ) risk and surface.

If you're deep - then you're not going to exceed the maximum rate of ascent to get there early, and I personally would make some sort of a stop (depending on my circumstances

Ideally you'd both shoot your dsmbs so there would be no need to hunt for bubbles. If one person surfaced before the others, they could then swim over to the others' dsmb, and descend (gas/time allowing)

Lost buddy procedures should be part of your pre dive chat anyhow.

For my wife and I on Scooters, where it's easy to lose one another) we agree to return to a certain depth (15m) and hunt around the reef at that depth, but if we don't find each other - depending on dive time we continue our dives (both solo trained both carry bailouts) and surface normally under dsmbs. We both make a stop prior to surfacing.

However... This weekend we got seperated in a fierce and unpredictable current, and both decided separately to find "shelter" shoot dsmbs, make a stop and get out asap We pretty much surfaced at the same time (according to our computers) both had been caught in downcurrents and surfaced out of sight from each other - the point being we'd had a plan which couldn't be achieved and both decided based on risk and knowledge, to "get out of dodge" so we could be on the surface and be one less diver to chase down

 

[Akimbo]

Work it out with your buddy before the dive depending on your experience, conditions, and dive profile. You are more likely to lose your buddy in 1.5M/5' of visibility than with 30M/100'. Are you both carrying redundant gas supplies? You are much less likely to find your buddy's bubbles during a shallow dive in sloppy seas than deeper in flat seas. Say you get to the surface and still no buddy or bubbles. Have you agreed what to do then?

You might as well do the stop if the buddy plans to. Safety stops are not mandatory but increase the DCS safety margin. Their value is far less if you are on you first dive and separate from you buddy 10 minutes into a 20M/66' versus your 4th dive of the day that all bump up against the NDL from 40M/130' dives.

 

[TheGraveyardDiver]

I'd skip it.
A safety stop is a "recommendation" unless you've gone into decompression from overstaying your bottom time, or ended up in a X, Y, or Z pressure group.

Secondly, you don't know know if it's an emergency or not. Your buddy could be floating face-down on the surface and those 10 minutes you spend on a not-required safety stop might cost him his life. After 10 minutes it's a body recovery not a rescue.


I skip safety stops often. Most especially when I'm spearfishing and have a stringer full of bleeding fish clipped to me.

 

[Bob DBF]

As above, its my second point on my buddy briefing, the first is my plan how to stay togather. If separated, look for up to a minute then ascend to the surface, no safety stop, look and wait. Shoot a bag if you have one, if I see my buddy's bag I'll give enough time to surface then it's time go down the line. If on a boat, I'll give my buddy time enough to surface and if he hasn't I'll notify the skipper. This discussion in itself has insured my buddy stays close.

Most of the time I dive solo, and perfer it that way, so when, due to circumstances, I am buddy diving, I expect my buddy to be serious about being a buddy.


Bob