Solo diving

[Marie13]

On top of that, this is the basic forum. No recommending sketchy practices.

There is definitely a “cowboy” culture among some divers. Basically, they’ll do what they want and you can’t tell them otherwise. I’ve watched this unfold locally with a couple of divers I know. They did a very sketchy dive and posted it online. Many people telling them plainly “we don’t want you to die” has had apparently no effect.

ETA: I was at visitation at a funeral home last night for a friend who died diving (cave diving - no idea what happened). Having friends die makes some of us a little more adamant on the topic.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

But on this I will also consider caring more about the metric-challenged and use "crap-load" instead.

I'm sorry but this is still confusing. Are we talking about elephant crap-load, donkey, or ....?

 

[Bob DBF]

Report it and ask for it to be moved to the Solo Forum

It couldn't be moved, it should have been locked after the rational standard answers, solo has no business in basic. The reason it doesn't belong in basic has more to do with this litigious society than whether one has the ability to solo dive. Once one cannot honestly talk about a topic, there is little reason to to have a thread. I believe the solo cert has made as many problems in solo diving as it solved. It certainly has on this website.

 

[johndiver999]

Dr Rich. I don’t know how you have determined what is a pretty good safety record. I’ve known quite a few people who have been attacked by sharks, however none were on shark feeding dives run for tourists. Rather than refer to data on the safety record of shark feeding dives ( which is probably pretty sparse) I think one can examine some of the shark feeding videos in order to conclude that the situation is far, far from safe.

 

[drrich2]

I don’t know how you have determined what is a pretty good safety record. I’ve known quite a few people who have been attacked by sharks, however none were on shark feeding dives run for tourists.

It's a judgment call from the multi-year runs of some of these operations and the seeming scarcity of reported customer injuries. I specify customer injuries because there have been reports of shark feeders getting hurt; I'm neither indifferent or dismissive of that, I simply think those people understand what they're doing and the risks involved, and choose to take on that role, not unlike other hazardous occupations. And I was only talking about shark feeding dives run for tourists.

I'm not suggesting there's not some inherent danger, and I generally recommend people work their way up to such diving, if it's something they wish to do, having researched the matter.

Even then, if you knowingly choose to get in the water with a tiger shark, you take on some level of risk above that of a similar dive without the tiger shark. It's hard to quantify that risk, and what level of roughly estimated hazard falls under 'pretty good safety record' or 'far, far from safe' is a personal judgment call.

And so it is with solo diving. There are additional risks inherent in the activity, people disagree on how much more vs. buddy diving (and it depends on the buddy and other factors), there are risk mitigation strategies (including getting more dive experience first), and some of us consider the reward worth the risk.

 

[Lorenzoid]

As far as I'm aware, the OW courses do not mention anything about shark feeding dives. There are probably other activities the OW courses omit mention of that some divers consider to be on the risky side, especially for inexperienced divers. Diving alone is not one of those.

I realize that with experience, divers grow frustrated with how the buddy system is practiced out in the real world, and they may turn to solo diving. But should we be actively encouraging inexperienced divers to consider deviating from what they were taught in the OW course?

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

But should we be actively encouraging inexperienced divers to consider deviating from what they were taught in the OW course?

We should help inexperienced divers learn how to deal with bad dive buddies.

 

[Lorenzoid]

We should help inexperienced divers learn how to deal with bad dive buddies.

Not to mention, how to deal with lack of a dive buddy, especially when you're apparently at a perfectly good snorkeling location. Things happen--you don't always have a dive buddy. All kinds of things can get in the way of doing some diving, and the experienced diver knows when to shrug it off and not dive that day. There will be plenty of opportunities to dive other times. If I were the OP, I'd take the opportunity to enjoy snorkeling with my wife.

 

[SlugLife]

Considering we're in the "basic scuba" forum, it's important to clarify "every diver is (often) a solo-diver" type comments.

• This does not mean: It's okay for new divers to go off solo-diving.
• This does mean: For safety reasons, one should not depend or rely on a buddy to rescue them.

The main meaningful difference between when I solo-dive versus buddy-dive, is that with solo-dives I'm looking out for myself, but with buddy dives I'm looking out for myself and then looking out for my buddy. Otherwise, I'm bringing all the same redundancy, staying within the same limits, thinking about how I'd self-rescue, etc.

 

[TMHeimer]

We should help inexperienced divers learn how to deal with bad dive buddies.

Agree for sure. Basically this would be the Rescue Course. What other aspects would you help them with that weren't in Rescue?--How to best identify and deal with a$$holes?