Solo flying vs. Solo diving?

[VooDooGasMan]

Thats why I only fly rockets, Once in space I breathe from compressor, when I land in the ocean I still breathe from compressor, no matter what I just aim for the water. Oh and I check all o-rings before i take my rocket on a dive trip.


Happy Diving

 

[Ragnar]

A lot of this for both activities really depends on the persons training, experience, and proficiency and the equipment used for the activity planned. The equipment and training have to be right for the dive/flight plan or one could easily find themselves in over their head. Weather and dive conditions are a HUGE factor in both as an easy dive or flight on a good day can be a heavy workload on another.

Looking at it in terms of both at a commercial level with all the training and experience that that entails, the diver is by far at greater risk.

 

[theduckguru]

In the flying industry, no one requires a student or pilot to sigh a liability waiver, everyone is required to sign a waiver in the scuba industry.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Solo flying - you screw up and die, everyone assumes it's your fault
Solo diving - you screw up and die. everyone assumes it's your instructor's (or agency's) fault

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[tropitan]

Very interesting posts. Thank you all for your replies. It would seem to me my old Boy Scout motto 'Be Prepared' applies no matter the solo activity. It really all boils down to self-reliance, and a bit of luck...

 

[theduckguru]

Solo flying - you screw up and die, everyone assumes it's your fault
Solo diving - you screw up and die. everyone assumes it's your instructor's (or agency's) fault

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Do you have a documented case of an instructor being sued from a solo diving accident?

 

[Trace Malinowski]

Economics

If the aircraft industry convinces pilots that they need to fly solo, they sell one plane per pilot. If every private pilot needed a co-pilot then 50% less aircraft might be sold with two pilots going in on the purchase of a single aircraft.

If the diving industry convinces divers they need a buddy, they might sell two scuba classes and two sets of gear for every student who might otherwise show up alone.

 

[Slamfire]

I'm a private pilot, single engine and I've done some solo deco dives. Personally, my most stressful times diving are nowhere near the level of my most stressful times flying. Flying on a mountainous canyon while caught in a downdraft that makes you lose altitude in spite of all your efforts and not seeing a decent strip of flat clear land to put the plane down is not fun.

Live training to recover from a spin is more intense than any ridiculously unlikely multiple failures scenario a sadistic scuba instructor can dream of. Oh, and did I mentioned that on the Canadian flight test you have to recover from a spin blindfolded (wearing a hood that prevents you from seeing anything except flight instruments).

When I dream of being underwater and not having any gas left, the resolution of my dream ends up with me taking a breath of water and miraculously finding out I can breath water. My dream ends up in the happy realization that I don't need to surface ever again if I don't want to.

On the other hand I have dreamt that I died when I crashed into a mountain while flying in low visibility.

I guess there is a good degree of individual personal variabilty here: are you more claustrophobic than afraid of heights? I'm sure there are people out there that feel that diving is more stressful than flying.

 

[Ragnar]

Like I said, training/experience, weather and equipment. If you were IFR rated and in an airplane with a higher maximum ceiling you would be on an airway and possibly high enough to be out of those mountain waves or at least high enough to be able to suffer a lot more altitude loss before coming close to terra firma.

Get yourself an instrument rating, scud running in the mountains is nothing to mess with, you should be having nightmares, it's your clue that you're doing something you shouldn't be

 

[Slamfire]

True. Comparatively speaking I have more training and experience in diving than flying. In flying I am at the OW cert level, if such a comparison is even valid. In diving I have a few more levels above OW.

The downdraft flight I described before was a training solo xcountry flight. Thankfully, skies were clear and there was no cloud ceiling. I was simply flying that low because that was the altitude I prescribed in my flight plan, which was reviewed and approved by my instructor and filed with Transport Canada. I knew about mountain waves, but there is a big difference in knowing about them and actually experiencing them.

At first I didn't even know I was in a downdraft. You notice the loss in altitude, check engine power settings, mags, carb heat, and everything looks fine. But you're still losing altitude in spite of gunning the little C-152 engine to best climb. It was only then that, with my limited experience, I recognized that I must be in a down draft.

I eventually came out of the downdraft and then made a series of climbing turns to get above mountain peaks for my way back. My flight plan did not specify going this high (6000' approx, if I'm remembering things correctly) on the way back, but screw the flight plan. I was not riding mountain waves again.

Shortly thereafter I passed the final flight test and got my PPL. I was working on the night rating on my way to IFR when the wife says that she's found the house of her dreams... I acquiesced and the mortgage increase killed the flying budget :depressed:

I haven't flown in a while. Now I have children. Other priorities come up. I'm thinking of getting reactivated in about 2 or 3 years just so that I can take my kid sightseeing around here. But the plans for IFR or CPL are placed on hold for a while longer. Fortunately, diving is cheaper than flying.