Eco-unfriendly Divers

[kelemvor]

About the only good way to avoid this situation is to organize your own group and make sure your group fills the boat.

As KWS mentioned, if you're that concerned about the environment you should reconsider flying across the planet to go on vacation. There's lots of great diving in your home state of California as I understand it. Actually, your kelp forests are on my bucket list.

 

[Johnoly]

..... We just arrived on the bottom and were hovering over it, checking our equipment, when steel 72 scuba tanks began to rain all over the reef like dud WW II era bombs. ....

{shaking my head}

 

[Scared Silly]

I have little patience for azzhats whether they realize they are being one or not. So I say something to those running the trip or to the person directly. On our last LOB trip I and others got tired of waiting for one diver the crew knew it. Usually they did not dive with our group normally but sometimes groups were combined. Towards the end of the week I pretty much yelled at him to get his crap together as we were leaving. The crew loaded up the dinghy.

Another time we were on trip where one of the divers always had to be first through the swim through. Unfortunately his technique was subpar and silted it up for the others. It was very clear they really had to be first as the one day they could not find the twin through while we did. They were immediately on our tails distressed that they were not first.

After a couple of days of this I spoke with the DM/DG to ask them to give a polite reminder about technique. The did, but the one diver did not get it. As such, I asked them to speak with the diver directly. Not sure if happened but they were done the next day which when I was going to say something to them directly.

Oh the language barrier be damned. I hate to sound like an ugly American but within a large group at least one will speak English well enough to understand.

 

[divinh]

I'm not saying I'm some kind of environmental crusader and I don't think it has to be all or nothing. I mean, if I really wanted to be 100% eco-friendly, I shouldn't exist. I think we should be somewhat mindful of the environment when we enjoy it. The guides poke around, sift the sand a bit to find things because we're there to see interesting things. To me, that's enough. We don't need all of the divers to be doing the same thing, especially divers who are just tourists /and/ inexperienced in finding things. We certainly don't need them to use a reef hook to tap on turtle shells to get them to react or drag up chunks of coral the size of basketballs.

My concern with what I saw is that this group felt it was fine to do these things and that just reinforces their belief that it's the norm. Yes, I come from San Francisco, CA, but I think my sensitivity comes from my training in Koh Tao, Thailand and later diving in other sites in Thailand, Japan, Hawaii and French Polynesia, where the guides emphasized "hands off". Sure, I saw a few divers here and there inexplicably pick up a critter/rock/coral, swim with it for a bit, then drop it, but for the most part, they were isolated divers. Most were respectful. This was the first time I saw a large group do these things over and over again.

Some of the other things I describe are diver etiquitte, like allowing other people a chance to take photos too. However, the ignoring of safety stops, not necessarily doing them, but basically a call to finish the dive is a safety issue. Not everyone will have enough air to wait out multiple safety stop intervals and we were in current and needed to come up together.

 

[KeithG]

Please do not take this personal. Not to justify the behaviors and concerns of either side... I see you are from san fran area. I submit that you may be a bit more sensitive to enviromental issues than others are. Yes the dive habits of others are less than optimal, no question about it, but in reality, not that dangerous to the surroundings. touching for me is a no no. much of what you describe is IMO divers etiquete. You will find that many that dive, do not do so regularly and their skills are not up to par, however YOU want to define par. You do mention that many sit and hover, which are more skills being used than i am accustomed to being around. Some of your comments regarding dangles are well made and are simple to remedy, however to do so means 2 people have to be able to take criticism and accept suggestions. In many aspects diving is much like politics. What one thinks is acceptable is the basis or the end of the world for others. I always try to dive with the understanding that one person is going to go home a better diver. either it is me or my buddy. You may have to accept that you are no more able to fix these divers than san frans powers to be can be when it comes to cleaning up their streets. You may have to be satisfied that although others may not be optimal , you at least can evaluate your own performance and set the better example.

Agreed. There are lots of etiquete issues underwater. The simple (but not necessarily easy) solution is to find a reliable divebuddy (I married mine) and then go places that do not require group dives. We dive on our own away from the cluster.

 

[MelasLithos]

Hi, I see this quite often, and I do believe that most of the time, people just don't know and never thought about these subjects.

I am lucky that I speak three of the most common languages in the world, and like to strike up conversations on the boat (there was only once where I was not able to communicate with my buddy because of language issues). And I do not hesitate to tell people when I see attitudes such as you describe. Most of the time, they will tell me that they didn't realize the issues it was causing/didn't know about, thank me for mentionning it and will try to correct it on the next dive.

Of course, I will never start with that. I would usually start the conversation discussing what we saw, favorite dives, etc. And usually, at some point, I will say "BTW, did you noticed that you were doing this and that?". More often than not, the answer will be "No". And I like to frame it as a discussion more than a "lesson". What I prefer though is point their act to them while they're diving, so that they realize it.

For example, a few month ago, on the third day of diving with a group of people, with went on a muck dive. A young women was flutter kicking very close to the silty bottom, with all the mess that that entails. I gently grabbed her and asked her to watch behind her. When she saw the clound of silt, she had a movement of surprise and immediatly went a bit shallower. After the dive, she thanked me and told me she didn't realized how the bottom could be so easily disturbed.

So I believe you shouldn't be worried about discussing their attitudes with other divers. I know that here, in Asia, where I Iive, a lot of people didn't have the same environmental education and awareness as we had in Europe for example. But they are eager to learn and discuss. Of course, I always try to stay polite and humble when I do that, and it usually goes very well. And it's usually a learning experience for me too in cultural differences ^^

 

[AfterDark]

About the only good way to avoid this situation is to organize your own group and make sure your group fills the boat.

As KWS mentioned, if you're that concerned about the environment you should reconsider flying across the planet to go on vacation. There's lots of great diving in your home state of California as I understand it. Actually, your kelp forests are on my bucket list.

I couldn't agree more, 99% of my diving is done in the cold dark waters of RI. An occasional trip to NC or FL is a warm water treat for me that happens infrequently. I'm no ecowarrior, I'm just not inclined to spend large sums of money to go diving in places where I can't even talk to my fellow divers, and to witness this kind of Charlie Foxtrot?! I don't see how any of it is enjoyable, IMO.

 

[Dirty-Dog]

Some people don't care, but some just don't realize what they're doing. I recall an obviously new diver in the Bahamas who was kicking the reef while trying to get pictures. I wrote "You're kicking the crap out of the reef. Can you be more careful?" on my slate and showed it to him. He became more careful.
I think he assumed I was one of the guides, because he started following me around the rest of the dive and using my slate to ask "What's that?" sort of questions.

 

[outofofficebrb]

Hi, @divinh!

Sorry to hear you had to witness all of that in a week. That sounds frustrating. I can understand because we nicknamed a diver Twinkle Toes recently. He was balancing on the tip of his fins at the bottom or on top of coral at times when he ended up diving with us. In current, he was holding onto a barrel sponge to stay put.

I have witnessed many forehead slapping things in my short dive career and unfortunately, there is always something by someone. The best you can do, as you’ve done, is to mention it. I have pointed out things to divers underwater and position it like a “FYI” as if they don’t know. If it continues, I do mention it to the DM. That usually does it and if not, I have no qualms mentioning it to the cruise director, very respectful and sensitive to not want to embarrass people.

All that aside, I know you went on the KLM Seamore Papua and that it was your first liveaboard. How was the boat including food, accommodation, dive arrangements and logistics? How was the diving? Did you otherwise enjoy what you saw? Anything special? Komodo is one of my favorite places in the world. I really hope that this experience didn’t put you off to all liveaboards.

I’m looking forward to your reply.

 

[Saniflush]

Since Mrs Flush isn't on here I can tell this one her. Some of our first dives were in Morrison Springs in North Florida which has a bottom that best be left not disturbed. She was very mindful of not being on the actual bottom however she considered not being on the bottom with being free and clear to kick like hell. During a surface interval I mentioned to her that she had really stirred the bottom up with her kicks to which she replied that "it must have been someone else because she was never on the bottom". I know when to pick my battles so I just said" I think you may be mistaken" and left it at that.

There was a DM and instructor with us and the DM had a a video camera so I quietly asked him to video her on the next dive silting it up "not on the bottom" to which he did.

I knew the subject would come back up over beers that evening and when it did the DM rolled the tape to which she was mortified. She truly believed that she had not done it and was being careful until she saw how much silt her fin kicks around the bottom had disturbed.

I say all this to say that people rarely think that they are doing wrong or poorly unless they are very self aware or it is pointed out to them by some other means so I am never afraid to mention it to someone somehow, usually in casual conversation maybe even making myself the bad guy of the story. "Man that was a great dive but for some reason I had trouble a couple of times where my lack of buoyancy had me close to hitting the bottom." I don't mind being the butt of the example if it helps illustrate the overall point.

(also sorry to whoever else was there at Morrison Springs that day. You really had crappy visibility)