Experienced Divers: Will You Dive With Newbies?

[OE2X]

...yes I do, and sometimes I should buy the lunch.
The real question is, sir, would you take a noob diving on your boat??

On my boat?
Having faced that question before, I would say no, unless I'd done a shore dive with them first. When boat diving I need to know that they can do their stops without any visual reference. Even at Hat Island, occasionally we come up away from the anchor line. While it's only 50' deep, I have to know that my newly certified diver won't lose control of their buoyancy and breach.

BTW - How do you like my countdown timer?

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

[newb ? alert]Just curious, wouldn't a canister light still be nice in warm clear water for bringing out colors? Granted, it's not as necessary as here in the PNW, but wouldn't it still be usefull?[/newb ? alert]

Only at night. My last trip to Bonaire I brought my Terkel ... and even at 50 fsw in the daytime you couldn't even see the beam unless you got the lighthead within about a foot of the subject.

On night dives though, you could light up the whole reef !!!

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Hank49]

Not only that ... but the canister light just screams "warm water noob" to everyone on the boat ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Good you guys have a sense of humor. If I was to dive up there with you, you would be whispering to each other, "did you see that guy from Belize floating upside down in his dry suit? hahahahaha". At Deception Pass (my friend who works here from Seattle has pictures of it) you would have to hold my hand while I'm screaming for my mama.

 

[OE2X]

Good you guys have a sense of humor. If I was to dive up there with you, you would be whispering to each other, "did you see that guy from Belize floating upside down in his dry suit? hahahahaha".

A kindred spirit. I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one that likes to float upside down in my drysuit. Hey Bob and Pug - there are others who use this technique.

At Deception Pass (my friend who works here from Seattle has pictures of it) you would have to hold my hand while I'm screaming for my mama.

For 45 minutes all you'll hear me do is aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! As I scream my way through the drift dive.

 

[Rick Inman]

BTW - How do you like my countdown timer?

http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?p=951227#post951227

 

[al1]

Sure would.
Diving with newbies gives them the opportunity to learn from a variety of divers.

 

[Uncle Pug]

For those of you who feel it is a moral obligation to dive with n00bs and are upset with those who would chose not to:

Please respond to these questions in this thread: link

 

[MikeFerrara]

When I'm diving alot (which isn't lately) I often plan local outings with new(er) divers. It's as much a social outing as a dive outing and I enjoy it. If it helps them out, so much the better. Other times I go out to dive with my wife and/or son and we exclude others in those plans. On the local dives I'm not concerned with having a dive cut short because I've seen it all before and it's a simple matter to hop out, let some one switch tanks and jump right back in anyway.

The only charters we really dive on are on the great lakes wrecks and there aren't usually divers on those trips who are less experienced than we are. Where we have the biggest conflicts is in cave diving. We have freinds who aren't ready for some of the dives we do and other freinds who are doing dives that we aren't ready for (or don't want to be ready for). Just about every one is new someplace or in comparison to some one.

 

[Doc Intrepid]

I'll go on practice dives with new divers. No problems at all. Particularly if a new diver is getting ready for an offshore charter I'll go diving with them to get them familiarized with procedures, their equipment, communications, and the rest of their skills foundation. Practice dives are the place to learn, and I don't mind spending time with new divers to help them along. This is where the whole "we were all beginner's once" idea comes full circle, IMHO.

I won't jump into deep ocean dives with new divers unless I've practiced with them previously. If I'm familiar with them, we've practiced together first, etc., then I'll dive with them on deeper dives. If not, there are too many unknowns and variables possible in the ocean, including how they might react should they have "issues", for me to be comfortable with them.

With respect to considering the expense of paying for charter boat slots or remote vacation dives in deciding to dive with new divers, IMHO this decision does not only come down to a cost/benefit analysis. There is a safety issue that should be considered as well. It's important to recall that any diver could die on any dive at any time - and it may not always be my buddy who needs rescuing. I wouldn't dive with an unknown new diver, on a vacation or a charter boat, who is obviously exhibiting signs of incompetence or inexperience - because if I were the one who blacked out underwater I'd want a measure of confidence that my new buddy could successfully respond to that emergency. If I don't feel that a dive buddy could safely perform the dive, for whatever reason, then IMO its best not to dive with them.

FWIW. YMMV.

 

[bubblelogist]

usually I'm happy to help newbies, or less experienced divers. I was the newby once and learned a lot diving with experienced divers, and continue to learn. Diving with newbies is also a way to learn. But once on a charter we paid we were 2 buddies who planned a deep dive in cold water (100 feet in 45 degrees water) we had the right equipment and a good dive plan (drysuits, big tanks with H valves) and then the charter operator decide to join a third diver with us. He had a 5 mm wetsuit, his last dive was 3 years ago in warm water. We refused to change our initial dive plan. we offered the guy a short dip at the end of the dive (the site was on a cliff, it started at about 20 ') Finally he didn't dive because he din't have enough weight to get down. actually I think it was dangerous from the dive operator to allowed the guy in this conditions, and i'M happy that I never came on a charter whitout a dive buddy.