Hello, SB! I'm a deaf diver living in Overland Park, KS, and I have a wife living in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. I've dived several times, both in the Honduran waters (usually Roatan) and in the lakes around the Mid-Western USA (mostly in northern Arkansas and western Missouri.)
For my entire life, I've been very fascinated by underwater world, and jumped into scuba diving last year and couldn't be much more happier!
However... I've noticed that everybody are required to verbally communicate about whatever they wanted to say on the surface BEFORE they enter into the water, then they're pretty much "mute" beyond doing some basic gestures such as "Out of air", "Ok? Ok.", "Turtle", etc hand signals. If people wanted to say anything more complicated than that while underwater, they have only two choices: Swim up to the surface and talk before swimming back down underwater, or bring a slate with them.
How I communicate with my instructor, on the other hand... During my AOW, Rescue, and DM trainings in the water, my instructor and I just kneel down on the bottom in the water and communicate using sign language as to what I will need to be doing, and complete the task, entirely without having to surface to explain what tasks we need to do.
During the dives out in the open water, while we're underwater, we're able to chat, form plan, etc, without having to swim up and talk. Here's couple of examples:
While I was doing a search and recovery exercise with another person that knows sign language, we did a sweep, then when I felt as if we've been going in circle, I simply stopped my buddy and we signed, "I think we're going in circle, let's going that way." "Are you sure we're going in circle?" "Yeah, I've seen that rock before, I'm pretty sure." "Okay, let's go."
Or when we're in the ocean in Honduras, we talked underwater, "I saw a turtle over there, it was awesome!" "What color was it? Green?" "I think dark green, with yellow spots." "Cool, I haven't seen that one, where is it?" "Over there, behind that reef." "Okay, thanks, I'll BRB!"
You wouldn't be able to say all of these with just gestures taught in the classes. All you would be saying is "Turtle" (pointing). Or fumbling around with slate trying to write stuff down while floating mid-water. I don't even know how you would tell your partner that you're going in circle underwater and to go the other way?
Here's an important one - what if you're allergic to a sting from certain fish? Suppose your buddy got stung by one, he would be able to sign to you while underwater, "I got stung by a fish, I'm allergic to the sting, we should surface before my symptoms gets worse." then if the buddy passes out halfway up to the surface, you already know WHY he passed out and would be able to treat him right away on the surface without trying to find out the cause of his passing out.
I'm going to make a post about this somewhere else on the board later, but I would like to start a project to develop a type of sign language designed for underwater that would be easy to pick up and use by anybody, anywhere. (I can't just teach people American Sign Language, because people in, say, Honduras or Thailand doesn't know American Sign Language at all.) I'm hopeful I would gain some support for the project on the SB. I'll talk about this some more this weekend.
I was fortunate to have an instructor that believes in my project enough to allow me to get AOW, Rescue, DM, and various specialties for free or for cheap in order to encourage me to develop my diving skills and to develop my project.
Well, I should stop this long post, thanks for reading!
For my entire life, I've been very fascinated by underwater world, and jumped into scuba diving last year and couldn't be much more happier!
However... I've noticed that everybody are required to verbally communicate about whatever they wanted to say on the surface BEFORE they enter into the water, then they're pretty much "mute" beyond doing some basic gestures such as "Out of air", "Ok? Ok.", "Turtle", etc hand signals. If people wanted to say anything more complicated than that while underwater, they have only two choices: Swim up to the surface and talk before swimming back down underwater, or bring a slate with them.
How I communicate with my instructor, on the other hand... During my AOW, Rescue, and DM trainings in the water, my instructor and I just kneel down on the bottom in the water and communicate using sign language as to what I will need to be doing, and complete the task, entirely without having to surface to explain what tasks we need to do.
During the dives out in the open water, while we're underwater, we're able to chat, form plan, etc, without having to swim up and talk. Here's couple of examples:
While I was doing a search and recovery exercise with another person that knows sign language, we did a sweep, then when I felt as if we've been going in circle, I simply stopped my buddy and we signed, "I think we're going in circle, let's going that way." "Are you sure we're going in circle?" "Yeah, I've seen that rock before, I'm pretty sure." "Okay, let's go."
Or when we're in the ocean in Honduras, we talked underwater, "I saw a turtle over there, it was awesome!" "What color was it? Green?" "I think dark green, with yellow spots." "Cool, I haven't seen that one, where is it?" "Over there, behind that reef." "Okay, thanks, I'll BRB!"
You wouldn't be able to say all of these with just gestures taught in the classes. All you would be saying is "Turtle" (pointing). Or fumbling around with slate trying to write stuff down while floating mid-water. I don't even know how you would tell your partner that you're going in circle underwater and to go the other way?
Here's an important one - what if you're allergic to a sting from certain fish? Suppose your buddy got stung by one, he would be able to sign to you while underwater, "I got stung by a fish, I'm allergic to the sting, we should surface before my symptoms gets worse." then if the buddy passes out halfway up to the surface, you already know WHY he passed out and would be able to treat him right away on the surface without trying to find out the cause of his passing out.
I'm going to make a post about this somewhere else on the board later, but I would like to start a project to develop a type of sign language designed for underwater that would be easy to pick up and use by anybody, anywhere. (I can't just teach people American Sign Language, because people in, say, Honduras or Thailand doesn't know American Sign Language at all.) I'm hopeful I would gain some support for the project on the SB. I'll talk about this some more this weekend.
I was fortunate to have an instructor that believes in my project enough to allow me to get AOW, Rescue, DM, and various specialties for free or for cheap in order to encourage me to develop my diving skills and to develop my project.
Well, I should stop this long post, thanks for reading!
