Doing it Solo - DIS?

[TomP]

Disclaimer: This is not a shot – cheap, thinly veiled, otherwise – at DIR. Nor is it an inference that DIR is in any way relevant to Solo diving. I’m simply and admittedly hoping to generate interest by co-opting its name recognition.

Okay, down to business. I thought it might be fun to have a thread where active solo divers can describe their view of:
• What a solo diver is
• Skill level/training needed
• Redundant gas supply, if and when
• Limits to solo diving
Above is what quickly comes to mind but its not intended as a complete list or even a check list.

Here’s my 2 cents…

You are a diving solo when you make a conscious decision to dive without a buddy and accept responsibility for your own safety during the dive irrespective of whether other divers may be diving in the same area.

I think divers need whatever training is commensurate with the complexity of the diving they plan to do. Most of my dives are in the 90 – 130 foot range and are deco dives. I’m DSAT (PADI) Tec Deep certified and that provided a great basis for solo from both a skills and configuration perspective. I’m also SDI solo certified. I took the SDI class primarily because the local quarry requires a solo cert.

I almost always dive with my doubles and, except in the Caribbean, always carry an independent gas supply. I wouldn’t impose any limits on solo diving but think each individual should consider what makes sense for them. I dive solo so I can dive more and practice more – it is a means and not an end to me.

 

[dugout]

Okay, down to business. I thought it might be fun to have a thread where active solo divers can describe their view of:
• What a solo diver is
• Skill level/training needed
• Redundant gas supply, if and when
• Limits to solo diving
Above is what quickly comes to mind but its not intended as a complete list or even a check list.

Okay, I'll play.
A solo diver is free of the responsibilities assumed when paired with a buddy. A diver can become solo, as planned, at any point in a dive. Start, Finish, for a period in between, or the entire dive.

I feel a diver should be comfortable with planning a dive and diving the plan. They should have enough experience to tackle issues as challenges rather than threats.

The issue of redundant Gas supply is based upon the diver and the dive. Again, plan the dive and dive the plan.

Limit goes back to comfort and experience. I've been diving for 30 years. I'm not comfortable deep. It's cold, it's dark, it's colorless, and I didn't lose anything down there I need to go back and get. I can count the planned deco dives I have done on one hand and none of them were solo. Obviously, I'm not planning deep solo dives any time soon. Others may be perfectly content and find joy in dragging half a dive shop down with them and spending an hour or more hanging off a down line. To each his own. I don't feel there is any dive that shouldn't be done solo if the diver is fully prepared for the dive and skilled enough to plan it and execute it.

Good thread.

 

[drbill]

To me it is not just the skill level and training that matters. Of great importance IMHO is whether the individual's dive experience includes the following:

A good understanding of their physiological response to nitrogen loading and degree of impairment due to narcosis

A sufficient number of emergency situations so they know whether they respond to such emergencies calmly and rationally, or have a tendency to panic.

A diver with hundreds of dives who is not familiar with the first, or experienced in the second, may not be truly ready to solo dive.

 

[Nemrod]

Well, I am trying to actually make something in the shop now but---

Solo, (my definition) is when I get in the water alone, dive alone and get out alone--I am alone. If I get on a boat or arrive at a beach dive with friends, even if we don't specifically team up then it is nonetheless a buddy dive. While that sort of disoraganized gaggle certainly takes on some charateristrics of a solo dive --as has been pointed out by you guys--you might also need to render assistence to one of your--uh--buddys (yep) so therefore it is still buddy diving and therefore as a good buddy you should be equipped to render that assistence with octapus etc and therefore not relevent to the solo forum.

A loose gaggle of disorganized divers ambling about the bottom is not solo, it is just a not very well organized group dive. If you arrive with them, dive with them and leave with them then they are your buddys--that is my definition.

Solo is alone, arrive alone, dive alone, leave alone. The Lone Ranger was not solo, he had Tonto and a trick horse, he was a Buddy Ranger, not the Lone Ranger!

N

 

[Halthron]

• What a solo diver is
• Skill level/training needed
• Redundant gas supply, if and when
• Limits to solo diving

Last week was the first time I was able to take my newly minted OW diver daughter out. Remembering my skill level when I was brand new and then adding on the teen ability to be easily distracted, I knew that I was essentially diving solo. While I want her trained to a competent and reliable level, I realize that I can only push so fast before it becomes "too boring".

To be a solo diver, you just need to be alone. To be the functional equivalent of a solo diver, you just need to be paired up with someone who is unreliable for one reason or another.

It doesn't take any skill to hop in by yourself but it certainly does in order to return reliably. The bare minimum to be would be Nitrox training so people can unnderstand the difference between narked and oxtox and how to analyze a bottle.

Diving without a redundant gas suppoly is like driving without wearing a seat belt or having an air bag. It's safe as long as something doesn't happen but it's only a matter of time. When I took my daughter out, she asked why I was carrying "a pony" (AL80 slung). IMO, any responsible solo diver carries an extra tank of at least .25 cu ft per foot of max depth.

Are there/should there be limits? No. As long as someone is otherwise competent, why not?

I once heard a guy say that since he was single and his parents were dead, it didn't matter how he dove. Regardless for any other family or friends, I started to think about the rescue team and any other people who may encounter the body.

 

[Nemrod]

"To be a solo diver, you just need to be alone. To be the functional equivalent of a solo diver, you just need to be paired up with someone who is unreliable for one reason or another."

Well, I think that is how all this began. If your actually solo then you don't need an octapus on any length of hose but you may need redundancy depending on conditions and depth etc. If your buddy diving but "functionally" solo because the buddy is your daughter or a newbie or a stranger or a gaggle of friends group diving then you need an octapus because "funtionally" solo or not your still buddy diving and need to be able to support them and you do have their tank as your redundancy for yourself--potentially.

Why do we keep discussing buddy diving of various sorts and trying to relate it to solo? if I am diving with my neice, newbie or not, I got a buddy and I need to take care of her/him/whoever and vice versa. The rig I would use for that would not be the one I solo with.

N

 

[divemaster_jim]

"To be a solo diver, you just need to be alone.
N

I agree with that statement in it's most general terms, the only thing I would add is that training and comfort level go hand & hand with it.

The rest of his statement I agree with completely,

 

[DeepBound]

I agree with Dr.Bill, about having enough experience with a variety of real problems. That way you know what can go wrong, and hopefully you've been forced to face the reality that diving can kill you, and will kill you if you are too complacent.

I don't know about the other one about understanding your reaction to nitrogen loading... I guess I'm not there yet

 

[TomP]

Okay, I think we are running into the same issue again, only this time with alone vs solo.

To my view, if you have a buddy you are not solo diving irrespective of the skill level of your buddy. If you reasonably believe you can't rely on your buddy in an emergency then you should be as self sufficient as possible but that just makes you a responsible diver not a solo diver. As long as there is any level of agreed mutual accountability you are not solo diving.

I understand and respect Nemrod's gaggle view and we've already agreed to disagree. The fact that I share the same means of transportation to a dive site does not make anyone my buddy. I may not be alone on the site but I am still solo.

 

[TomP]

Last week was the first time I was able to take my newly minted OW diver daughter out. Remembering my skill level when I was brand new and then adding on the teen ability to be easily distracted, I knew that I was essentially diving solo. While I want her trained to a competent and reliable level, I realize that I can only push so fast before it becomes "too boring".

To be a solo diver, you just need to be alone. To be the functional equivalent of a solo diver, you just need to be paired up with someone who is unreliable for one reason or another.

It doesn't take any skill to hop in by yourself but it certainly does in order to return reliably. The bare minimum to be would be Nitrox training so people can unnderstand the difference between narked and oxtox and how to analyze a bottle.

Diving without a redundant gas suppoly is like driving without wearing a seat belt or having an air bag. It's safe as long as something doesn't happen but it's only a matter of time. When I took my daughter out, she asked why I was carrying "a pony" (AL80 slung). IMO, any responsible solo diver carries an extra tank of at least .25 cu ft per foot of max depth.

Are there/should there be limits? No. As long as someone is otherwise competent, why not?

I once heard a guy say that since he was single and his parents were dead, it didn't matter how he dove. Regardless for any other family or friends, I started to think about the rescue team and any other people who may encounter the body.

I don't want to take my own thread off on a tangent but what was the profile of the dive? An AL80 as a stage bottle seems like a bit much.

I'm not sure that Nitrox is particularly relevant to Solo diving but I do agree that its a good practice to analyze any bottle that is filled from a system that has the potential to introduce additional O2.