Drinking & Diving

[Thalassamania]

Multi-variate Statistics

 

[billmosel]

ONCE AGAIN... This thread has gotten way off topic. 1 beer with lunch... A lot of water between dives... with a 3 HOUR SI..? Nothing but RECREATIONAL diving, no heavy lifting, no strong currents, no work because that's not rec diving, just plain ole take it easy, have fun, WATCH YOUR COMPUTER diving.

Yes, anything can happen on any dive and you should be able to handle all situations but as was someone stated earlier in this thread, driving a vehicle in say, NJ where I live, can be one of the most dangerous things you can do.. sober. In the State of NJ you can operate a vehicle with a BAC of .07 but, you can't dive with a BAC of .01?

LOGIC somewhere is missing. Whether it is within the lawmakers (which seems to be always a given) or within the dive community. So far no one has given me any studies which states that having 1 beer and diving 3 hours later is going to have any effect on me whether it is DCS or getting DCS because of dehydration.

Y'all can have your ADVANCE discussion of how 1 beer will affect you when you are doing a tec dive but this was not the intention of this thread.

I agree that having more than one beer, within a certain time period, and doing more than what you would NORMALLY do during a TYPICAL REC DIVE, could hinder yourself of being more alert to a certain problem or maybe having a problem with dehydration because you did not hydrate yourself properly. Hydration is a valid point, but if I hydrate myself properly this should not be an issue.

That was not the intention of this thread. PLEASE READ THE ORIGINAL THREAD.

I have read this entire thread and have gotten more information than I originally wanted to get although it has been been very informative.. I have gotten the point.. Dive what you're comfortable with, and be sure your buddy is onboard.

Thanks to all that have contributed to this thread.

 

[Bubbletrubble]

Yes, anything can happen on any dive and you should be able to handle all situations but as was someone stated earlier in this thread, driving a vehicle in say, NJ where I live, can be one of the most dangerous things you can do.. sober. In the State of NJ you can operate a vehicle with a BAC of .07 but, you can't dive with a BAC of .01?

LOGIC somewhere is missing. Whether it is within the lawmakers (which seems to be always a given) or within the dive community. So far no one has given me any studies which states that having 1 beer and diving 3 hours later is going to have any effect on me whether it is DCS or getting DCS because of dehydration.

@billmosel: It's really not a question of logic. There are no laws that state it is illegal for divers to have some alcohol in their system while diving. The dive community has no hard-and-fast rules about this, either. The dive tables and deco algorithms used by dive computers don't take into consideration the possibility of having any alcohol in the diver's system. It appears as though liveaboard ops are the ones mandating this as a precautionary measure (out of a concern for liability). I would think that you should take up this issue with them.

You're placing the burden of proof on others to demonstrate that having any alcohol at all increases DCS or other dive-related risk. The dive op would probably assert that it's your responsibility to demonstrate to them that some alcohol (let's say a very small amount: BAC 0.01) in your system does not increase DCS or other dive-related risk. I agree that no one has studied this in enough detail yet. If drinking while on a dive trip is that important to you, I recommend you secure the funding for the research and get it done one way or another.

I didn't realize that this was such a controversial subject. Thanks for starting the thread.

 

[DocVikingo]

I don't know why you want to make it so complicated... if consuming alcohol <24 hours before a dive had a significant impact on DCS incidence, then the bend rate at Puerto Galera, Cozumel & etc would be double or triple that of LOBs or the Red Sea or wherever else alcohol intake is restricted

Hey Tortuga68,

Surely you jest?

Sharm is the main diving hub on the Red Sea, followed by Hurghada. If you think there's any problem in locating convenient and copious alcoholic beverages in these venues, you either haven't been to them or had your eyes closed when you visited. They have scads of restaurants that serve alcohol, plentiful bars (some of which stay open almost all night) and a more than adequate number of liquor shops.

Regards,

DocVikingo

 

[shoredivr]

I lost my Dad and brother to alcohol abuse, and two other brothers have ruined their lives because of it.

It runs in my family too, so there are lots of good reasons for me not to drink. And one of them is more money to spend on diving.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

ONCE AGAIN... This thread has gotten way off topic. 1 beer with lunch... A lot of water between dives... with a 3 HOUR SI..? Nothing but RECREATIONAL diving, no heavy lifting, no strong currents, no work because that's not rec diving, just plain ole take it easy, have fun, WATCH YOUR COMPUTER diving.

That's what I love about ScubaBoard ... someone asks if it's OK to have a beer with lunch three hours before a recreational dive and the thread immediately gets hijacked by people who assume the dude's an alcoholic who's going to be binge drinking and then doing a tech dive while drunk. Everything gets taken to extremes by a handful of people with a God complex and a need to demonstrate how knowledgeable they are.

Folks ... if one beer with lunch three hours before your dive is going to increase your DCS risk by anything but a statistically insignificant measure, then perhaps the beer isn't your problem ... how you're planning and executing your dive is!

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[vladimir]

It appears as though liveaboard ops are the ones mandating this as a precautionary measure (out of a concern for liability). I would think that you should take up this issue with them.

As a practical matter, it would be difficult to enforce, say, a one-hour-per-beer waiting period, even if that was a generally accepted safe threshold. The no-diving-after-drinking rule on liveaboards works well: it discourages early drinking--which probably curtails excessive drinking (as I recall from college); it's a clear rule that doesn't leave much room for interpretation or negotiation; and it seems to have emerged as an industry standard, in my experience.

 

[dmoore19]

I have sympathy for those who have lost loved ones or suffered because of alcoholism.

However, please do not put those of us than can enjoy 1 beer or 1 cocktail or 1 glass of wine and not turn it into a drunk into the same category as an alcoholic. There is a difference.

As for the topic at hand. It is all about mitigating risk isn't it?

Would I consume alcohol prior to a tech dive? (Not a tech diver but the answer for me is no) Should I not drink 24 hours prior to snorkeling? (I see no problem with that) Extremes I know but none the less I have formulated a plan for risk mitigation. Some of you would not dive while depending on a dive computer, some of you dive with a computer but would not do so without a back up computer. What do you base these decisions on? Experience? Is there a scientific proof that diving without redundant dive computers is unsafe or is that just your opinion. Is it your opinion or is there scientific proof that one should only dive using the tables and square profiles?

I can understand not wanting to get commode hugging, knee knocking drunk the night before any dive. 1-2 Beers the night before a dive I see no problem with. Having 1 beer with lunch 3 hours prior to a dive, I am still not convinced either way from what is posted here. I could tell you what my thoughts are about it but that would only serve to add yet another scientifically unproven opinion posted. Even if there was undisputed scientific evidence proving one side or the other someone would find fault with the evidence.

I really do like reading this thread, there is some good information to be gleaned from it. At this point the decision to have or not have a beer 3 hours before a dive is still a matter of self imposed risk mitigation. (unless of course the situation involves being on a liveaboard or a dive op and following their rules)

 

[Tortuga68]

Sharm is the main diving hub on the Red Sea, followed by Hurghada. If you think there's any problem in locating convenient and copious alcoholic beverages in these venues, you either haven't been to them or had your eyes closed when you visited. They have scads of restaurants that serve alcohol, plentiful bars (some of which stay open almost all night) and a more than adequate number of liquor shops

You totally missed or avoided my point which is that comparing DCS statistics from somewhere with high alcohol consumption the night prior to diving & somewhere with low consumption would give you an indication of whether there was any basis to the '24 hour rule'

FYI when I said the Red Sea I was thinking of Jeddah in Saudi Arabia - somewhere I have been & dived - but pick whatever locations you feel meet the criteria and have discernable data available

I notice you dropped the topic of what the average persons BAC would be 3 hours after 1 beer

It is somewhat frustrating that you continue to fail to understand what it is that I am talking about... I doubt that there is mouch problem with having one beer at dinner and then making a physiologically easy dive the next day... It is quiet [sic] possible to plan to make a physiologically easy dive yet have it turn into a cold, deep and arduous because something goes wrong

It's not that I fail to understand what you're talking about, it's that I don't think it's germaine to the discussion at hand. Although it's quite possible for *some* dives to turn into a cold, deep & arduous event well beyond NDLs, it's not possible for many dives, it's not a common occurence anyway, and if it does happen to people who started out on a recreational dive, they're probably going to get bent anyway regardless of whether they had a beer or three over dinner the night before or not, because they're not equipped or trained to deal with it

I'm not encouraging everyone to start boozing and diving regardless, I just don't believe there is any statistical support for the argument that consuming alcohol within 24 hours of a dive leads to increase risk of DCS compared to not having consumed alcohol, even taking into account your scenario

A recreational dive in the Bahamas on a site with a 20m hard bottom is *not* going to turn into "a cold, deep & arduous event well beyond NDLs". If you cave dive or whatever then fine you use a different set of rules, that's not what we're talking about here

 

[DocVikingo]

FYI when I said the Red Sea I was thinking of Jeddah in Saudi Arabia - somewhere I have been & dived....

....if consuming alcohol <24 hours before a dive had a significant impact on DCS incidence, then the bend rate at Puerto Galera, Cozumel & etc would be double or triple that of LOBs or the Red Sea or wherever else alcohol intake is restricted

Ahh, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. How silly of me--just the location everyone thinks of first when the topic of diving the Red Sea is mentioned on a message board located in the USA and primarily populated by divers from the Americas. While I can't say for certain, I'd venture that Sharm probably runs more dives in a week than Jeddah does in a year.

RE your "point," what is the point?

First, you can't sincerely think that comparing simple raw DCI rates between venues where alcohol is readily available vs those where it is not is going to tell you anything meaningful about drinking and diving. The potential confounds boggle the mind.

Second, and the above notwithstanding, it's extraordinarily improbable that funding for such a research project could be found. And, even if some organization was willing to fund it it would be next to impossible to steer a properly controlled study through an RRC and/or legal department.

Regards,

DocVikingo