Missed the boat...Underwater strobe what distance is it visible?

[wetb4igetinthewater]

One of these is what I had in mind.
TekTite Multifunction LED 3500 Strobe Light | Dive Gear Express®

I have it and set it up for the anchor when I set up a dive float. In the Puget Sound in a dive site used often for dive training (i.e., silted up), I think I can discern it at 20 feet or so. Not very far.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

TekTite strobes are quite junk. If you want really a good strobe it's going to cost. This is best I have used. Trojan diving strobe eXtreme It is expensive though.

I may be interested in that. Thanks for the link.

 

[oly5050user]

Learn to Use your compass. Keep an eye out for features on bottom during your way out and then back. Track distance traveled by air consumed if at a constant depth, use time as a way to measure distance. Keep a mental picture in your head on your position in relation to boat/shore

 

[scubadada]

...In curaçao, we used a smb slightly inflated attached to a weight to mark where we went over the wall...

...IF we are talking about returning along a reef structure, your “small weight long ribbon” idea, that’s kind of my method.

a 1# weight, a 15’ string, a plastic water bottle.

i plunk it in 20fsw (or whatever my return path depth is) and stumble into it at 20’. Aha...turn left.

I do this every time in Bonaire or wherever shore diving.

Failsafe. No batteries, all I have to pack is a string...

I don't know about Grand Cayman or Curacao. This has recently been discussed regarding Bonaire and you are not to place anything on the reef Shore Dive Experience Levels without Guide Edit: according to Shore Diving Guide to Cayman Brac, this practice is allowed/encouraged for shore diving there

Hi @Stuart99 If I were to find myself 300 yds from the boat with a swim I did not want to make, I would deploy my SMB, if I had not already done so for the ascent, and wait for the boat to pick me up. I might also use my Dive Alert if I thought it would do any good. If it was relatively dark, cloudy or late, I might point my DGX 600 button light at the boat in strobe mode. Did you signal the boat, or did you decide just to swim back?

I carry this with me on night dives, particularly drifts in SE FL. TekTite LED 200 Strobe Light | Dive Gear Express® It does not seem like junk to me. I've had it for several years, works perfectly, very bright. I've only really deployed it a couple of times when I ended up reasonably far from the boat in brisk current. They tell me it is easily visible and facilitates pick up

 

[Stuart99]

Thanks for your advice everyone.
Will add your advice to our club discussion. I think you are right in that in daylight it will probably be next to useless. I think a reef marker as discussed is the answer. Though again we should still navigate as normal just in case the marker gets picked up falls off or gets chucked into the abyss. I wouldn't use it instead of proper navigation.
At the time I was not using my own kit, and looking after someone who had not dived for many years, in a bit of current.... The extra task loading made a routine dive more difficult. All of which mean't I didn't plan the dive and think it through as well as I should have.
We all make mistakes but the main thing is to at least make different ones.
The reason the boat couldn't pick up is a longer story, we carry smb's etc.....best left for another thread. But also on the agenda tonight over a beer.
Thank you.

 

[flyboy08]

If the boat couldn’t pick you up, it was the wrong operator to dive with...I imagine you won’t be using them again.

 

[rsingler]

We used a strobe tethered to a weight as a rally point in Bonaire for night dives. From the shore, it was easy to see the divers' lights and that strobe from many hundreds of feet away at night. But the slant range only included ~40' of water.
Despite 80' vis during the day, at night we couldn't see the strobe as a rally point directional aid further out than 200-300 ft, altho' as we swam to where we thought it was, it indeed came into view at 200-300 feet, so maybe we were indeed picking up a hint further out.
But as a "which way?" assist if your nav is way off, or you get turned around, it's not much help. More like "alter course that way" when you're heading back and are not seeing familiar landmarks in the dark as you get close to where you think home is. Then it'll help you at the end.

But in daylight? Underwater? No, it won't help at all.

 

[Diving Dubai]

If the boat couldn’t pick you up, it was the wrong operator to dive with...I imagine you won’t be using them again.

Oh do pay attention. It was a BSAC Club boat, not commercial operator

No doubt the club DO will be having a word in someones ear

 

[flyboy08]

Oh do pay attention. It was a BSAC Club boat, not commercial operator

No doubt the club DO will be having a word in someones ear

An “operator” is an operator. What’s the difference?

 

[Stuart99]

We used a strobe tethered to a weight as a rally point in Bonaire for night dives. From the shore, it was easy to see the divers' lights and that strobe from many hundreds of feet away at night. But the slant range only included ~40' of water.
Despite 80' vis during the day, at night we couldn't see the strobe as a rally point directional aid further out than 200-300 ft, altho' as we swam to where we thought it was, it indeed came into view at 200-300 feet, so maybe we were indeed picking up a hint further out.
But as a "which way?" assist if your nav is way off, or you get turned around, it's not much help. More like "alter course that way" when you're heading back and are not seeing familiar landmarks in the dark as you get close to where you think home is. Then it'll help you at the end.

But in daylight? Underwater? No, it won't help at all.

Thanks for the confirmation, We had a good discussion last night on improving our dive safety.