Red or Yellow or Orange DSMBs

[Cave Diver]

I carry both a yellow and orange SMB on many open ocean dives.

 

[Peter_C]

Everything I have read, is orange is the easiest during mid day, but early morning and dusk leaves yellow for the win. I have an orange DSMB, and a yellow buoy for my current line.

 

[Doc]

At 8' long, I don't know if what I have is a lift bag or an SMB.

Whatever, for crazy current diving, that's the one I take along.

I mark it with a symbol in magic marker and show it to the boatsmen. I hang at 15' at the end of the drift. He knows it's one of his divers, and when he is ready, he comes near and then I ascend. An SMB is an excellent device for safely handing off to a boat in rough chop- then he can reel me (us) in on the hang line I have attached.

Hot pink would be ideal, but mine is orange.

If you are considering how the tube would appear "against the horizon" from the perspective of a boat driver- consider the geometry of his line of vision- likely any 5' SMB would be viewed against the water as a background.

The UK Health & Safety Executive commissioned a study by the Heriot-Watt University, on “Diver Emergency Surface Location Devices”, see here, however, a summary by the UK Diver magazine is here.

The Brits I dive with from PADI Sport Diver UK have these nifty collapsable staff flags. Quite smart.

 

[Quero]

The vast majority of my dives are daytime dives that are drifts, and orange is more visible to the boat crew than any other color widely available. For night diving, in cases in which I'm not returning to the anchor and will instead be picked up by a dinghy, I just shine my light up into the mouth of the orange SMB, making it glow.

 

[Ulfhedinn]

Someone once told me that Orange was for "hey I'm OK" and yellow was for "Oh crap something is wrong". Any truth to that?

 

[Them]

Someone once told me that Orange was for "hey I'm OK" and yellow was for "Oh crap something is wrong". Any truth to that?

From a boater perspective: No.

International orange is deeply associated with PFDs, life rafts, and SOLAS-related items in general. As in SOLAS specifies International Orange for some safety gear. It's also a common color for regatta buoys so it isn't unambiguously "emergency" related.

Yellow buoys mark caution areas...swimming areas, under water pipes, and the like.

If I was sailing and saw an orange object floating around I would probably try to get close enough to make a visual ID in case it was someone who had fallen overboard from another boat. If I saw a yellow object floating I would probably think there was some sort of hazard and avoid that area.

 

[randy88k5]

I was told by a boat captain once that he could see the standard bright orange better than the other widely available colors

 

[dbulmer]

Someone once told me that Orange was for "hey I'm OK" and yellow was for "Oh crap something is wrong". Any truth to that?

In the UK that would be the convention especially among the tech diving fraternity. Orange/red is this is where I am - yellow is basically a shout for help ie emergency as would 2 SMBS connected together but note it is a convention rather than a cast iron rule.

 

[OldNSalty]

Orange? Yellow? I have a zebra print for night dives-super sexy

 

[jimthediver]

My SMB is yellow. Way back (way, way back, pre-Loran, pre-GPS) when I was involved in Great Lakes wreck diving on deep wrecks way out beyond visible land marks we maintained submerged mooring bouys with small surface bouys on our favorite wrecks. We found what always, under all conditions made them easy to find was a yellow Prestone jug, even one lying flat on the water. We could see them from more than a mile away. If we were worried someone else might spot them we would use red. If we were really worried we would use white which even we had trouble finding!

Jim