River diving

[john844]

My diving buddy and I are wanting to start diving in a local river. We dive together regularly and are very comfortable in the water. We are aware of the obvious dangers of entanglement, low vis and current. We don't want to learn too many things the hard way and would love to hear any bits of advise you have learned along the way.

Are there any special emergency skills that we should practice/perfect before venturing into the river?

Thanks,
John

 

[M_Bipartitus]

More than specific skills, I think a proper plan is necessary. Such as agreeing on, and closely following, a dive plan and emergency plan. The specifics depend on the river and situation. For example, are you towing a dive flag, or is it too much of an entanglement hazard? Is it safe to surface in the river channel? My river diving instructor has a site with some info on how they do it. For them, the river channel is a major shipping lane with freighters, so surfacing mid-river is a not a desirable option.

River Diving Technique

 

[john844]

More than specific skills, I think a proper plan is necessary.

I agree with this completely and we do follow this today.

I will take a look at your link. Thanks.

 

[memorex77]

I certainly agree that you should not do this without proper training. The risk is way too high. On the other hand, it's sooooo cool that it is well worth the effort!! Have fun and do it!

 

[SuPrBuGmAn]

I guess it would really depend on the river, high currents, depths, black water??? If your profile is up-to-date, and some of these are factors... I might just get more time in the water before trying to tackle any of it.

 

[potato cod]

Is there a local dive shop you can ask? They would likely be able to share their knowledge of your local rivers, the particular hazards of the rivers, where good places to enter and exit are, interesting things to look for, etc.

I found an orientation from our local shop was key when learning to dive the Niagara. They gave us an estimate of the time it would take to reach the exit point, made sure we knew where to be in the channel to avoid boats (and ending up in Canada), let us know to be alert for logs and other debris (which come up fast in the low vis), etc.

Have fun!

 

[Doc Harry]

Try a search, this question has been asked and addressed many, many times.

 

[john844]

I see posters every day getting their hands slapped for not searching, so I did some homework before posting this question. It might have been posted before, but I did not find the search criteria to reveal those posts. My appologies.

The river in mind is the Tennessee river and has an average depth of 15 feet. It is pretty shallow and has no rapids. The viz is anywhere from 2 feet to 15 feet until the bottom is disturbed. I have found some local divers that gave us some pointers about desired CFM for this river to have enough flow to clear the stirred up silt. The primary contact we were going to start using as a mentor has had medical issues and is not able to dive for a while.

I guess this does seem like I am trying to learn how to scuba through the internet, but that is not my intent. I am trying to expand my horizons and learn from others.

When the weather and water temps warm up so more, the local diving scene will improve and become more active. At that time we will have more opportunities to work with the regular river divers.

I enjoy hearing different views of what people find important about the diving they do. I used to be a river junkie spending every free moment on the river kayaking, rafting and free diving the smaller rapids looking for treasures. I understand the power of current and how the hydraulics are created around obstacles.

I have about 40 dives this year, so my profile is a little outdated. The local diving season is about to start, and we are looking forward to seeing more divers out there.

Thank you for the concern and the information provided so far.

 

[AndyNZ]

I guess it would really depend on the river, high currents, depths, black water??? If your profile is up-to-date, and some of these are factors... I might just get more time in the water before trying to tackle any of it.

Definitely. Some rivers are entirely straightforward.... one of our guys put this video together of a recent drift dive down one of our rivers, 20m+ vis, no boat traffic. It's a great fun little dive!

Tech Dive NZ - Waikato River Drift Dive

I see posters every day getting their hands slapped for not searching, so I did some homework before posting this question. It might have been posted before, but I did not find the search criteria to reveal those posts. My appologies.

Don't apologise. The search feature is rubbish and barely (if ever) works. If it were usable, the "use the search" criticism is fair.... but I've never got anything but the most simple searches to work, and then you get so many threads and posts returned that it defeats the purpose.

 

[SuPrBuGmAn]

Definitely. Some rivers are entirely straightforward.... one of our guys put this video together of a recent drift dive down one of our rivers, 20m+ vis, no boat traffic. It's a great fun little dive!

Tech Dive NZ - Waikato River Drift Dive

Thats pretty cool, looks like fun, and it looks like they're moving pretty good. Got a couple semi-clearish water ways around here(mostly in times of drought), but nothing that good when the waters are that deep.