Diving Solo - Discussion

[Siku]

Esom, your assertion that diving without a buddy is less safe if the diver has been warned of the danger is... absurd.

Why are you arguing this?

Similarly your repeated claim that the semantics of the term free-diving (e.g. whether it includes or excludes diving without proper safety) is a saftey issue.

Or have I misunderstood? Your posts seem wilfully obtuse and I struggle to understand or assign meaning to them.

I'm not picking a fight, just being honest. This is, after all, a matter of life and death.

 

[esom]

Similarly your repeated claim that the semantics of the term free-diving (e.g. whether it includes or excludes diving without proper safety) is a saftey issue.

do you have a different thread in mind? please quote

Or have I misunderstood? Your posts seem wilfully obtuse and I struggle to understand or assign meaning to them.

i believe our subject is complex. i take time to write as clear and on point as possible.

Esom, your assertion that diving without a buddy is less safe if the diver has been warned of the danger is... absurd.
Why are you arguing this?

please read through the thread fully and use the "quote" function. i feel i repeated myself already replying to sanso. i feel not quoted in the above, so i can not really answer your question apart from repeating again, take the time if you will

 

[sanso]

Esom, what siku writes is exactly what I understand from your posts.
You say you take time to write clearly. I suggest you use shorter, full sentences for a start. Much of what you write reads like incoherent rambling, which may well be a simple language issue.
What is your native language?

 

[Fondueset]

Esom, your assertion that diving without a buddy is less safe if the diver has been warned of the danger is... absurd.

Why are you arguing this?

Similarly your repeated claim that the semantics of the term free-diving (e.g. whether it includes or excludes diving without proper safety) is a saftey issue.

Or have I misunderstood? Your posts seem wilfully obtuse and I struggle to understand or assign meaning to them.

I'm not picking a fight, just being honest. This is, after all, a matter of life and death.

I agree - Esom seems to be making the argument that to be conflicted about the activity somehow makes one accident prone. I can understand this kind of thinking - but I do not agree with it.

On the other hand - among the things I disagree with in this thread are some of the comments about 'making us all look bad'. My instinctive reply to this does not belong in this context. Freediving is something I DO. Your values and judgements alluding to my needing to conform to your expectations are something best kept to yourself - be they 'reasonable' expectations or not. I do this to relax, not to satisfy your criteria.
Personally I am normally much less relaxed when diving with a buddy. This is because I am usually the most experienced diver and feel responsible for them. However - when I am diving with very competent divers (like Connor) I feel very relaxed and have even more fun.

My first Ice dive was with scuba divers - I was the only free diver and was invited to join them on a wreck beneath several feet of ice and in about 15 meters of water. I did not get to stay in as long as I'd've liked to (small hole) but it sure was fun.

I train here almost daily in a community pool. I know the lifeguards and I have designed my workout to be easy for them to track and well within my limits. I've also tutored them all in SWB rescue, explained precisely what I am doing and I never stop moving. I don't do anything intense without a trained buddy and a very quiet pool. I frequently encounter people training to be SEALs, air force or Coast Guard rescue. Typically upon seeing them swimming underwater I immediately coral them and impart the basics. The lifeguards know they are not me and its not likely to reflect on me if they black out. (in fact, one did - coast guard rescue swimmer (hadn't spoken to him). I tell the lifeguards stuff like "don't let them do that"

The vast majority of freediving fatalities are spearos. The reason is obvious - they have an intense focus outside of their bodies. A good many of them have died while diving with others.

At the risk of contributing to your delinquency and making myself a social pariah - here are three suggestions:

Make a point of dividing your attention when you are spearfishing - so that part of your mind is ALWAYS monitoring your state. Make a rule to just let go of the situation, whatever it is, when it's time to go up. Let the fish go, or whatever. I do free dive photography and have bailed on innumerable perfect shots because I've made a rule.

Generally speaking neither I, nor anyone I've trained, dive into contractions - with or without a buddy in the immediate area. That said - some people just don't get contractions, or get them very late.

Don't compete with your last dive - or with the last day you dove.

Don't use ideas like 'I can go x amount of time more after contractions'. Such an idea is remotely applicable only in statics.

Freediving Solo is obviously more dangerous than diving with a competent buddy. But I'm not going to give you some righteous monologue about social responsibility to try and guilt you out of doing it. The only mitigation is to be thoroughly educated and experienced. There are no guarantees.

 

[cdavis]

Thanks for the compliment, Fondue. I did not realize I'd fooled you. Could not agree more with most of your post, especially the "don't compete with your last dive- or with the last day you dove"

The contractions thing is interesting. Some don't get them, so do, some late, some early (like me). If I came up at the first contraction, I'd be doing very very short dives, no where even close to BO territory. Especially doing FRC, contractions start very soft and are easy to ignore for upwards of a minute. For me, its time to come up when they start getting strong. This appears to be a function of C02 tolerance. Mine is lousy.

Is it possible to have some general rule about this?

Connor

 

[Fondueset]

Thanks for the compliment, Fondue. I did not realize I'd fooled you. Could not agree more with most of your post, especially the "don't compete with your last dive- or with the last day you dove"

The contractions thing is interesting. Some don't get them, so do, some late, some early (like me). If I came up at the first contraction, I'd be doing very very short dives, no where even close to BO territory. Especially doing FRC, contractions start very soft and are easy to ignore for upwards of a minute. For me, its time to come up when they start getting strong. This appears to be a function of C02 tolerance. Mine is lousy.

Is it possible to have some general rule about this?

Connor

Good point Connor. No, I do not have a rule about contractions - nor do I tell other people to have one. That's just how it works out for me most of the time - exceptions being formal trainings with uber competent divers and once in awhile. I actually do more with contractions in the pool - because of short breathe-ups on short swims. My point, not thoroughly stated, is that it's not wise to apply ideas like 'you've got another 100% to go when they start' to contractions. Particularly with all the variables in active diving. I think the guy who started this thread has a good question. Unfortunately most people who've blacked out don't remember the lead-up - so almost everything the rest of us can say is speculative. For example - when I push a pool swim - I start to feel fatigue in my arms and legs. Could be I'm about to blackout. Could be the DR is kicking in and I've got 2 or 3 more minutes. So, basically, I got nothin'.

 

[Bill McIntyre]

I'm getting into this conversation a bit late, but I have a simple question. When you ask about solo free diving, are you talking about pure free diving for depth or time, or are you talking about free dive spearfishing?

If its the former, then it seems pretty simple. If you can normally dive to say 60 feet comfortably with a buddy watching you, limit yourself to 30 or 40 feet when solo. If you can stay down for 2 minutes fairly comfortably when spotted by a buddy, them limit yourself to 1 minute when solo. Is that foolproof? Of course not, but it sure does minimize risk. If there is no fish to chase and shoot and no one keeping records, then what is the point of going deeper and staying down longer anyway? Why would any contractions be acceptable?

If you are talking about free dive spearfishing, then that complicates things, but I'll tell you how its done in Southern California. I've been diving with many people over the years, including many graduates of PFI and FII courses, and not a one observes a tight buddy system. It would be very difficult to keep a buddy in sight in a thick kelp bed and the usually poor visibility, and we usually don't go straight up and down, but swim horizontally. If my buddy didn't come up, I wouldn't know where to look for him.

The biggest danger comes when we shoot a big fish that wraps up in the kelp on the bottom. When that happens, I urge people to call for a buddy to come spot them.

I'm not trying to tell you that this system is optimum. I'm just telling you how its done in this part of the real world.

I own an FRV and won't dive without it.

 

[Fondueset]

I'm getting into this conversation a bit late, but I have a simple question. When you ask about solo free diving, are you talking about pure free diving for depth or time, or are you talking about free dive spearfishing?

If its the former, then it seems pretty simple. If you can normally dive to say 60 feet comfortably with a buddy watching you, limit yourself to 30 or 40 feet when solo. If you can stay down for 2 minutes fairly comfortably when spotted by a buddy, them limit yourself to 1 minute when solo. Is that foolproof? Of course not, but it sure does minimize risk. If there is no fish to chase and shoot and no one keeping records, then what is the point of going deeper and staying down longer anyway? Why would any contractions be acceptable?

If you are talking about free dive spearfishing, then that complicates things, but I'll tell you how its done in Southern California. I've been diving with many people over the years, including many graduates of PFI and FII courses, and not a one observes a tight buddy system. It would be very difficult to keep a buddy in sight in a thick kelp bed and the usually poor visibility, and we usually don't go straight up and down, but swim horizontally. If my buddy didn't come up, I wouldn't know where to look for him.

The biggest danger comes when we shoot a big fish that wraps up in the kelp on the bottom. When that happens, I urge people to call for a buddy to come spot them.

I'm not trying to tell you that this system is optimum. I'm just telling you how its done in this part of the real world.

I own an FRV and won't dive without it.

That reminds me - and this has changed since Connor was here. We ALWAYS dive with floats. In thick kelp that would likely be suicidal. But here we've got a line to follow.

 

[Bill McIntyre]

A float wouldn't be suicidal or even dangerous in thick kelp, but it just wouldn't work. In the first photo below, you can see a nice thick kelp bed behind the boat. You couldn't even swim through it on the surface without the float hanging up and driving you nuts. And then if you dove, you would go under horizontal stringers of kelp so that the float would have to follow you down. You would have to fight the buoyancy and well as dealing with it hanging up on kelp that it went under. The second photo my next door neighbor fighting a big fish in kelp that is bent over in the current, but notice that his float line passes under some kelp that he went under before shooting the fish.

For years I used a reel, but about three years ago went back to a breakaway float line, and one reason is that it would give my buddies something to follow to find me. I'd say that its about 50-50 between float lines and reels here, but I wish all my friends would use float lines.

Many people use a line with no float at all, but I use a slim streamlined float that just makes it easier to spot the end of the line and gives me something to hang on to if all of my 120' float line is pulled through my hand. It slides through the kelp easily.

 

[Fondueset]

I sure would like to get out there again... It's been awhile.

 

[Ronnie]

This post in no way constitutes advice to others.

I have only ever dived alone. I'm quite solitary and fiercely independent, but am quite open to diving with a buddy if I cold find one. I always try very hard not to die, in all circumstances.

This is my reality

 

[blumon]

I too am late on this thread ... its a great subject tho' and these are my two cents:

The desire to get 'wet' and decision to go solo (freediving, but more like drift snorkelling) happened often in my travels and work in the Bahamas and Caribbean ... there were simply no options for buddies in many instances. Later the difference in skill levels of those that I did buddy up with were a major detraction from the overall experience of the dive/swim. In the end I preferred going solo. I believe that many people are 'put off' getting in the water by the liability of having a buddy.

In order to enjoy the activity I think that what is needed is an intimate knowledge of the location where you decide to do this - my advantage was I often found myself frequenting the same anchorages, Islands or marinas - so I had a sound understanding of the conditions in which I played. Second I had the advantage of access to a dinghy which I could use to scout and determine the water conditions. Third is what we all know to be one of the cardinal rules - ie "Plan your dive, Dive your plan" .

There are other times now when I take the plunge into my favorite waterborne past-time - 'coastal trekking'(working half a mile or more of coast). This kinda ups the ante a little ... again, I scout (from shore mostly) and 'dive the plan'. This is the most stimulating and by far the most gratifying.

My recommendation to those who are attracted to solo water time with mask, fins and snorkel is get to know one location intimately and really focus on developing the ability to 'read' the ocean ... then move on to coastal trekking. There is nothing really new about what I am saying here ... spearos develop intimate knowledge of their hunting grounds and many hunt solo. The difference is their focus and freedivers too have a different focus. My focus is neither ... perhaps just connecting with the Ocean Mother.

post script: In wrapping up this post I wonder if I went off topic here ... but I believe that sometimes going solo is the only choice ... start small and condition yourself in small doses to coastal trekking ...

 

[cdavis]

Interesting discussion;

I would not knock those who feel they have to dive solo, as long as they understand the issues. Further, I can readily imagine a situation where buddy diving with a poor system, poorly trained buddy, etc, is more dangerous than diving solo, but it seems a no brainer that diving in a tight buddy system with a reasonably trained buddy is safer, much safer, than diving alone. Personal experience always affects your judgement, but in my personal experience, nobody is dead from diving a tight buddy system and one guy would be dead if we had not been diving that way.

There is another aspect, what you are used to. I never used to dive with a tight buddy system, did not know how and could not see how it would work for the kind of diving I wanted to do. A PFI course and a couple of scary experiences forced me to learn how to adapt a tight buddy system to my kind of diving. Worked just fine, spearing might even be more efficient. Something else, I got addicted to buddy diving. now I'm uncomfortable diving solo. Wierd.

 

[sanso]

"as long as they understand the issue" is the problem.
My acquaintance was convinced he understood the issue when I advised him to always dive with a buddy.
It doesn't even matter if he actually did understand the issue. He is permanently dead now leaving a family minus a dad, when in all likelihood a buddy could have easily saved him.

 

[esom]

Sanso, you are confusing things. Your acquaintance was not told 'that you do not knock him if he dives solo, as long as he understand what he is doing',
in contrast he was told to 'never freedive alone' which implies, apart from other things, that he does not know what he is doing. Depending on how serious he took you, this left him conflicted as a solodiver to an according degree.
Sure he had to make you see him being convinced. How would you as a seasoned solodiver react on your advise throughout your talk? what happend afterwards? this later occurances were what you meant to be speaking of i guess.

 

[Fondueset]

I'm pretty well convinced that nothing more constructive is going to come from this thread. As it is it contains some useful discussion, but also a lot of semi-contentious crap. We all know freediving alone is dangerous - it's very dangerous for inexperienced people and it's very dangerous for experienced people - for different reasons. This site does a great job of providing a way for aspiring free divers to educate themselves - and education is really the thing. There are some good stories here about blackouts - which are illustrative and compelling. Connor - who has posted on this thread - has first hand experience rescuing someone who had several SWBs. That's useful.
But the strident self-justifying bullshit is just as bad as the guilt tripping social responsibility bullshit and the thread is turning into an argument.I agree with Sanso about 'understanding the issue'. It is irresponsible for us to say that solo freediving is ever 'OK' - it is always an illusion to imagine that you are 'safe' because you 'know what you are doing'. Freediving just doesn't work like that. We can say we are 'SafER' - but this is not always the case.

For me there is a little discomfort even discussing techniques I use to mitigate risk when diving alone - I'm worried that new divers will interpret this as a 'safe' way to solo dive - when in fact there is no such thing. The line between safe and dead, in freediving, is a very fine one - and is not always in the same place.

I have no idea what esom is talking about - it sounds like he is just trying to pick a fight but the logic seems so convoluted that I suspect a language barrier.

I LOVE freediving alone. I get closer to the wild things that live under there, I get better photographs and I am more relaxed. I love the solitude and quiet. But I am the sole provider for a family of three - one of whom is severely autistic. My wife is a nervous wreck when I am diving alone. So I am changing. I'm training my buddies to not scare the fish. We drill in SWB rescue and, as they become more competent, I relax more. Circumstance works to my advantage as well. I like to dive deep, but this is a lousy place to do it. It's cold and dark down there, with next to nothing to see. Most of the action is 20 meters and above - really 15 meters and above. Photography pretty much sucks below 10 except in the winter when the cold limits dive times. I've already talked about some of the psychological devices I use to prevent myself from getting fixated while photographing things - the same works for spearing: You have to be willing to drop it and go up. Sometimes, if I am out by myself, I mostly just surface swim with my mono fin - which is a blast too and good training.

Anyway - The consensus on Diving Alone is that it is EXTREMELY DANGEROUS. Of course you can mitigate the risk with sensible precautions - but there are plenty of examples of experienced, educated and cautious divers who died. Most people who've been lucky enough to survive will tell you their's was not a particularly challenging dive - and that they didn't feel stressed or desperate for air before the lights went out. Everything you ate or did before diving affects you. Digesting fats, for example - uses oxygen. A whiff of boat exhaust can screw up your hemoglobin for 24 hours. Hydrations, acid/alkaline balance, thinking and a bunch of other stuff can impact your abilities from day to day and hour to hour. You are not going to successfully quantify safety for solo breath-hold diving. It's not safe, it'll never be safe and you can't make it safe. You can mitigate risk - but that only works up to the point where it doesn't.

 

[esom]

I´ll explain. Fondueset, this hole thing here is convoluted, you admit to feel it too. I´m speaking of the discomfort you feel when speaking about this.
Thing is, your post is not only reporting of speaking about it, but it IS speaking about it. What the heck am i talking about?
What i am saying is, that we have constantly two subjects, that are not very well met with the same logic. Our two necessary subjects are "solodiving and safety" and "talking solodiving and safety". You can easily track those two subjects down in any safety related thread and also in this one. Lately cdavis touched "talking solodiving and safety" by stateting that he "would not knock those who feel they have to dive solo, as long as they understand the issues". When i wrote that Sanso is confusing things, i meant these two subjects. He criticized cdavis liberal way of TALKING solodiving, using an example. Have a look at the example though, it´s the story of a talk about safety that led to a fatal accident. But it´s not really a story of dealing with these things the way cdavis suggests, is it? So logically Sanso's post is a complete mess, or is it not? It is or is not, depending which of the two subjects it points to.

Regarding consensus. I think, that it is important to point out, that the consensus solofreediving itself to be dangerous, requires a consensus on "freediving" and can not stand on its own. You can observe the truth of this rereading e.g. blumon's post. Blumon is carefully writing about what he (she?) is doing, using other namings than "freediving". Also cdavis puts statements regarding safety in relation to "his way of diving".
Differently said, the actual consensus would be: freediving is...
- is there really consensus? if yes, does it lead to solofreediving to be generally dangerous? These things are convoluted. (thanks for the word , btw my post isn´t revised by a natural english speaker... )
Looking at it like this does not make things easier, which is good, i guess.

 

[Bill McIntyre]

I should stay out of this, but no one ever accused me of being smart.

So I have a question- are we talking about free diving where the only object is depth and time, or spearfishing while free diving? There is a difference.

When I free dive in hopes of spearing a fish, I set no objectives for time or depth. I come up when its no longer comfortable. The time and depth is specific to me, and no one is keeping score. Of course it would be safer if someone watched me on every dive, but it would be safer yet if I stayed home in bed. I have more fun when spearfishing.

Life is dangerous, and it never lasts forever. I just turned 75, and I'm acutely aware that my clock is ticking. I have to find the right balance between living as long as possible and enjoying what life remains. I spend a lot of time thinking about the subject lately, and it isn't easy. When you turn 75, you may make different choices, but there is no right answer.

And think about this- recently one of the best divers in the world died at Dean's Blue Hole. No one could have had a better team of safety divers, along with medical personnel on the platform where he surfaced, but he still died. He had more help than any of you are likely to have, but he died.

Maybe the lesson is that you should stay out of the water?

 

[Stephan Whelan]

This topic pops up time and again and is always a contentious one.

I'll give me personal opinion first...

Lots of people freedive and spearfishing (whilst freediving) alone - it is also a sad fact that the vast majority of deaths in both sports tend to come from people who are diving alone. The reason is it is easy to push yourself beyond your limits without realising it and without adequate safety in place you will end up dead.

There are lots of arguments each way but my fundamental advice is go and have a lesson in freediving and freediving safety. Unless you are equipped with the basics in understanding safety in the sport there is no way you can make sensible judgements on your own (or others) safety.

Having a buddy there is like having a good insurance policy - it increases your chances of survival in the event of an accident or pushing yourself too far dramatically.

Now i'm going to give the official DB take on this...

Freediving is a dangerous sport. We encourage everyone to take a freediving class to understand the basics as well as safety. You should never freedive alone and always freedive with a buddy - http://freedivingsafety.org/EN.php

 

[Bill McIntyre]

I just realized that my last post repeated a lot of what I had said in a previous post where I got into the difference between our free diving and free dive spearfishing. I knew this subject sounded familiar for some reason.

My excuse for being repetitious is that since my wife was out of town on my birthday, we belatedly celebrated it last night with bison steaks and grape juice, and I may have consumed a bit too much grape juice.