Rig,
You have some good thoughts there. I think that it is smart to dive as if your by yourself, even if your not, but if there are very many times when I dive with my buddy next to me and he is no where in sight when I surface, I will be looking for a new buddy. I take the effort to try and keep up with him and I expect him to do the same. But, it’s my boat, so if he wants to dive with me he has to play by my rules.
I dive pretty much in the same environment as you. My buddy is good about staying together. He told me that if I want to dive the other side of the rig fine, we will do it together than we will dive the side he wants to. I don’t know if you have had any problems with barracuda trying to take your fish there, but we had some here last year. I came pretty close to getting bit once and had my cable get twisted all up another time by a cuda teeth. After that I left some nice looking snapper, just because my buddy already had one and he needed me to guard him on the way back to the boat.
The main reason I want a close buddy though is still blackouts. As I have learned more about freediving I have come to realize that the line between pushing it and being conservative is very fuzzy. The main difference between someone who is able to hold their breath longer and someone who can’t is bradycardia, which is the O2 conservation reaction brought about by a lower heart rate and constriction of blood flow to extremities.
As we advance in our freedive abilities we get stronger bradycardia. The problem is it may not happen on ever dive. In static, it’s no big deal. You just come up, well that is most of the time. I passed out once way before my pb and had no warning. In a depth dive, even if we are able to sense it the realization may come after we reached our planned depth. Then there is nothing we can do, but pray, try to remain calm while we swim toward the surface.
My own opinion is that there are way too many spearo deaths and I don’t ever want to have the realization that I probably could have saved a person, if I had been there to get him on his ascent, before he sunk.
What are and where do you get EMT shears? Sounds like a good idea.
On another note, are you doing the Hell Divers Rodeo this year? Do you know the date?
don