Are you a good dive buddy? -

Are you a good dive buddy?

By Aziz “Sinbad” Khan

Sam is a good diver. He has over two hundred dives under his belt, but no one wants to dive with him. Why? Because he jumps in the water, descends on his own, expecting that his buddy should be following him because after all, that is what a buddy is for. Then he swims at his own pace, in a direction of his own choosing and often looks back to see how far their buddy is. He always has that surprised look on his face that his buddy is not following him!

Don’t be Sam.

It is easy to say, “Don’t be Sam,” but not being Sam is a skill that will take training to learn and discipline to execute. Why? Try this little experiment next time you go to the mall with your spouse. Agree before leaving the car that throughout the mall trip, you and your spouse will always remain within two arm’s length from each other. Then go from store to store, matching pace and see how that goes. Even though you will be moving on a one-dimensional plane, without the tunnel vision of a scuba mask, without the problems of a zero gravity-low vis environment, it will still be hard to execute a skill that divers are expected to right from their open water class.

This is why “Sam” is a very understandable scuba diving phenomenon. He happens to be one of the motivators for SDI’s Solo Diving class. For years, scuba diving agencies ignored the existence of Sam, pretending that he does not exist, or that even if he does exist, then he is not as bad as we think, or if Sam continues to be Sam, then at some point he will stop being Sam and become a Harry or Joe etc. But Sam has persisted.

Since Sam does not go away, I am writing this blog with hopes that Sam will be out there somewhere reading the following. Wait a minute! Are you Sam?

Answer these questions to see if you are the same Sam we are talking about.

If you scored:

25-30 points: You’re the ultimate dive buddy! People diving with you know they’re in safe and steady hands.
20-24 points: Not bad, but hey, it might be time to brush up on your skills and knowledge to become the perfect buddy.
19 or below: Sam, dude, what’s up? Long time no see!

Tools to become the best dive buddy:

Buddy skills begin from the surface. New divers often have pre-dive anxiety and are not fully alert during the gear assembly and donning phase. A pre-dive ABCDE check can be done together to save time and is a quick way to ensure that some of the most crucial elements are checked and cleared by two pairs of eyes. It is an important leniency check intended to spot problems before they happen.
Match descent rate and descend in view of each other ensuring that you are reaching the bottom at the same time. A lot of times, buddy separation happens because descent rates do not match. One person will reach the bottom early, look around and believe that the nearest diver in that all-familiar black wetsuit is their buddy and just take off with them. Slowing down the ascent rate while keeping a visual on the buddy will ensure that dive that began on the surface with a buddy will continue below the surface with the buddy.
Move at the same pace. Divers who have good buoyancy control have the luxury to stop without losing buoyancy, whereas those dives who are new or struggling with their buoyancy, would constantly fin as means of not sinking. When both are paired together, then the less competent one will end up enforcing their pace. The solution here is a buoyancy class and then constant buoyancy training to develop precision buoyancy.
Drill your out-of-air, emergency procedures. A few months back, I swam up to a very experienced diver and gave him an out-of-air sign. He continued to stare back at me. I did it a few times and the person kept gesturing “what?” to me. It was just a drill but later when I asked him about it, it turned out that he had learnt air sharing more than ten years ago. This is not a skill that comes into play on every dive like mask clearing so it becomes something you did in a previous lifetime. It does not hurt to allocate a dive occasionally, to honing those skills that never come into play.
Understand that the appropriate distance that you need to be from your dive buddy will vary. If you are following your buddy and swimming behind them while being five feet away, then this may not be an unreasonable distance to cover in case of an emergency as long as the buddy is swimming slowly. The same five feet will be very difficult to close if your dive buddy is shooting away from you like a torpedo, and not paying attention.
Take the SDI Rescue Diver course.

If you were to repeatedly drill going mall shopping with your spouse while staying up close, then there may come a time when you have mastered the drill like a coordinated dance. But it would not be too much fun. Fortunately, practicing the same skills underwater is not as boring.

5 replies

Riccardo Cast says:
November 21, 2024 at 3:51 pm

This quiz is really good, and everyone should take it to understand how important is your buddy!!!
Few months ago I dove with some people that I never met before.
When I jumped into the water nobody was there. I was the last one and I asked the crew: where are they?
The crew answered: they already went down.
I wanted to abort the dive, but I decided to go down.
I found one of them at the bottom, and after a while we found the rest; in total 6 people: 4 RB and 2 with Doubles Trimix. 250 feet.
The dive went well but my concern was: why people like that could dive alone? Especially when talking about Tec diving.
I called my Tec instructor to talk about my experience where I told him how bad the people did the dive in terms of taking care about themselves and the rest of the people that were diving together.
He told: Tec people believe that they are in another level, but the reality is that Tec or not, the buddy rule stays the same.
I personally like to be with someone while diving, because who never knows, it doesn’t matter how deep the dive will be.
Be safe!!!
Reply
Judy sivcovich says:
November 22, 2024 at 12:52 am

This quiz was a good reminder to practice those skills which don’t always get used. A good time to practice buddy breathing is during a safety stop.
Reply
Michael David Campbell says:
November 22, 2024 at 9:14 am

” A few months back, I swam up to a very experienced diver and gave him an out-of-air sign. He continued to stare back at me. I did it a few times and the person kept gesturing “what?” to me. It was just a drill ”

This trains divers not to take emergency signals seriously.
Reply
Kelley says:
November 22, 2024 at 10:51 am

This was excellent training. Thank you for making me check myself.
Reply
Bruce Seiler says:
November 22, 2024 at 12:09 pm

Good review. I have not practiced buddy breathing in decades. I will next dive. I show my buddy secondary regulator location and he shows me he breathes on BCD hose and I take his primary regulator. Need to practice underwater. I need to study up on all underwater hand signals
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