Continuing your skills?

[lottie]

On the dive last friday (wreck dive) - one of the divers had a problem with the BCD strap that holds the tank in place as it wasn't set up properly (it was her BCD not the LDS').
The DM tried to sort this out (with assistance from me as well ) and had to take his BCD off to check the buckle on his (and how the webbing was put through the buckle), so that he could do the webbing and buckle on the divers correctly.
I haven't taken off my BCD underwater since I did my OW. But surely the skills we learn in the OW course should be practiced on a regular or semi-regular basis??!!

So this begs the question - how often do YOU check your skills???

[Papa Bear]

You should have fun with it! I sometimes take mine off near the surface, under great conditions, and sit on the tank at the safety stop or on the surface. The more you play with it and become super familiar with it the less chance you have of something small causing you a major problem. Bailouts are fun to do and should be something easy for the experienced diver! That is why they are called experienced

[rubber chicken]

As I frequently assist on OW/AOW courses, I get to practice the basics a lot. I often perform the skills behind the students as i'm working toward my IDC/IE and want to nail them down pat so that I can just concentrate on the theory and teaching bits.
Gotta admit though, if fun diving or guiding I don't really practice the skills, except for bouyancy obviously! Though i have started doing mask removals on safety stops.

Suprised, your DM couldn't remember how the camband was threaded though. It was drilled into me on my course.

[Papa Bear]

It is easy for west coast diver the original LA area code 213 and you can't go wrong Buckle open Middle, Close, and far slot! Try it it is easy 213!

[lottie]

hey rubberchicken, thats an interesting point to know.
Watching him trying to figure out which way the camband was supposed to go, looked (to me, having not done the DM course) complicated. Maybe he'll review that part of the materials again...which goes back to one of my previous threads about re-reading course materials....hmmm...

I was trying to hold the tank and her BCD while he was trying to sort out the clasp (or whatever its called). The DM did also say Thank you to me (and the other guy) for our help as well, which I thought was good.

Right, I'm off back to my sick bed (if your curious - checkout my blog)

Ciao

[Sarah]

Some of the cam bands and all the loops through various slots can be hard to figure out ABOVE water, let alone under it, lol

[acelockco]

A common thing I see all of the time is divers neglecting to wet the cam bands BEFORE connecting to the cylinder. What happens is they seem tight enough before the dive, but as soon as they get wet of course they strech out.....and the cylinder is falling out.

Make sure you completely remove the strap from the cam before you install they cylinder, this will force you to reinstall the strap and the cam. Before you know it, you will be able to do it with your eyes closed.

This is basic OW stuff though.

[PinayDiver]

on forgetting to wet the cam band -- i've dived with two people who've forgotten to do just that, ending up with us, buddies, being all-hands underwater (steadying the cylinder, tightening the band, looking into the diver's eyes making sure she wasn't wide-eyed/stressed-looking from all the helpful action around her lol)

in the first case, while we were busy tightening her cam band, her weight belt picked that very moment to loosen and fall to her thighs ?!

during safety stops, we tend to test our octopus (octopi?)

[amtrosie]

Constantly practising the skills picked up during the various classes are vital to maintaining the safety of the diver and his/her team.

An exercise that a lot of the technical community has adopted is to go through a thorough "S" safety drill before starting the dive. Each diver fully deploys the long hose (primary regulator) and donates it to their partner, all the while breathing off of the secondary regulator. The full deployment of the long hose will ensure that there is no entanglements and verifies that this regulator can be donated "in an instant". All lights are checked for proper operation (a biggie for the cave divers). A "bubble check" is done to ensure that all manifolds and hoses are bubble free. Finally, a full equipment verification "call-out" is done. This is where a team member will call out each and every piece of gear, mask/hood to fin/booties. This ensures that nothing is forgotten and every one knows where each piece of gear is at. This includes the contents of the pockets and especially the where abouts of the back-up bottom timers and compass and wet notes.

Another thing that my team does is take a dive and do nothing but drills. Out-of-gas drills, unconscious diver drills, etc. We spend a lot of time honing our buoyancy to remain within a foot of the target depth. Do this at shallow depths and that really makes you pay attention! We do other drills as well, which is more to the team dynamic. All this improves our communication and team awareness.

How important are skills? I pay money to practise them, that's how important they are to me and my team.

[lottie]

Make sure you completely remove the strap from the cam before you install they cylinder, this will force you to reinstall the strap and the cam. Before you know it, you will be able to do it with your eyes closed.

This is basic OW stuff though.

I don't remember reading about that in the OW manual? and I didn't do that at any point during the course either.