Safety stop - Equipment provided by the dive boat

Online   Nov 29, 2018

Scuba Shack Weekly – Volume 1, Number 13

Black Friday is over. Small business Saturday is behind us. And the Christmas commercials are a little overwhelming. I wonder just how many cars people really buy at Christmas time.

We are in full maintenance mode here at the shop. After a very long and busy dive season, we now have a several weeks to get all of our gear serviced and ready for 2019. The van has been unloaded and all of our tanks will be inspected. Our regulators will be serviced as required and all BCs inspected and made ready for the new season. And that’s not all. The maintenance shop is also very busy servicing full-face masks and regulators from our public safety clients.

One of the skills we teach during our open water course is the giant stride entry. We do this because most of our dive adventures start from a boat. By the end of the course everyone is fairly comfortable with the giant stride. We also talk a lot about safety stops. During the classroom we discuss the various equipment that the boat may provide to make our safety stops easier and less stressful.

On our trip to Turks and Caicos I was able to capture some pictures of what this equipment looks like underwater. First there is a hang bar that is off the side of the boat at approximately 15 feet. Just make a slow ascent and “hang out” for three minutes. Dive boats also typically have a line off the stern with a buoy ball and suspended from the buoy ball is a line with weights on it. This is another place to hold on if you need to steady yourself. A final safety measure provide by the boat may be a regulator (also called a hooka reg) at safety stop level should you run low on gas. This equipment is there for safety but one of the best safety options is to dial in your buoyancy and relax on your safety stop.

I came across a short article on Dive News Wire about a new book called The Airplane Graveyard. I would call this a coffee table book that combines military history and scuba diving. If anyone has it, I would be interested in your thoughts on the book.

Hopefully we will see you around the shop in December. Come by for “hot stove” scuba any time.

Thanks for tuning in,

Jeff