Risks associated with diving on diving expeditions:
The diver is alone during part or all of the dive
The primary risk of diving is to dive alone, that is, without a partner. Often divers base their sense of security in the equipment they have and in their skills. Of course, both equipment and skills are very important, but when we lose consciousness underwater, the only resource we have that can help us is a partner.
The majority of diving incidents and accidents occur at relatively shallow depths, as can be seen from the “Part I” emergency situations described. Divers don’t feel much stress while at my depth, and it’s all too easy to get into situations that lead to being alone underwater. It greatly increases the risk of diving. To paraphrase, one might ask what a diver walking alone into the water before a diving accident says in his last words:
- “I just for the platform”.
- “I have two vending machines”.
Diver is low on air at the end of the dive
Diving in groups, often with unknown people with very different skills, often leads to situations when some person or persons in a pair, in a group, runs out of air faster, and the other divers still have quite a bit of it. It is often tempting then not to stop diving. The emergence of a single person is troublesome, it is a violation of certain rules, so partners, sometimes even guides, “lend” some air to such a person. That is, you give your octopus or someone in the group gives their octopus and the divers continue swimming as a team, with one person breathing from the other diver’s cylinder. The procedure seems clever, although in a situation where, precisely because of the environment, for example, the current, the last phase of the dive turns out to be longer return to the place of ascent of the boat will be difficult, it may happen that this air begins to run out of the next person or persons.
Diver overestimates his physical capabilities
When diving especially in a new environment, it can happen that divers overestimate their physical capabilities. Here we very often think of strong currents about swimming against the current, and of course this can also be a problem, but most often unpleasant incidents occur due to large waves. The undulations make Getting back on the boat can be very difficult. It’s easy to get some trauma and at the same time, waiting, for example, for your turn and for the zodiac to take you under a buoy or some fixed or let go can also be fraught with risk. Waves can make divers unable to stay in the team, as large waves cause severe fatigue when trying to swim. Additionally, it limits visibility, causes the divers’ will to fight to stay in the group to diminish, and the team can break up into smaller groups or even individuals.
New environment/changing environment
A common problem on expeditions is the new environment. In fact, it’s mainly about the tides at sea sometimes also about the rapid changes in this environment. When diving in quarries or lakes, we are used to the fact that visibility, for example, is either bad or good and won’t change from one minute to the next. At sea, sometimes, due precisely to the heavy precipitation near the shore plus the surge that is caused by a violent storm, we can encounter a very strong change in conditions during the dive. When entering the water, the sea will be calm, there will be no swell, visibility will be very good, it will be easy to avoid underwater rocks or choose a good place to exit. After a while when we return from a dive, visibility may be zero. Such a situation, combined with strong waves that can throw us on rocks and stones that are invisible in these conditions, can cause a really dangerous situation.
A realistic situation from a dive on the Mediterranean coast, the border of France and Spain. Calm sea, beautiful visibility, easy entry into the water. During the dive, a strong storm with heavy precipitation breaks. Red earth from the surrounding rocks is rinsed into the water. Then the strong wave action mixes this runoff land – this sediment with the water and makes visibility really zero within a few dozen meters from the shore. Which, at the same time, combined with strong waves, makes it practically impossible to go calmly ashore. Divers have to break through the shoreline which, unfortunately, ends up with a strong beating on the rocks.
Boats
A certain challenge for divers training inland is the problem of diving from a boat. On the one hand, of course, we get to know these conditions well on typical diving safaris in Egypt, where diving from large boats belayed by zodiacs, or rigid-bottomed pontoons with motors, makes the dives seem fairly easy. At the same time, if we go somewhere farther away and end up in a place where the diving organization and belaying is no longer so well prepared, then a certain lack of experience associated with diving from a boat. Getting in and out of the boat, arriving at a predetermined place at a predetermined time, can be quite a problem.
New partners
Diving with new partners is also a risk factor in diving expeditions . It’s not even about the fact that they will be people who will have very low diving skills (that can also happen, of course) it’s more about the lack of chemistry and the adverse impact on our decisions. That is, on the one hand, pushing us into too difficult conditions as well as, at the same time, poor assurance between partners or teams.
“Raging” guides
With diving expeditions, a certain risk factor is let’s call it “rampant” personnel. On the one hand, the people who run dive centers, dive schools, bases, and the staff who work there try to ensure as much safety as possible for incoming divers. On the other hand, the pressure of people who come and necessarily want to dive in certain situations, necessarily want to see something, coupled with a certain financial pressure sometimes causes the staff in such places to make irrational decisions by taking people to the wrong place in relation to their skills and experience. Sometimes in unsuitable weather. In such a situation, however, you need to show some common sense yourself and sometimes already in the water – just at the dive site, looking at the water to say – “I’m not going in, I’m going to read a book”, if divers knew how to react in this way to conditions that they feel in general are too difficult for them very many accidents would be avoided. Diving would become even safer.
Diving on “slightly” faulty equipment
Diving expeditions involve a considerable cost and the sacrifice of our precious time. Often we approach a dive at a site as something really important, cancelling a dive due to equipment failure or some problems with our equipment seems to us like the end of the world, and sometimes divers decide to dive after all. This is one of the very big risk factors on trips. When diving somewhere close, if we have a problem, it is easier to make a decision – we do not enter the water. When we have already arrived at the end of the world and suddenly it turns out that we should not enter this water , it really seems like the end of the world and sometimes we make an irrational decision to dive after all.
