Dive Like A Pro

Each issue, a panel of RAID Instructor Trainers will give their insight into a specific topic, starting with the core skill of buoyancy

Steve Lewis, RAID Director Diver Training (worldwide) – A cave-diving student years ago was having problems with buoyancy. A huge contributing factor was the wetsuit he’d opted to wear for his course. Well, truth is, his problems were legion… but, hey, that’s a story for another day. What was memorable was an assumption he made about his instructor.

“It’s easy for you,” he mumbled. “You mastered all this stuff ages ago… it’s second nature to you now.” I thought to myself: “Mate, if only you knew!” There’s nothing more true about diving than all scuba skills are perishable. And that’s the take-home message from this issue’s contributors – Ian, PJ, and Oli – real pros who long ago learned that the secret to making it look like second nature is practice. Practice and being careful to mess up only when there are no cameras (or cave students) around.

BUOYANCY Olivier van Overbeek – Buoyancy is the force exerted on an object that is wholly or partly immersed in a fluid, or in diving terms, does it float, sink or stay neutral. Buoyancy control is what we keep ourselves occupied with as divers, being able to control the amount of positive buoyancy during an ascent or the amount of negative buoyancy during a descent gives us that feeling safety and confidence during these two phases of our dive and takes away the need for frantically holding onto lines, or not being able to stray from sloping bottoms. Further fine-tuning of our buoyancy control around the neutral point is what we desire during most of the bottom phase of our dive.

At RAID we do not believe that buoyancy control is a standalone subject - after we’ve achieved a balanced equipment set-up, we can start working on buoyancy control, and with some practice we’ll achieve sustained neutral buoyancy. Simply having neutral buoyancy isn’t quite enough - once we’ve established an ability to sustain neutral buoyancy, we’ll look at a flat, trimmed-out position in the water and a good body position (the manipulation of this position can greatly influence trim control!).

Once we’ve achieved all that, we’ve got a nice solid platform to work from and this is the point where we’ll introduce effective propulsion as a stand-alone skill set. This provides a diving platform where buoyancy and propulsion are truly separated, and streamlining is optimum. How does this look in practice? Well, the diver could stop their fin motion at any time, turn towards their buddy, and simply not move, not up, not down, not forwards, etc.

This creates a calm and confident diver and an asset to the team. Once the diver has mastered this at a constant depth, they can bring this skill set to their ascents as well, allowing for comfortable, in-control group ascents where communication is easy and clear.

OLIVIER VAN OVERBEEK

Olivier van Overbeek (Oli for short) has been diving since 1998, and an active RAID Professional for over six years. His current roles within RAID include Training Manager for the UK, and Training Consultant for RAID International. He enjoys modernising and working on training materials, developing new techniques, and when not teaching or writing, thoroughly enjoys doing any type of archaeological diving.

Ian France – What is the key discipline of buoyancy? Buoyancy is defined as the force exerted on an object that is wholly or partly immersed in a fluid. Effective buoyancy reduces drag and promotes more efficient finning, with less gas to control with depth changes, allowing us to remain motionless while hovering and gliding through the water column. This helps to reduce our workload, fatigue, gas usage and stress, making for a more-relaxing and enjoyable dive, with less impact to our environment.

So, what are the things that affect our buoyancy? Well, this includes water salinity, exposure protection, and the minimum gas required to exit the dive. With these factors in mind, how do we achieve pinpoint buoyancy control?

Well, it’s no one thing, but made up of a number of building blocks. Firstly, equipment should be balanced, as poor positioning and ill-fitting equipment isn’t going to help at all. Then weighting is a key component - if you are carrying just the right amount of lead to offset you and your equipment, the less gas you’ll need, as remember, every 1kg of extra weight that a diver is wearing requires one litre of extra gas! Correct breathing is also important - your lungs play a big part because if you are breathing incorrectly, then buoyancy will be made much more difficult. Propulsion is another important factor as correct fin kicks, such as frog, flutter, back kicks and helicopter, help improve stability. RAID puts great emphasis on buoyancy and rightly so, as it’s a key discipline in diving and not just a skill that’s added on later.

So, RAID divers - practice, and develop that muscle memory! RAID Instructors, remember when you first started diving, you weren’t perfect, so encourage your students to practice, sow those seeds of control, develop those skills, there is no reason why right from the outset RAID divers shouldn’t have a high level of buoyancy control. Practice those ascents and descents, holding those safety/deco stops, practice those fin kicks. Then start to add in extra skills, like mask replacement. Laying line is also a great exercise to practice buoyancy. To lay line effectively, you need good control of the key disciplines, especially buoyancy!

IAN FRANCE

Ian France is an experienced, full-time technical diving Instructor Trainer, providing OC and CCR Cave, Mine and Technical diver training at diver and instructor level throughout the world. A member of the British Cave Diving Group (CDG, https://cavedivinggroup. org.uk/), founding member of the UK Mine/Cave Diving & Exploration Group (UKMC, www.ukminecave.com), a regular instructor at TEKcamp (www. tekcamp.co.uk) and Cave Camp (www.cavecamp. com), and when not teaching - a very active diver exploring caves, mines, and the ocean.

PJ Prinsloo – There are over 30 individual skills a new diver learns when they complete their Open Water course. Apart from learning how to breathe underwater, the most-important skill that needs to be mastered is buoyancy control.

All divers, especially diving professionals, need to control all aspects of buoyancy. A diver that does not have positive buoyancy control at the surface can very quickly tire and start to panic as they struggle to keep their head above water. The act of diving requires us to get underwater, descending safely and with correct control of negative buoyancy. The last thing a diver wants to do is ‘crash land’ on the reef, so slowing your descent as you approach the bottom is crucial.

Of course, while we are diving, the goal is to be neutrally buoyant. The benefits of being a truly neutrally buoyant diver are endless. Diving becomes effortless, you have improved freedom of movement but, most importantly, diving becomes safer. Every diver wants to have good air consumption and getting your buoyancy control perfected is one of the best ways to improve your gas usage.

When did you last do a buoyancy check? Even seasoned diving professionals should do regular buoyancy checks. Over time your body changes, your equipment changes - these changes have an effect on your buoyancy.

It all starts with the correct weighting. Perform a weight check without your fins and scuba gear first. Once you are weighted correctly for your exposure suit, then check your weighting with all your gear fitted. While holding a full breath and a deflated BCD, you should float with the top of your head at the surface.

Avoid carrying too much unnecessary weight. I wish I had a dollar for every instructor that has told me they purposely over-weight themselves so they can assist students. An instructor should be spending adequate time ensuring their students’ weighting is correct and giving them ample to time in the pool to perfect their buoyancy.

There should only be one anchor on a dive boat - and it shouldn’t be a diver’s weightbelt.

PJ PRINSLOO

PJ Prinsloo became a recreational scuba instructor in 1996 and has been an Examiner since 2008. He has been involved in a number of deep expeditions in South Africa and throughout Europe. In March 2017, he joined RAID and took on the position of Technical Diving Director for RAID Southern Africa. He has written several courses for RAID International, including the Liberty Rebreather and Performance Diver courses, with many other programmes still in development. PJ is a RAID Tec Examiner certified to teach at all levels, recreational and technical open circuit, recreational and technical rebreather, cave, wreck and sidemount.