Posted by Eric Frasco on July 16, 2001 at 13:33:11:
In Reply to: Flying/Climbing after diving. posted by DaveJ on July 13, 2001 at 13:02:07:
Dave:
When I was living and diving in Santa Barbara, the folks from Truth Aquatics would caution divers about driving over the Fwy 154-San Marcos Pass by Lake Cachuma (about 2500 feet). Apparently there were documented cases of divers getting bent while driving over San Marcos Pass after diving at the Channel Islands. They recommended using Fwy 101-Nojoqui Pass instead (if you really had to drive north), since it was a lot lower in altitude, something just under 1000 feet if I remember correctly.
Also, I once called the PADI training department to ask about diving and flying out to Catalina Island. They recommended against it as the airport ("Airport in the Sky") is already at 1600 feet. Furthermore, they also cautioned me about driving through El Conejo Pass (Fwy 101 between Camarillo and Agoura) as it also is above 1000 feet. Judging by their familiarity with the topic, it had come up before (which means that there could have been some incident associated with driving over the Pass - at least someone went to the bother to find the altitudes of all the local passes on all the major freeways leading in and out of Los Angeles).
This topic is something that DAN (Divers Alert Network) has revisited every year for a long time now. When divers used the old Navy tables (the ones that only went to "N"), the general rule of thumb was that once you out-gassed to "D" or lower, it was safe to go to altitude. In contrast, DAN has historically advocated (after a no-deco dive) "12 hours minimum, 24 hours recommended".
-Eric-