Posted by Karl S. on January 10, 2003 at 12:01:42:
In Reply to: Re: Cause or effect? posted by e-shark on January 10, 2003 at 10:04:17:
E-Shark is right, that being alone while diving, of itself, did not ever kill anybody. When something does go wrong while being alone underwater, whether due to buddy separation or due to solo diving, there is no one then to help. When a solo or separated diver dies, we normally dont find out what went wrong on the dive, other than the usual post mortem of "death by drowning."
The point of my classifying the separated-diver deaths in their own group merely serves to re-emphasize that we dont know what happened to kill these divers, but whatever it was, there was no buddy there to attempt an assist or rescue.
So I believe it is worthy of its own classification. And it gives us food for thought, while we plan our own dives, whether solo or buddy or team dives. Can we depend on our buddies? Should we depend on them? Is it more safe to be buddy independent, even while buddy or team diving?
I have met a lot of anxious-dependent buddy-dependent divers in my life. Somewhere along the way, they got the impression that they could rely on their buddy like a crutch. I dont know who taught them that. Thats not how I read the diving standards.