scending from the depths of the pool, feet-first, blood rushing into my
head, I contemplated the thought of a boatload of laughing divers who
would witness my initiation into the realm of dry suit diving later in
the week.
For years I traveled around the world slipping beneath the surface of tropical
waters without a thought to submerging my chill-prone
body in cold water. Last year, I decided to give California diving a
chance. In a rented 7mm wetsuit, I stayed relatively warm underwater, but between
dives I slowly turned blue and became too chilled to make some dives. I envied the
divers relaxing in their dry suits, nonchalantly sipping
drinks and chatting during surface intervals while I was forced to pull off the
wetsuit over goose bumps as large as the Channel Islands themselves, and don warm
clothing to regain my body heat. With fingers sore from pulling on thick
neoprene I vowed that the next time I would be one of those dry divers.
My photos from the trip convinced me that it was worth an attempt to find
a comfortable approach to cold water diving. How does a diver located in an
area where no shops even stock dry suits learn to use one? On my California trip,
I had met the perfect instructor, Captain Ray Simon, (retired, USMC), a PADI
course director and owner of The Scuba Center on Camp Pendleton, the US Marine Corp
base near Oceanside. I thought,
now, here is someone that could even handle teaching a warm water wimp like me
to dive in a dry suit! Throughout the year I hassled Ray by email from all over
the world until he consented to give it a try and take me through the PADI
dry suit specialty course.
Knowing very little about dry suit use, I relied on Ray's experience and help to
find an appropriate suit for a beginner. I needed something that would not
add extra buoyancy to complicate my underwater photography, especially since
I was totally unused to diving with any weights at all.
Ray chose a USIA professional suit for his own personal use which includes many
hours of cold water instruction, technical diving and some salvage diving. USIA
produces military and combat products as well as recreational dive suits so I
believed that their suits might hold up to a photographer's misuse. I began
my course in the sport diver's suit, the Aqualite, a coated fabric suit
with moulded boots, latex wrist and neck seals, "knee pads" constructed of a
second layer of fabric from thigh to boot and an automatic exhaust valve.
Because this type suit fits loosely, I was able to use a suit in a stock size
without the need for a custom made suit. This kept the cost down, a good plan
for a beginner still trying to decide if cold water diving is really worth it.
Buoyancy control is the key to dry suit diving, otherwise you can
find yourself heels over head ascending rapidly toward the surface as I found
in my initial pool session! Techniques learned in non-buoyant or neoprene suits
do not apply. The trapped air inside the suit is used to control buoyancy
underwater with air added via a low-pressure hose on the chest and
released by an exhaust valve on the upper left arm. The BCD is used only at the surface.
The air inside the suit shifts around the suit as limbs are moved or
horizontal/vertical position changed. This can take some re-adjustment if diving skills
and buoyancy control have become second nature as they had for me. My thoughts in the
pool were that I felt like I was covered in warm Jell-O (gelatin) and had strings like
a marionette that pulled my limbs in directions I had not planned to move them.
The four-hour dry suit course (not counting open water session) covered the information
necessary to select a dry suit and the underwear that traps air and insulates one from
the cold water, suit maintenance, and advantages and disadvantages of diving dry.
Classroom, pool and open water instruction on
how to control buoyancy and handle emergencies was the meat of the course.
The day after my classroom and pool session Ray and I drove to Santa Barbara to do my
open water training from the Truth Aquatics boat, Conception. My first dry suit dive
was sans camera, a dive I still regret as it was one of the best of the trip for
macro photography. The suit was much
easier to handle at 50 feet than at 15 and I felt only slightly jittery during the first
dive in spite of a stiff current.
On the second dive, I attempted photography and was only mildly frustrated with the
need for a different approach. My usual upside down approach to macro subjects on the
bottom didn't work well and I had to adapt to a more horizontal approach. With
both hands holding a camera it is critical that the automatic exhaust valve work perfectly.
Since I was unaccustomed to using the valve, Ray had to catch me a few times before I
learned the best position for fine tuning my buoyancy.
The divers on the boat never had a chance to laugh at me. I managed to surface right side
up from every dive. But best of all, I never gave a second thought to jumping into that
cool water. The initial rush of cold water into the suit never happened! I didn't hurry
to finish my roll of film before I froze. During my surface intervals, there
was no evaporation to chill me so I hung out, all dried out and
chatted with the dry suit divers.
To schedule a dry suit course or inquire about a suit, contact
The Scuba Center.
For information on U.S.I.A suits email
U.S.I.A.
or visit the
U.S.I.A. web site.
The Truth Aquatics web site describes
their Channel Island cruises.
Story by Deb Fugitt.
Sea Gifts