Flying & Scuba Diving

[dublinpilot]

I've been asked by a friend who is a regular scuba diver, to bring her flying.

I was just trying to find some sort of offical guidelines as to how much time should be left after diving before going flying. I seem to remember that it depends on the depth of the dive, and the height of the flight.

I've tried looking on the Padi website, but couldn't find the answer.

I was hoping to find something offical, rather than hearsay. Can anyone point me in the right direction?

My friend may already know the answer, but for some questions it's better to know the answer before you've asked the question ;)

Thanks.

dp

[S-Works]

The official guidlines are 12hrs from single dives 24hrs from repetative and 48hrs if a lot of deep diving has been done.

I have often flown to dive sites, and flown home in my aircraft. I have also dived in the morning and flown commercial PAX home in the afternoon, it is a personal choice.

I am an Instructor examiner for a number of agencies including PADI with 23yrs experiance and 7000 dives and have not suffered any problems despite regularily diving beyond 100m on helium based breathing gases.

If she is just a recreational diver and you want to be cautious wait until the day after her last dive.

[JoshCritchley]

bose-x

I was very interested in your reply as have often wondered about this.

Do you keep below a certain altitude (presuming your aircraft isn't pressurised)?

[S-Works]

generally speaking I keep to around 2000ft, not for any diving related intention but mostly the airpspace on the routes home is restrictive and I can't be bothered to file and fly the airways for fairly short trips!

There are a huge number of myths about diving and flying and most of them are untrue or generated by litigation fearing agencies seeking to give advice that will prevent them getting sued.

Understanding how people get bent and what predisposes you to it is an inexact science at best. I have known people dive with me in a weeks worth of deep wreck dives to 130m daily without problem yet someone who came along with us dived to 10m and on a single dive and came up bent.

At the end of the day if you have a bubble seeding that is going to cause a bend flying or not is going to make little difference.

Without blowing my own trumpet, outside of the PPrune world I am recognised as an authority on the subject and I dont have all the answers!

[dublinpilot]

BX

Thank you for taking the time to answer. It's very helpful.


dp

[mad_jock]

As I am sure you know Bose-x the CAA has a 48hour rule for commercial flying after diving below 10m.

I must admit is started diving in the old days when you came up at the rate of the smallest bubble etc. Trusty manual inflate fenzy round your kneck and you thought you were great.

Now 14 years on have discovered all those sore muscles and general tiredness had nothing to do with shifting boats. And how we got away with the amount of booze we drank every night i don't know. And as for 50m on air on a single 12l!!!! never again.

What profiles and depths would you say are 99.999% safe with a 24hr/12hr rest period on air and Nitrox. This is more for travelling home for me not weekend diving then working monday.

And as I don't have the time or the knowledge of the algorithms.

Would you get micro bubbles if you had a decompression at 30k when you were pressurised at 7k?

I used to dive with Phi of decoweenie but never really got into the whole thing of accelerated deco and the rebreather scene.

MJ

[S-Works]

Yep I am aware of the CAA guidlines, along with the PADI, SSI, NAUI, TDI, SDI, IANTD et all (who all have different guidlines!).

Phi, is out in Dubai misbehaving himself as usual. Has found himself a nice shiny 115m sub to dive. Deco weenie is still alive and kicking. A nice presentation of a standard Buhlmann algorithmn.

I agree with you, the old days of slower than the largest bubble always worked for me as well!

Microbubbles are a bit of a misnomer, they will be present in your system after any dive, even a freedive. Where they present themselves problematically is when they seed into larger bubble formations and while theoretically a rapid pressure change from 7k to 30k in the event of an airliner having an incident could present a problem, in realty the pressure changes are measured in fractions of an atm equating to less than a 5m depth change in underwater terms. The cause of seeding is still subject to much argument but flaws in the veins and arteries have been recognised as a source of bubble capture which then causes microbubbles to attract to the site and grow to a size which they then breakaway and head happily off somewhere to do some damage.

Generally speaking if you are going to get bent then it will manifest itself within minutes of getting out of the water, on helium it will actually manifest itself in water. It is very rare for a person to get a "real" bend 24hrs after a dive.

I generally think that anything in the "standard" recreational (a deep dive is classed as anything great than 18m) depth of 0-20m is fine, as long as you are correctly hydrated and are not pre-disposed (PFO etc.). Again it is matter of personal choice, I rarely dive less than 60m these days but am still happy to fly the next day but I understand the decompression methods I use and am so hydrated I could fill a lake.

An interesting diversion from flying talk!

:p

[mad_jock]

He is some lad :D

Has father hood changed him at all?

Slower than the largest bubble!!! :D

O well haven't managed to get my hair wet for nearly 18months now. And all my old diving buddies are up with JT in the shetlands sometime soon. :(

MJ

[S-Works]

it switches between cooing about the "mini me" and his next hair brained scheme which at the moment is an ECCR module we are working on for the KISS CCR.

I have not been on John T's tub in ages. There is only so much leaking of the roof into your bunk you can take!

The scapa wrecks were starting to show the toll of the scottish weather on our last trip about 18 months ago and I will bet thing are not getting any better!

The smallest bubbles were fast little bleeders! :p

[mad_jock]

"Mini me" I would have hoped that the kid had some of Mels looks.

The tub was apparently out the water and has had a refit. Bet it still stinks though.

Agree about the scapa wrecks. I don't think i will do the flow again. Its not going to be long before some poor sod gets trapped when something moves.

And you know phi hair brained usually works. That MK5 was a beast of a machine.

See its all this watching boxes on your arm, makes you forget the basics.

H'mm maybe i should go for a few dives in a wet suit and fenzy just to remind me. :D