Читать книгу Into the Abyss. Diving to Adventure in the Liquid World онлайн

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About 15 divers in total turned up, some experienced, some, like me, completely new to the sport and under instruction. I was paired up with a very capable and experienced club diver called Colin Rivers. Colin was a very genial tall bearded diver, unassuming but very capable.

We got dressed into our wet suits and rigged up with our dive gear. Colin, knowing that it was my first sea dive had a good look over my shiny new kit to make sure that I hadn’t forgotten anything obvious, like turning my air supply on.

I knew how buoyant my wet suit was without weights, and never having dived in the sea before, I wasn’t entirely sure how much weight I should carry in my weight belt to counteract that buoyancy. Sea water is more buoyant than the pool water I had practised in so I knew I would need some more - but how much? I was also concerned at what might happen if the seemingly fragile plastic clamp on my weight belt were to fail or be knocked open.

To avoid such a calamity, I thought it would be a good idea to put a half hitch knot in the excess length of my weight belt to secure it to the main section. Colin saw this straight away and patiently explained to me the error of my ways. If he had to recover me from the water and had to get my weight belt off to get me into a boat or onto rocks at shore, he would be hampered as he would not be able to untie the knot quickly. He might have to cut the belt off me. Weight belts were designed to be quick release for just such an eventuality - and I was complicating the position.