27/09/2021
Written by SDITDI Instructor Trainer Mark Powell
The Four Levels of Buoyancy
Buoyancy control is a skill and like any skill it takes time and practice to master. It would be great if I could tell you that a particular course contains all you need to know in order to master your buoyancy and, by the time you complete the course, you will have world class buoyancy control. Unfortunately, that is not the case. Equally you should not expect that one day you will learn the magic secret of buoyancy control and suddenly be in complete control of your buoyancy. You will not wake up one morning and suddenly “get it”. This is because buoyancy control is not binary, it is not a case of you either get it or you don’t. Instead, achieving buoyancy control is a gradual progression and one that never ends. You can always improve your buoyancy so there is no end point where we can stop practicing.
If you think about learning a martial art, there is the same progression. As you study any martial art you will progress through the ranks, from a white belt to yellow, orange, green and onwards. Even when you get to black belt, and are considered a master, you still keep on practicing and improving. There are further levels of black belt indicating higher levels of mastery.
In diving we don’t have the same concept of levels to match the belt system in martial arts but it is still possible to identify different skill levels that divers have in managing their buoyancy. Buoyancy control can broadly be categorized into four levels.
LEVEL 1 - BEGINNER
The first level is where the diver has very little idea about how to control their buoyancy and they are often unable to maintain any level of control. They may drift up and not realise why it is happening as they have not yet grasped the key concepts of buoyancy. At times the instructor may need to help the diver to control their buoyancy by dumping air or injecting more air. Someone learning to dive for the first time would usually start off like this but they usually move beyond this point within their initial pool training.
If you're teaching other people, be aware that at the beginning of the process, they may not know how unskilled they are. You'll need to make them understand how much they need to learn. You'll also need to explain why they need to learn these skills.
This stage may be very frustrating as the diver does not necessarily understand what they are doing wrong, or how to correct it. Clear and understandable instruction is required in order to move past this phase and to summarise the many interrelated factors that the diver needs to understand. At this level it is very easy for a diver to get the wrong idea or to develop bad habits.
It is essential that the instructor starts off by explaining some of the key concepts of buoyancy as described in the next chapter. Without this basis of knowledge, the diver will not understand what they should be doing or how to correct a problem. This can be difficult for some instructors who are so comfortable with their buoyancy that it has become second nature. They cannot put themselves in the position of a new diver who simply does not understand the whole concept of buoyancy and how the act of breathing or injecting or dumping air into a jacket can have any bearing on their position in the water.
Be sensitive at this early stage, and give plenty of positive feedback to keep people's motivation high.
LEVEL 2 – NEW DIVER
The second level is where the diver understands the principles of buoyancy control and can manage their own buoyancy to a large extent. They may still have to work very hard at it and divers at this level are easily identified by the fact that they keep a constant hold on their BC inflator hose. By the end of your initial training then you should have reached at least this level. Some divers never progress past this level, especially if they only dive very occasionally. At this stage buoyancy, and by extension diving in general, is hard work and requires a lot of effort. Unless the diver moves past this level, they will not fully enjoy the real experience of diving.
As I mentioned at the start of this chapter buoyancy control is a gradual process and this second level covers quite a wide range of experience levels. At one level is the open water diver who has started to grasp the principles of buoyancy control as is starting to look more comfortable but still has a lot of room for improvement. Another level is the diver who has been diving for a while but does not dive often enough to make any progress. They may only do a couple of dives a year and as a result never make enough progress to make any real improvement and then have such a long gap between dives that any improvement is lost during the gap until the next diving activity. This means that even someone who has nominally been diving for several years may never progress past the new diver level.
Another reason why some divers do not progress past this level is that they are not aware of their buoyancy level. They do not reflect on how well they are doing or whether there is anything more that they could do to improve. They may well have poor buoyancy skills but not even realise they have poor skills.
The difference between this level and the next can be difficult to identify. At this level we would expect a diver to look relatively comfortable and to the inexperienced eye they may look like they have reasonable buoyancy control. There are two main differences between a diver at level 2 and level 3, one internal and one external. The first difference is that the diver does not feel comfortable or confident with their buoyancy. They may have it under control but they feel it is a constant struggle and they could lose control at any moment. Divers in this state are not truly enjoying their diving and, unless they can move past this state are unlikely to continue diving as this level of struggle is just not fun. The second difference is external. The diver may seem under control but that control can be disturbed quite easily by any external factor. Dealing with any other situation, a slight change in equipment, a slight drift up or even just a lapse in concentration can be all it takes to lose that control.
One challenge that divers at this stage face is that they compare their buoyancy control with their instructors and get disillusioned because they don’t have the same level of skill. This is not surprising as the instructor has put in many hundreds or thousands of hours of practice to get to that level and it would be unrealistic to get to the same level within a few lessons. This is where the instructor has to set the expectation of the student and explain what is achievable and realistic for any given level of course. It would be unrealistic for a new martial arts student, or even a yellow or green belt, to have the same level of skills as a black belt after just a few lessons. The same thing applies for any subsequent courses and it is important for instructors to set realistic expectations as to what level of control a student should have at each level.
LEVEL 3 – CONFIDENT DIVER
The third level is where the diver is growing in confidence and can hold their buoyancy without constantly thinking about it. They will appear to be fully in control and to be able to maintain position at the depth required. The majority of divers will get to this third level but then do not progress any further. They may seem to have mastered buoyancy control however, when they become distracted, by sending up a DSMB or dealing with some type of problem, then their buoyancy is affected and they may start to fall or rise in the water.
They may not realise that a higher level of control is desirable, or even possible, as they may get into the habit of sending up a DSMB from the bottom and unless they get into trouble will not realise that a problem will interfere with their ability to control their buoyancy.
It is possible for divers to dive for many years and even progress quite far with their diving without developing beyond this level. However, for any diver looking to dive with less experienced divers, progress into technical diving, become an instructor or wanting to be confident that they could deal with an emergency situation it is essential that they progress onto the highest level of buoyancy control.
LEVEL 4 – MASTERY
The fourth level of buoyancy control is where the diver can control their buoyancy precisely and in a range of conditions, even when they are focusing on other tasks or dealing with a problem.
Instructors need to have this level of control as they will need to be focused on their students and cannot afford to be struggling with their own buoyancy while dealing with a student’s problem. The same applies for dive masters or anyone diving with someone less experienced than themselves.
For technical diving it is essential that we aim to reach the fourth level of buoyancy control. There are a number of reasons why we must aim for this level and not be content to remain at the third level. Technical diving inevitably means decompression diving and a decompression ceiling puts restrictions on how far we can ascend without risking DCI. If a problem at depth results in a loss of buoyancy control then a rapid ascent may result. Technical divers must be able to deal with any problem at depth without risking a rapid ascent and so must be able to deal with any problem while still maintaining their buoyancy control.
Obviously, this level of control is also useful for any recreational diver as then they will be able to deal with problems without a subsequent loss of buoyancy. In addition to the risk of an uncontrolled ascent there is also the risk of sinking further. A diver who becomes fixated on dealing with a task and is unaware of their buoyancy may sink deeper. This can make the original problem much more serious. By sinking deeper, the diver is using up their breathing gas faster, they will experience a higher level of narcosis and finally they will be incurring a greater decompression penalty.
In other words, every diver should aim for this level of control and should not be content to remain at level 3.
