Is Rebreather diving inherently more dangerous than OC?

sven

Reading through another thread on Rebreather World, I thought it would be interesting to get everyone's view on whether Rebreather diving is more dangerous than OC, and the reasons for your Yes or No.

Your thoughts? Poll is open!

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Sven

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"Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it's time to pause and reflect." Mark Twain[/SIZE]

PCDiver

Diving a rebreather on a shallow dive is more complex than doing the dive on OC. More dangerous? Probably. But I couldn't care less. I do it because I can do the dive on CCR, because it is good training for the deeper stuff and because I like it. It is fun.

It's been almost a year since my last OC dive and I don't want to go back.

scunick

If you accept the fact that risk is a co-efficient of the number of things that can co wrong, probability of the events occuring and the impact of the events ...then I believe that rebreather diving is inherently more risky than recreation diving.

As we move into deep technical I believe that the risks start to equalise with there being a similar number of different potential issues. While I would be hesitant to state that rebreathers are less risky than technical OC, on balance, I am comfortable with the risk/benefit charateritics presented by rebreathers and do not enjoy diving OC as much as I used too (noisy and cold).

JMHO and more a statement of belief than anything else

Nick

robvdmr13

Yes, I believe so.
CO2, hypoxic, hyperoxic.
More sneaky ways to kill you. CCR does provide you with more time and possibilities to sort out problems and get you out, but you can`t trust the unit one bit. Do that and it will bite you.

Robert

O.C.Diver

While there are those who will never have an incident with either OC or CC, statistics on diver fatalities for both recreational and technical diving, show a greater risk with rebreathers.

Ted

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chrismc

yes their is a minimum danger from rebreathers that isnt there on OC, if you forget to turn the unit on hypoxia will lead to death.

However moving away from the 'how easy to kill yourself' debate a paticular situation could be safer on either.

OC has less complexity, less things to go wrong, easier redudancy and no relaince on electronics / user operation.

CC gives the advantage of extra duration safety margin, safer deco (considering same profile OC).

This means that where the kit / setup / dive is complex a rebreather is often safer as the added complexity of the rebreather is ofset by its advantages over OC for this dive. Hence a good reason for CC on techincal dives

Where the dive is simple / shallow / no deco / infrequent OC is safer as the safer profiles arent significant compared to the complexities.

Gilles

I vote no!

Not really sure why yet, but the redundancy in breathing is comforting. The ability to take the necessary deco time as well. The removal of gas constraints is important, in addition to the deco advantages, along with heat and moisture consevation.

Totally against the statistics. Perhaps it is just my vested interest. I have no interest in OC diving anymore.

Susceptibility to complacency seems far greater with Rebreather. The complexity of it keeps me and others engaged and interested.

To answer such a question, a set of boundary conditions need to be defined. It is too generalized as is. I vote that it will eventually become safer than OC.

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Gilles
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PacketSniffer

While there are more opportunities for failure on a rebreather, there are more redundant breathing methods to perform dives safely. It is the responsbility of the diver to understand the opportunities of failure and have a procedure to overcome it that he/she can effectively execute.

So, in my eyes, the answer is yes and no.

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Mark Chase

To me its simple

Shalow diving >50m with a CCR is more dangerous than OC

Deep diving < 50m is safer on CCR.

Being deep in terms of actual depth or in terms of yardage of penitration into cave or wreck puts unacceptabley high time preasure on gas reserves.

Things that could be fixed easily with a bit more time or with less presure induced panic, will kill you on OC. On ccr they are just mildly anoying.


ATB

Mark Chase

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nigelh

I voted yes.

Am I bothered? Not really.

You can be as safe as you want.
This from an ex-motorcycle racer with the X-rays to prove it.

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nigelh