How to master natural navigation

It’s only fair that I confess to the fact that 25 years of diving and becoming an ‘expert’ for Sport Diver has not always been based on model diving technique. Getting it wrong occasionally is part of life some would say, but the embarrassment still smarts every time the word ‘Kyarra’ appears in print or conversation.

The wreck of the Kyarra near Swanage, Dorset, was a favourite wreck dive of mine although it didn’t start that way the first time I dived it. On that day I descended the shot line into the gloom and arrived moments later on the sea bed at 28m with the dive marshall’s words still ringing in my ears: “You’ve got 20 minutes bottom time, no more”. Looking around I couldn’t see the wreck and didn’t appreciate that having let go of the shot line I had just drifted a little way downstream. All I had to do was turn to face into the gentle current and swim the short distance back. Instead I swam off in entirely the wrong direction into deeper water and turned it into a drift dive. Not only did I surface a long way from the wreck but the area became ever more tidal. This was in 1985 when the use of DSMBs on wrecks was considered a daft idea.

Inevitably I incurred the wrath of the skipper who finally spotted me in choppy water over half a mile away. As I climbed the boarding ladder he publicly berated me with: “Miss it! How could you miss it? There’s 5,500 tons of f****** steel down there!” He said lots of other things too, but I’ll write no more about it; I’ll come out in hives otherwise. Needless to say that I consider the person who invented the delayed SMB to be a genius. Having a compass is all well and good but recognising natural features is probably more important as you can’t always rely on a compass to tell the truth – especially not in the vicinity of tons of wreckage.

The key to successful pilotage is to use a compass only for as long as it takes to get oriented and then only refer to it occasionally. Once oriented you use visualisation to ‘see’ where you are in relation to nearby natural features such as the beach, reef, cliffs or headlands that you saw before you went in the water. Swimming around slavishly following your compass means that you can miss the clues that tell you where you are going. Pilotage means that exploration is your navigation. By drawing up a list of features, on a slate if necessary, you can navigate from feature to feature. You can still use your compass occasionally just to check that you are generally heading in the right direction.

Top Tips for natural navigation

1: Visit and walk around a shore dive site at low tide, this is a great way to get orientated – particularly for night dives.

2: On wrecks, follow the shot line all the way to the wreck. When you arrive look for a memorable part of the structure close to the shot line. On a recent dive on the SS Missouri, Anglesey, the shot was placed on the seabed on the port side of the bow. On the other side of the bow we found the capstan winch.

3: Visit the local dive centre for advice. On organised dives listen to the skipper’s or Divemaster’s briefing carefully.

4: Features such as the parallel sand ripples created by wave action will help you confirm your direction.

5: Marine life can be very helpful. Many creatures including fish are territorial. In the entrance to the cove at Porthdafarch, Anglesey you can find pollack shoaling in a small area throughout the summer months.
6: Marine life such as sea weed will grow in zones. By observing the position and type of seaweed in an area you can tell where you are in relation to the high water or low water mark on the shore line.

7: For wreck dives try to find a photograph of the wreck when it was still a ship to get an idea of size, and key structures. 8: Remember that you are navigating in 3-D. If you are looking for something in a maximum depth of 16m and you are already at 18m and getting deeper – you’ve missed it!

9: On reefs and beaches, an effective way to navigate is to follow where the rocks meet the sand. If you have the rocks on your left on the way out, when you turn back they will be on your right. 10 Rocks themselves may not be memorable, but what’s living on them can make them very much so.