[underwater exhalation]
There are a couple of reasons you want to be able to do this:
first of all it is one of the required skills that you need to do during your check out dive.
But also, what is built into this skill is the muscle memory where you learn where everything is
and how the buckles and clips on your BC work
and also when you get into week two of the class
some of that muscle memory is relied upon for the rescue portion
because during rescue you have to undo buckles and clips and loosen shoulder straps
and remove the BCD from the diver as you do a complete rescue.
So that's the reason we do it like this.
BCD: remove and replace. The first thing you want to do is let all the air out of your BC.
You want it as negatively buoyant as possible.
You're going to loosen up the shoulder straps; you have a buckle over each shoulder.
You want the shoulder straps open as far as possible, that makes this skill much easier.
Next thing you are going to do is take your gauge console - notice how it runs under your left shoulder strap and under your left arm -
you are going to back that out and put it in your BC pocket.
At your waist, on the front, there's a plastic buckle.
Undo that. underneath that is a Velcro cummerbund, undo that as well.
Remember that the regulator comes over your right shoulder, so we want to take this off like a jacket
taking your left arm out first, that way you can keep the regulator in your mouth during the entire skill.
Then, with your right hand reach back behind you
either grab the bottom of the scuba cylinder or the bottom of your scuba jacket
and take it off like we just did here.
check to make sure there is nothing wrapped around your first stage; that you cam band is done properly
and then to put it back on, put your right arm in first. Remember the regulator hose comes over your right shoulder.
With your right hand push the scuba unit up against your back
and hook down with your left hand trying to find that large shoulder strap hole.
Then, find the cummerbund up front
do the Velcro cummerbund and then the buckle that is in front of that.
And remember that we put our gauge console in our BC pocket, that way it can't get tangled up front when we put our scuba unit back on.
Reach back and find your gauge console.
Run it underneath your left arm in between the BC shoulder strap and your body
and then tuck it on the opposite side
and then you can tighten down both of the shoulder straps on your BC.
That was scuba unit: remove and replace.