| I recently spent some time in Maui in 20m-50m vis. Took my Salvo 21w because, well, I couldn't imagine diving without it.
Managed to get a few dives in with another DIR diver, here is how we worked it:
Dive 1 was a sunken pier where single file was the norm due to some narrow areas we were swimming through. I had my light, but we were only in 10m of water and ambient light really washed things out. The solution was vigilance in terms of both the lead diver checking on the trail diver and the trailing diver staying in contact with the lead. Worked fine. We'd get through an area and the lead would often turn and check. Where we could be wing-on-wing, I'd work to get into that position in order to make life easier on the lead diver.
Dive 2 was a reef where wing-on-wing worked really well.
Dive 3 was Molokini Crater. 50m+ of vis, max depths probably 25 meters. At depth, my Salvo worked really well, it would cast a bright spot on the reef that I could use to communicate with my buddy. At times we were wing-on-wing, but the end of the dive was on a wall where that doesn't work so well. Again, vigilance among the team members made not constantly being able to see each other a non-issue.
Dive 4 was more of the same, times for wing-on-wing and times where single file worked well.
I guess the point of all this is that positioning really is a matter of what the environment will dictate. Some formations require a bit more effort to keep track of teammates, and when that is necessary, you put the effort in. That, at least, was the lesson for me on these dives.
When it comes down to it, I view team positioning as a way to minimize the stress imposed on the team. When positioned correctly, keeping track of your teammates becomes almost a non-issue, either because you can see them directly by slightly turning your head, or you can see their light. The environment sometimes won't allow that, in which case you need to adapt team strategies. |