Samba While Freediving – What To Know

Freediving can be one of the most enjoyable activities you will ever engage in. It can feel like you are flying over an entire aquatic world where your only limit is how long you can hold your breath. However, freediving isn’t without its hazards and risks. In this article, we examine the condition known as samba and what you need to know to handle it.

What Is Samba?

Simply put, samba is the condition of lost muscle control and uncontrolled movement in the body, which occurs when your body is running low on oxygen. Freedivers are at risk of samba due to the duration of their breath-holds and the frequency of their repetitive dives (not resting enough in between dives). When you don’t take the time to re-oxygenate yourself with several minutes of breathing between dives, your tissues within your body can run low on oxygen. When this happens, a diver can lose control of his or her own body. This can result in an inability to continue swimming or even an inability to continue with a breath-hold. Both of these instances can potentially lead to a diver’s death if not addressed immediately.

What Are The Symptoms Of Samba?

One of the things to know about samba is that the symptoms may not be apparent to you as a diver who is exhibiting them. You may very well be showing severe signs of samba and not even know it. That is why it is always a good idea to freedive with a partner. As partners, you can visually monitor each other and be on the lookout for signs of samba. A few key signs of samba are as follows:

Air bubbles – if you notice an inability to retain your breath-hold or if your dive buddy is leaking air from his or her mouth or nose during a dive, you need to assess this to see if this could be an early sign of samba. Generally speaking, an inability to maintain a breath hold for any reason is a sign that you need to ascend back to the surface. If you are leaking air then its time to call it quits. However, this needs to be considered as a possible sign of samba and you will need to stay alert for any other warning signs.

Inability to keep your eyes open – If your eyelids won’t say open or if you look at your dive buddy and see that they look as though they are falling asleep behind their dive mask, this could be a sign of lost muscle control or samba.

A noticeable change in movement patterns – freedivers tend to have very deliberate and graceful movements when diving. They have to in order to maximize their distance coverage while diving. However, as samba set in, you may notice your dive partner begin to move erratically. In some cases, it can appear that the diver is suddenly intoxicated. If you notice any erratic movement from your dive buddy, it could be a sign of fading muscle control and you will want to assist the diver to the surface immediately. If you happen to notice that your own body doesn’t appear to be moving the way it normally does during a dive then you too will need to calmly make your way to the surface.

Loss of direction – if at any point during a freedive you become disoriented, you may be suffering from a lack of oxygen to your brain tissue. If you see your dive partner looking around as though he or she cannot tell which way is up, you need to guide them to the surface immediately. If you yourself are feeling a loss of direction, follow the direction of a few air bubbles and they will lead you to the surface.

Inability to keep your head above water – samba doesn’t always manifest mid-dive. Sometimes you won’t notice anything is wrong until you make it to the surface. Sometimes divers who are suffering from samba will reach the surface and won’t be able to keep their head out of the water due to the loss in muscle control. This is why it is a smart idea to have a dive partner nearby who can assist you and keep your face out of the water so you can breathe.

Failure to respond to signals from your partner – If you are signaling to your dive partner and you notice that they are not responding, the may be showing signs of samba. Just because they are still swimming along, it doesn’t mean that nothing is wrong. Divers need to communicate with one another and when on diver stops responding to another, it is a sign that action needs to be taken to get the afflicted diver back to the surface.

NOTE: In some cases, there may not be any noticeable signs of samba. In fact, this list of symptoms just scratches the surface of possible symptoms. Prevention is key. In the following section, we will talk about how to prevent this condition.

How To Prevent Samba While Freediving

Dive Partner – Whenever you are freediving, you have to recognize that there are dangers that come with this activity. Splashing around in shallow water is one thing, but if you are planning on making serious dives into deeper waters, you need to have someone there to watch your back. This is why it is always preferable to have a diver partner (or dive buddy) to accompany you.

Keep in mind that this person doesn’t have to actually be in the water with you (although it is much more effective if they are). It can be beneficial just to have someone observing from the boat while you make your own freedives. You just need someone close by who can objectively monitor your movement and your behavior for signs of samba. As we mentioned previously, the symptoms of samba often go unnoticed by the diver who is exhibiting them. An observant dive partner may actually save your life.

Hand Signals – Obviously, when you are underwater, you will not be able to verbally communicate with your diving companion. This means that you won’t be able to approach your friend and say, “Hey, I think you are losing muscle control. We should probably ascend to the surface.” However, there might come a time when you need to convey a similar message to a fellow diver. This is where a series of hand signals can come into play.

Basically, you and your dive partner need to establish a way of signaling to one another while underwater in order to communicate important information. The obvious hand signals can be pointing to the surface to let the other person know that you need to ascend for some reason. Or, pointing to your wrist to covey that you have spent too much time submerged.

These are not “official hand signals for freediving.” These are just mere suggestions. However, before you and your dive partner make your dive, you need to have established some sort of emergency signal that you both agree upon. This is the “code red” signal that translates to, “Get to the surface immediately because something is seriously wrong.” This sort of signal is important because it will let each of you know that this is no time to relax and continue with the dive. Something is wrong. Perhaps there is some sort of environmental threat or maybe one of us is displaying the early symptoms of samba. Either way, we need to get to the surface.

Limit The Duration And Frequency Of Your Dives – We mentioned earlier that samba is the condition of lost muscle control and uncontrolled movement in the body, which occurs when your body is running low on oxygen. This means that when you deprive your body of oxygen over and over again for long periods of time, you run the risk of experiencing samba during your freedive. For this reason, you need to regulate the length of your dives and the amount of time you spend at the surface recuperating between dives.

A good dive watch can help you monitor your dive times along with a multitude of other useful information like dive depth and heart rate which can help you keep your body oxygenated while diving. The main thing to remember is that it is easy to get caught up in the fun of freediving. You need to remember to take care of your self while doing it.

What To Do If You Experience Samba While Freediving

If you begin to feel strange in any way at all while diving, DO NOT disregard it. Immediately ascend to the surface and make your way to whatever boat or dock or rock formation is nearby. It is important to not simply stop once you have reached the surface. Samba can set in even after you have reached the surface and if that happens you can lose consciousness and fall facedown back into the water. If no one is nearby to assist you, this can result in drowning.

If you notice your dive partner displaying the symptoms of samba, signal them with your predetermined “code red” signal and assist them to the surface and out of the water. Even if it turns out that they are fine, it is always better safe than sorry.

If you happen to have an oxygen tank nearby after you surface, you can administer O2 directly which should help your overall recovery from samba.

How Long Does Samba Last?

There are varying accounts of how long a samba will last. Divers report feeling loopy or euphoric for several minutes to hours after being rescued from a samba. The main thing to remember if you samba is that your body is compromised. You have been oxygen deficient for far too long and now your body’s performance is beginning to suffer. While there is no specific recovery time that we can report, it would be wise to cease all freediving for the day once you experience samba. That may not be what you want to hear, but you need to allow your body to recuperate from the lack of oxygen that it has been subjected to.

Does Samba Cause Long-term Damage?

Samba is the body’s response to deprivation of oxygen otherwise known as hypoxia. The samba itself isn’t what is so damaging in these situations. It’s the lack of oxygen to the tissues, particularly the brain. Long-term deprivation of oxygen to the brain is directly related to brain damage. Additionally, other tissues cannot survive without oxygen for extended durations. However, the fact of the matter is that you should not be repetitively attempting to induce a samba on yourself. The lack of oxygen that your body experiences while freediving should be short-lived and if you start to lose motor function or you just begin to feel a little loopy, get back to the surface and get some oxygen. If you continuously subject yourself to this, you may be more inclined to experience a total blackout and subsequent drowning before you get a chance to experience any form of actual brain damage.

What Is The Difference Between Samba And A Blackout?

Samba is the physical manifestation of symptoms from hypoxia or lack of oxygen in the body. These can be a loss of motor functions, lack of responsiveness, euphoric feelings, etc. It is caused when the tissues in the body and, particularly, the brain lack sufficient oxygen to function properly.

A blackout, on the other hand, is essentially a complete shutdown of the brain due to lack of oxygen. Overall function is compromised so severely that a person completely goes to sleep until the brain can uptake enough oxygen to restart the body.

Freediving is an exceptionally fun activity. So long as you can be mindful of your body and be responsible with the amount of time that you subjected it to low oxygen levels, you will have a safe and fun freediving experience.