Buddy Check (BWRAF): The Pre-Dive Safety Check, Step by Step

Buddy check checklist: the five BWRAF steps

Do the check last, once both of you are kitted up and immediately before you enter the water, so nothing changes between the check and the entry. That is how BSAC defines it. PADI asks for a full check before every dive, including repeat dives after each surface interval, and SSI puts the time needed at under a minute. The sections after the table explain each step and the research behind the faults it lists.

The check has a second job: learning how your buddy's equipment works, because in an emergency you may have to find their alternate second stage, inflate their BC or drop their weights without asking. PADI's own memory aid for the letters is "Begin With Review And Friend". Divers trade many others, such as "Bruce Willis Ruins All Films", and any of them works as long as you remember what to check under each letter. The skills behind the check are part of entry-level training, covered in our training guides.

BWRAF, SEA BAG, ABC and other agencies' versions

There is no single standard. The DAN researchers behind a 2012 checklist trial note that there is no gold-standard pre-dive checklist and that agency checklists can differ considerably in content. PADI uses BWRAF. NAUI's manual uses SEA BAG, which adds site, emergency and activity planning to the equipment check. DAN lists ABC (air, buoyancy, clips and releases) as another common version. SDI teaches ABCDE: air, buoyancy, computer, dive equipment, then enter the water. BSAC's Safe Diving Guide describes what its check should contain without an acronym, and so does SSI's buddy article, which asks you to check that no hoses are trapped inside the BC, the cylinder is open and the alternate air source works.

Put side by side, the equipment items overlap almost completely. The real differences are whether the dive plan is part of the check and whether the out-of-gas response is rehearsed. If you learned a different acronym, compare its items with the rows below rather than the letters.

German-speaking divers call it the Buddy-Check. PADI's German blog teaches the same five steps as TBSLO, remembered as "Tauchen Brauchen Saubere Luft OK": Tariersystem (BC), Bleisystem (weights), Schnallen und Verschlüsse (releases), Luft (air) and a final check of mask, fins and dive computer.

B: checking the BC

Press the power inflator, let the BC fill, then vent it through every dump valve, including the overpressure valve. DAN adds the oral inflator. In a dry suit, check that the inflator hose is attached and that the exhaust valve works.

This step catches real faults. In DAN's case files, a group of certified divers on a Hawaiian shore dive found out at waist depth that one BC would not inflate: the inflator elbow on a brand-new jacket had never been screwed onto the BC. Among the first 1,000 reports to Australia's Diving Incident Monitoring Study, the power inflator failed to work in 14 incidents, and the author judged that a careful pre-dive check would have found almost all of them.

Watch the whole cycle, not only the inflate button. When Chris Acott asked 55 divers to check a deliberately faulty rig, 85% spotted the disconnected inflator hose, but only 22% noticed the loose dump valve and 18% the torn oral inflator.

W and R: weights and releases

For weights, find every piece of lead your buddy carries and how each one comes off. PADI suggests a gentle tug on integrated pouches to confirm they are locked in, and a look at belts and rear trim pockets. BSAC wants the emergency weight release covered in every check, because after an incident the weights may have to come off as soon as you reach the surface. Integrated systems release in different ways, which our guide to choosing your first BCD compares.

For releases, go over the cylinder band, shoulder straps, chest strap and waist buckle. DAN adds that the cylinder band should be tight. A loose cylinder is easy to miss while you stand on deck and hard to fix in the water: in Acott's test, 40% of divers missed a cylinder that was loose in its harness, and 9 of the 108 unsafe conditions reported by divers in a DAN field study were tanks not well secured.

The same DAN study found that the most common unsafe conditions were being underweighted or overweighted. A buddy check will not tell you whether the amount is right, only whether it is there and releasable.

A: checking the air

Open the valve all the way, then breathe from both second stages while watching the pressure gauge. The needle should stay still. If it dips on each inhalation and recovers, the valve is only partly open. DAN suggests exhaling into each regulator before your first inhalation. PADI puts it bluntly: a quick breath or two off the regulator is not enough. If you are diving nitrox, PADI wants the cylinders analysed before you kit up.

DAN's incident files show why the gauge matters. One diver test-breathed the regulator without looking at the gauge, rolled off the boat and got no air on the first breath underwater; the valve was closed. Another had turned the valve fully off and then half a turn on, instead of the reverse. The needle flickered with each breath, and at 17 m (55 ft) breathing became hard with about 83 bar (1,200 psi) still in the cylinder. DAN calls this an error reported every year and says a valve should be either fully open or fully closed.

Read the pressure too. In Acott's test, 76% of divers noticed the closed valve but only 29% noticed that the cylinder was empty, and the same share noticed tape left over the valve outlet. Gauges themselves fail: contents gauge faults were the largest single group of equipment failures in the Australian incident study, and the author advised comparing your reading with your buddy's before, during and after the dive.

BSAC adds one more item: show your buddy where your alternate second stage is and how to use it, ideally with a dry run of the out-of-gas response.

F: the final check

Do a head-to-toe check of each other. PADI's list is mask, snorkel, fins, light, knife, camera and signalling devices, plus clipping off loose hoses so they do not drag on the reef. DAN adds a defogged mask. Two items deserve a second look.

Fins: Acott's review of equipment failures cites a fatality analysis in which 10% of the dead divers were missing one or both fins, and concludes that a pre-dive check must include the fin straps. Dive computers: switch them on and look at the screen. In the Australian incident data, 6 of the 11 computer failures led to harm, and none of those divers had tables as a backup. Our article on what to do if your dive computer fails covers the backup options.

The final check is also the natural moment to confirm the plan: maximum depth, turn pressure, signals and what you will do if you lose each other. NAUI's SEA BAG builds that into the check, and the rest belongs in the dive briefing.

Buddy check with a new buddy, or when you dive solo

With an unfamiliar buddy, slow down and say each step out loud. PADI recommends exactly that, and asks you to question any gear you have not seen before. One PADI author gives her own setup as the example: she carries an AIR2 instead of an octopus, so in a gas-sharing emergency she hands over her primary regulator, which a buddy who had not been told would struggle to work out underwater. DAN's 2025 list of questions for a new buddy starts with certification and recent dives, then gear: ask about new or rental equipment, make sure each of you knows where the other's reserve regulator is and how to reach it, and check that tanks are secured, valves open and pockets zipped.

Agree on communication before you get wet, especially when a language or training barrier exists, as DAN advises. Our hand signals chart shows which signals vary. Settle the lost-buddy rule too: PADI's is to search for no more than one minute and then ascend, BSAC's is about 30 seconds. Separation matters. In a UK review presented at DAN's 2010 fatalities workshop, it occurred in 55 of 140 analysed deaths (39%), almost always after something else had already gone wrong.

Solo divers have nobody to check their gear. SDI, which runs a Solo Diver course (minimum age 21, Advanced Diver or equivalent, 100 logged dives), points out that alone there is no one to provide an outside perspective or act as a check and balance. PADI's Self-Reliant Diver course also requires 100 logged dives. SDI writes its ABCDE check for the individual diver, so a solo diver can run it on their own gear, ideally from the written list below. The air step then covers two supplies: SDI's course requires a changeover to a redundant air supply, and its risk management article describes a small cylinder with its own regulator and pressure gauge. Open and breathe both.

A written buddy check list for the boat

Use a written list, because divers remember the letters and forget the checks. In a 2012 cluster-randomised trial run by DAN at four dive locations, 1,043 divers made 2,041 dives. The group given a written pre-dive checklist had 36% fewer major mishaps, 26% fewer minor ones and 32% fewer mishaps overall: about one fewer mishap for every 25 dives.

The trial's control group gave a second result. Only 8% of those 426 divers routinely used a written checklist, 71% used a memorised one and 21% used none. The written-checklist users reported 69% fewer major mishaps after adjustment, while divers using a memorised checklist did no better than divers using none. The authors' explanation: a diver may recall BWRAF as buoyancy, weights, releases, air and final OK and still forget what to do under each heading.

An older test points the same way. In a study published in 1995, 55 divers were asked to do their normal pre-dive check on a rig with nine planted faults. Two found all nine and four found none. Print the list below or copy it onto a slate, and read it aloud while your buddy does each check.

• Both divers fully kitted, immediately before entry.
• BC: inflate with the power inflator, vent through every dump valve and the overpressure valve, test the oral inflator.
• Dry suit: inflator hose connected, exhaust valve working.
• Weights: every pouch, belt and trim pocket found, locked in, and the release shown to your buddy.
• Releases: cylinder band tight, shoulder straps, chest strap and waist buckle closed, no hose over a release.
• Air: valve fully open, never backed off. Breathe both second stages while watching the gauge, then read the pressure aloud.
• Alternate second stage: where it sits and how it comes free.
• Nitrox: cylinder analysed, computer set to the same mix.
• Computer: switched on, battery showing, correct mode.
• Mask, fins and fin straps, light, SMB or other signalling device.
• Plan agreed: maximum depth, time, turn pressure, lost-buddy procedure.