What is more dangerous, snowmobiling or recreational scuba diving?

[Andrew1]

Being that both of these are in my top 3 most addictive hobbies (flying is #1) how would you compare the safety overall of snowmobiling to recreational scuba diving no deeper than 80 feet and never in an overhead environment (eg. wreck or cave) where you can not ascend to surface directly in an emergency.

I guess the best measurement of comparison is the number of fatalities per hour of participation in each activity.

My dive instructor thinks hands down that snowmobiling is much more dangerous than even wreck or cave diving, let alone recreational diving (which I find very surprising) so I wanted to get your thoughts too?

 

[adrienne]

I would agree with your instructor definitely, but I'm not going off any data here. I have only been scuba diving, not snowmobiling.

 

[mmmmm6]

regular diving today isnt dangerous if you go with a buddy, keep the deco ascension, and today only 2stage regulators are used and safe equipment. snowmobiling well if you try a double backflip u might break yer neck...

 

[amad]

I've never been snowmobiling, I was a diver. I'd say diving, because you rely on external air, which can fail, you need to calculate your safety stops, and you should really be cautious about air travel and diving, A diver needs to be in good physical condition too. I had a classmate die because he didn't take a long enough safety stop. Scary. Diving messes with human physiology, and you really need to know what you are doing.

I think snowmobiling is easy to figure out, and as long as you operate the sled with reasonable caution, stick to the trails, and go out with a buddy you should be OK. If you're reckless enough anything can be dangerous. Snowmobiling can be dangerous if you go into avalanche territory or race in the trees. A local police chief here died when his snowmobile smacked into a tree.

Why fatalities per hour? That's kind of a weird statistic. How about fatalities per excursion, and you'll need to compare the number of participants in each sport. If you're talking fatalities per hour driving a car is more dangerous than either snowmobiling or scuba diving because you have a large number of people driving.