Traditional braided white nylon line is difficult to see in open water, but our Hi-Viz line stands out like neon, allowing easier line management with nearby divers. View the twenty second video of two divers on their stop during a training dive to watch the Hi-Viz Blaze Orange line in action. One of the divers is also carrying a backup spool loaded with Hi-Viz Blaze Orange, can you find it?

There is no easy answer regarding choice of color. Different colors are seen to differing degrees by the human eye, meaning people are more sensitive to some colors than others. Peak sensitivity is at portion of the visible spectrum where yellow transitions to green. With that in mind, most people will have the highest sensitivity to a yellow-green color (aka chartreuse, greenish-yellow) just by the nature of how the human eye sees colors. Yellow-green is somewhat more visible in dim light due to the Purkinje effect, however orange color is still on the brighter end of the spectrum making it highly visible too. Orange also provides more contrast with some backgrounds, especially those common to diving.

Another thing to consider is there are an estimated 300 million people with some degree of color vision deficiency - most of whom are male; about 1 in 12 men are color blind (8%). Color vision deficient individuals may better perceive orange due to contrast. The choices of orange and chartreuse have been extensively studied by human factors experts for applications such as transportation signage and high-visibility clothing.

We are not aware of any studies specifically for diving applications, however the other studies along with the science and the experience of our customers provides some guidance for our recommendations. In well lighted conditions, the blaze orange color is highly visible and by far the most popular color selected for safety items. Studies suggest the best compromise choice for all lighting conditions is the fluorescent chartreuse color. Regardless, it is proven that adding a Retroreflective stripe to either of those colors will greatly increase their visibility.