Disturbing trend in diving?

[Capt Jim Wyatt]

I taught my first PADI scuba diver course in 1974 at a local college. It was not for credit class. Graduates had divemaster level knowledge upon graduation.

 

[MacDuyver]

Watered down from what?

Well it certainly isn’t as hard as this pic of PADI OW from back in the 80’s when they had standards.

 

[Leatherboot69]

[

I'm imagining an outdoor enthusiast who enjoys participating in a variety of activities common on Roatan, where all of my diving experience comes from. When they come to Roatan they like to kite surf up on the north east side, parasail on the west side, love snorkeling in West Bay and West End. And yes, they also spend a morning doing a two-tank dive with any one of probably two dozen shops in West End or West Bay that will take them as a walk-in (or with a couple of days' notice).

But they only come for a week, because that's all the time they dedicate to a Roatan trip. On their other weeks of vacation time they are hiking, or skiing, or mountain climbing, or who knows what else - because they also enjoy doing all of those things. In other words, they are not as hyper-focused on the hobby/sport of diving as probably most of us posting in this thread are.

Let's further assume that in literally none of these activities do they invest considerable time and energy "getting into the details", as posted some dozens of pages back. They enjoy them all equally, but all casually, and do not have the time, funds, or frankly inclination to get as much into the nitty-gritty of any of them as we have about diving because of our passion for it.

The question I asked myself, imagining this hypothetical person, is: "How much should it disturb me if their level of knowledge, or involvement, or even participation in scuba diving isn't the same as mine?"

Frankly, it didn't take me long to come up with an answer...

This is/was me, which I think is why my views sometimes diverge from the Scubaboard mainstream.

 

[Leatherboot69]

I believe "discovery dives" divers and experienced (including pro) divers have the worst records of fatalities. That was from years ago, so it could have changed. I base that on the sanctioned ratios of Instructor/DM to students on these Discover Dives (noit including those who exceed the ratios, which apparently happens a lot). Relying on a DM or the instructor during a course is the norm. When diving on your own it should be basically a side issue, aside from a dive briefing about the area. You shouldn't be "relying" on a DM during the dive.

I’ve only read the abstracts so I know I’d need to scrutinise the methodologies to make them empirically comparable, but the following sources indicate that DSD fatalities are 0.87 per 100,000 participants, compared to 2 per 100,000 participants for recreational scuba diving more generally.

Mortality rate during professionally guided scuba diving experiences for uncertified divers, 1992-2019 - PubMed

PADI's contemporary Discover Scuba Diving introductory scuba experiences, at 0.87 fatalities per 100,000 participants, have a calculated mortality rate that is less than half that calculated for 1992-2008. The late period's rate improvement appears due either to significant under-registration in...

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Diving Casualties - StatPearls - NCBI Bookshelf

 

[Leatherboot69]

You shouldn't be "relying" on a DM during the dive.

Why?

 

[AsherN]

Is it your opinion that all courses taught in the late 1970s were done through college classes? Are you aware that colleges still offer scuba as classes today?

How does this show that current instruction has been "watered down?"

Current courses do not have anywhere near the amount of classwork.

 

[pelan-pelan]

From my experience. Twice I have been on a dive where the dive guide experienced difficulties. Not major, and definitely not due to negligence on their part. But it was good that we had enough skills to look after ourselves and them.

Another example where some "tourist" had received minimal briefing and was flapping around like a lunatic, finning far too close and snagged my regulator hose from behind. She proceeded to tow me by my teeth for some distance as I prepared to switch to my octopus in an orderly fashion but concerned that releasing my teeth would cause my regulator to rebound and do me and my mask a damage. You'd think she would have noticed the increased drag. Fortunately the snag released. When she looked round, I used my vast knowledge of hand signals to convey my discontent.

Then there were the maniacs, who did have some qualification, shot down to some unspeakable depth (where it's dark). The dive guide's rule was not to follow to such a depth so they held level and followed the bubbles coming up from below. The problem was not that the morons tried to kill themselves, it was that they left the dive guide alone. NB Buddy diving applies to the guide as well.

Message - dive guides are not invulnerable and should be treated as buddies that need care. And never mind the badly "trained" people, they can go to Poseidon, it's the other people who they put in danger.

I have made mistakes, or had unforeseen hitches, it was my training and my buddy who mitigated the incident and reduced the severity to a a "learning experience". So the dive experience is not an unpleasant memory. We try to practise our skills either in the pool or on the first dive to keep ourselves "supple" mentally and physically and count that as as good dive. Hope this doesn't sound sanctimonious - because that is the recipe for a right royal c*** up.

 

[OMyMyOHellYes]

Nevermind.

 

[boulderjohn]

Current courses do not have anywhere near the amount of classwork.

Compared to when? Are you comparing a college course to a non-college course again?

What has been taken out from scuba classes and when? Why is what was taken out valuable? Remember that I asked you to be specific.

 

[Leatherboot69]

Current courses do not have anywhere near the amount of classwork.

And yet diving is much, much safer than when it did