Diving Education Today

[SolarStorm]

Name another sport that costs hundreds to thousands of ducats to get the licenses to participate. [/B]

Try flying radio controlled aircraft, I cant even begin to imagine (nor do I really want to as my wife will read this) how much money we have tied up in a boat and wakeboards and stuff and lessons, just to look cool at the lake. Then there are the sleds, 5k a pop plus maintenance, ask a hunter how much his pound of mouse meet actually costs. Photography, now there is a sink hole of money. There are LOTS of ways to spend money on a hobby or sport. Some are just more dangerous than others. Some require govt licensing some not so. I cant imagine what the wakeboard injury rate is like. If you are taking it nice and calm and simply want to stand behind the boat, no big danger. Now start doing jumps and flips. Water is NOT SOFT! Yet I know of no certification, but the lessons sure openned our eyes.

 

[Kingpatzer]

For me it's less regulatory, but a moral responsibility to properly prepare the diver. It seems we do have a choice in what we provide to varying degrees.

Then meet your moral obligation by preparing the divers you train. No one is stopping you from doing that.

But proselytizing to the masses won't work. Not everyone excepts your version of morality.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

Try flying radio controlled aircraft, I cant even begin to imagine (nor do I really want to as my wife will read this) how much money we have tied up in a boat and wakeboards and stuff and lessons, just to look cool at the lake. Then there are the sleds, 5k a pop plus maintenance, ask a hunter how much his pound of mouse meet actually costs. Photography, now there is a sink hole of money. There are LOTS of ways to spend money on a hobby or sport. Some are just more dangerous than others. Some require govt licensing some not so. I cant imagine what the wakeboard injury rate is like. If you are taking it nice and calm and simply want to stand behind the boat, no big danger. Now start doing jumps and flips. Water is NOT SOFT! Yet I know of no certification, but the lessons sure openned our eyes.

That's quite a rambling rant! Tell me again what sports require you to pay hundreds to thousands (cave rebreather) for the license to participate? Are you telling me that flying remote controlled toys is a sport? If so, how much was the class for the license?

You took wake board lessons "to look cool", not because it was required to participate; same for skiing or snowboarding.

 

[Kingpatzer]

How many people spent $300 on ski lessons

Actually quite a few. Yet the injury rate there far exceeds that in Scuba diving. And if you want to talk about close calls and rescues and the like, go visit a ski hill and really watch what's going on there.

Complaining about the safety of scuba diving is really kind of amazing given how safe it is compared to so many other things in our lives.

a Benjamin on bicycle lessons

True, not many. But there again, injury rate is significantly higher than in scuba per participant. Oh sure, they spend more hours on a bike, and if you figure it by participant hour I have no idea how it'd fair, but when talking about participants, my kids would be far safer scuba diving after shoddy instruction than riding their bikes.

 

[Kingpatzer]

Are you telling me that flying remote controlled toys is a sport?

[sidetrack]

sport

Pronunciation [spawrt, spohrt]
1. an athletic activity requiring skill or physical prowess and often of a competitive nature, as racing, baseball, tennis, golf, bowling, wrestling, boxing, hunting, fishing, etc.
2. a particular form of this, esp. in the out of doors.
3. diversion; recreation; pleasant pastime.

Yeah, it's a sport. Pretty well by every definition. Flying a remote control plane takes a particular physical skill -- those controls are touchy. It often is of a competitive nature. It is a pleasant pastime. And it certainly can be quite diverting.

[/sidetrack]

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

This is what I'm trying to point out (sort of); back when Open Water SCUBA classes were all the kind of classes the old guard keeps "waxing" over SCUBA and toy airplanes were not defined as sports!

Was it the predominance of over 30 BMI people "needing" to participate in a sport, or did it happen because the people selling those activities are manipulating definitions to make more sales?

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

Name a sport other than skydiving that requires lessons to get the license, even a silly 30+ BMI sport like toy airplanes.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

I'll go first; hunting, where you have a rifle and bambi is chewing on some grass!

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

[sidetrack]


Yeah, it's a sport. Pretty well by every definition. Flying a remote control plane takes a particular physical skill -- those controls are touchy. It often is of a competitive nature. It is a pleasant pastime. And it certainly can be quite diverting.

[/sidetrack]

So Moto Storm on my PS3 is a sport? And Call of Duty or the one where you kill cops in LA?

 

[SolarStorm]

halemano, sorry for the rant, my point (and yes when I used to fly radio control airplanes, by the way I had a toy airplane that was worth about 5k, our club used to enforce a license) was that no one requires you to have a license to go cave diving. You have a certification so that when you go to a dive store they will fill your tanks, and when you go with a dive op or other divers, your license lets everyone know your are "this skilled".

There are many dead and injured that have all of the training possible in their "sport" of choice. Many more that thought the training was bunk, and they could do it, if you hold their beer. Education and certification are personal choices. Many like to have cards and certifications as status symbol while swilling beer with all of the civilians.

Every time we dive, we make a consious choice to get in the water. If the people around you scare you, you dont go.

The choices that I see are:

1. Create a certification/licensing that is enforcable.
2. Instill a respect for the sport, its dangers and a desire to learn more
3. Do nothing, accept that accident rates are fine where they are. Choose your partners and dives so that you limit your exposure to Darwins friends (trying to make DBDC laugh again)