Open Water Certifications – Cold vs Warm

[lowviz]

bro...

 

[Ste Wart]

I did my OW course in Thailand in 3 days doing all skills on my knees.

On Monday I was diving at 50m in the UK, in less than 1m viz, on a boat full of GUE instructors and Tech 1 divers (I being neither)

Just saying

 

[Storker]

These brand-new cold-water-trained divers have typically spent so little time in the water that they never actually dived much. That is, they spent just enough time to get the skills done and swim around for a few minutes, and then the dive ended so that they could get out of the water and get warm.

That's why, up here, we take our OW certs in a dry suit.

My OW certification dives were 14-15C (sub-60 F) on the surface and 9-10C (~50F) below the thermocline. Neither of those dives were the way you described them, and I was lucky: I certified during summer. The warmest water I've ever dived here in Norway was 18C (64F) on the surface and 14C (57F) below the thermocline. The coldest was 3C (37F) on the surface and 4C (39F) below. My fingers were a bit cold after a stiff half hour in 3-4C water, but I've never felt the need to "get the skills done and swim around for a few minutes" and then end the dive so that I could get out of the water and get warm.

It's perfectly possible to get a decent certification in cold water. You just have to use proper exposure protection.

 

[rhwestfall]

Honestly folks, moving any newly minted diver out of their training conditions will challenge any of them. Heck, likely so with seasoned ones too. I have trained and dove here in the cold of the Great Lakes for years. I can't say that a switch to the Carolina Shore, the Maine Coast, California Coast, Puget Sound, Florida, COZ, etc. would ever be "easy" compared to here. There is stuff I'm just not used to... I don't think you can/should differentiate entry level training based on region.

OTOH - you certainly could by instructor.... (opens the proverbial can of worms)

 

[Quero]

That's why, up here, we take our OW certs in a dry suit.

My OW certification dives were 14-15C (sub-60 F) on the surface and 9-10C (~50F) below the thermocline. Neither of those dives were the way you described them, and I was lucky: I certified during summer. The warmest water I've ever dived here in Norway was 18C (64F) on the surface and 14C (57F) below the thermocline. The coldest was 3C (37F) on the surface and 4C (39F) below. My fingers were a bit cold after a stiff half hour in 3-4C water, but I've never felt the need to "get the skills done and swim around for a few minutes" and then end the dive so that I could get out of the water and get warm.

It's perfectly possible to get a decent certification in cold water. You just have to use proper exposure protection.

I agree!

It is perfectly possible, and it sounds like you had a really good training experience. Great for you! Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be typical of how most people are trained in cold-water locales. Mostly they're in thick wetsuits, and mostly the dives are short by necessity. It's just the nature of the beast.

In cold water areas where instructors don't feel time pressure to get students in and out of the course in a few days, significant time can be dedicated to pool drills and classroom presentations, but the open water dives themselves just can't be very long in most cases. The only reasonable option to get more bottom time for these wetsuit-clad students would be to require more dives. Conversely, here in the tropics where we have the ability to offer relatively long open water training dives, we do have tremendous time pressure since tourists want to get the course out of the way and go do fun dives, so compared to our cold-water colleagues, instructors here often spend relatively less time in the classroom and in the pool, but they dedicate quite a lot more time to the open water portion of the course. The best courses, for me here, are when I get a long-stay tourist (often training at a muay thai gym) who wants to spread the scuba training out over a month. Sweet! No time pressure AND lots of bottom time in the open water dives.

Regardless of all that, and whether a diver was trained in a drysuit or a wetsuit, I still don't believe it's valid to claim that cold-water trained divers are a priori 'better' divers than warm-water trained ones or that certification documents should distinguish between those trained in warm versus cold water.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Personally, I see this whole 'cold vs. warm water' issue as an excuse for snobbery.

Cold water divers tend to be very committed to the sport of diving; willing to accept conditions that a majority of (vacation-only) divers are not. Being prepared to dive locally means that they enjoy more access to frequent diving.

Frequent diving helps promote accelerated skill retention and experience acquisition. That experience/skill acquisition is not the product of the environment, but the frequency of diving. Similarly high levels of skill/experience acquisition would be noted in warm-water based divers who had access to comparable frequency of diving opportunity.

Frequent diving tends to expose divers to a wider range of environmental variables. That is equally true of cold or warm water. Here in the Philippines, a 'frequent diver' will experience low visibility and/or rough water diving during monsoon season. I've encountered equally bad visibility, rougher sea states and stronger currents in the tropics than I did in temperate seas. Some of the wrecks I dive here experience very limited visibility as a routine. In contrast, I have memories of 100ft+ clarity diving on the north Scottish coast..

Again, an 'infrequent diver' might opt to decline from diving in (what they assess to be) less than optimal conditions - thus not gaining that varied experience, wherever they live or dive...

Divers who are based in cold-water environments, but only dive in warm-water locations (i.e. most divers) have limited opportunity to dive. They dive infrequently. This reflects in considerable skill-fade between periods of diving, serving to degrade their competency relative to more frequent divers.

Assuming equal frequency of, and commitment to, diving, what really differentiates cold and warm water divers? I'd rationalize that the only tangible and constant difference was the exposure protection used...

The use of thicker exposure protection, particularly gloves and hoods, only has an impact on the development of a small range of motor skills. I don't see any logic in using that small range of motor skills to justify an argument that such a diver is 'better'. Skillful diving encompasses far more aspects than motor skills and finger dexterity alone...

At a certain level I'll agree with you ... but there's a bit more to it than just thicker exposure protection. We don't do dive guides here ... so the expectation coming out of OW is that you'll be doing unsupervised dives that you plan and execute on your own. Even if you aren't initially trained any differently than the tropical diver, the demands imposed by not having a dive guide to do your planning and lead your dive for you tend to accelerate certain aspects of the learning curve.

You are correct that people who dive locally tend to be more committed to diving, and tend to be more frequent divers ... and this sets them apart from infrequent, less committed divers in ways that have more to do with their attitude and commitment than motor skills ... and that mental commitment also accelerates the learning curve because those people tend to put more thought into what they're doing, and more effort into correcting mistakes and bad diving habits.

I disagree that pointing out these differences has anything to do with snobbery. As you say, the more often you dive the better you'll get, regardless of where you dive. I think it's legitimate to say, however, that a tropical diver will have a more difficult time transitioning to a drysuit, heavy gloves, and 15 foot visibility than a cold water diver will have transitioning to a 3/2 wetsuit, no gloves, and 75 foot visibility ... all else being equal. It's also legitimate to point out that diving in a more harsh environment puts constraints on you that pretty much force you to improve your skills if you want to keep doing it.

I think if I taught diving in a tropical location, I'd change some of what I currently teach ... not because I think the environment would be necessarily easier, but because it's different ... and those differences would impose a different set of constraints. Categorizing the recognition of those differences as "snobbery" is a disservice to people who expect to be diving in those different locales ... I've seen way too many people come here with warm water experience and struggle to believe otherwise.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

---------- Post added June 12th, 2013 at 05:08 AM ----------

2 dives on Saturday, both at 43f / 6c. Dove wet. expect to dive 57f / 14c next weekend. It will feel positively tropical

It is relative ... my friend Ursa (Snowbear) comes down from Alaska to Puget Sound from time to time for what she calls "warm water diving" ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

---------- Post added June 12th, 2013 at 05:12 AM ----------

Honestly folks, moving any newly minted diver out of their training conditions will challenge any of them. Heck, likely so with seasoned ones too. I have trained and dove here in the cold of the Great Lakes for years. I can't say that a switch to the Carolina Shore, the Maine Coast, California Coast, Puget Sound, Florida, COZ, etc. would ever be "easy" compared to here. There is stuff I'm just not used to... I don't think you can/should differentiate entry level training based on region.

OTOH - you certainly could by instructor.... (opens the proverbial can of worms)

True ... certain dives in Komodo and the Maldives were certainly a challenge for me ... and those challenges had nothing to do with water temperature or the exposure suit I was wearing at the time.

Frankly, I find buoyancy control in a drysuit easier than in my 3/2 wetsuit ... for the simple reason that I dive the drysuit way more often ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

---------- Post added June 12th, 2013 at 05:18 AM ----------

I still don't believe it's valid to claim that cold-water trained divers are a priori 'better' divers than warm-water trained ones or that certification documents should distinguish between those trained in warm versus cold water.

Totally agree with the first part ... not so sure about the second. There's a valid reason why the OW certification qualifies you to dive in conditions "similar to those in which you were trained". The differences have nothing to do with "better" or "worse" ... but it is valid to recognize that different environments will affect both what and how you learn. The whole point of training is that we're putting people in an environment they've never before been exposed to ... and the learning experience is as much about mental adjustments as physical ones. Change the environment, and even if the equipment stays the same, the mental adjustments are different. There could very well be some value in distinguishing those differences. But it shouldn't be in a way that categorizes those distinctions in terms of "better" or "worse" ... diving's not a contest.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Quero]

There's a valid reason why the OW certification qualifies you to dive in conditions "similar to those in which you were trained". The differences have nothing to do with "better" or "worse" ... but it is valid to recognize that different environments will affect both what and how you learn. The whole point of training is that we're putting people in an environment they've never before been exposed to ... and the learning experience is as much about mental adjustments as physical ones. Change the environment, and even if the equipment stays the same, the mental adjustments are different. There could very well be some value in distinguishing those differences. But it shouldn't be in a way that categorizes those distinctions in terms of "better" or "worse" ... diving's not a contest.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

I agree wholeheartedly with this, and while I'm not familiar with what sort of emphasis is placed on these points in the agency materials that support your teaching, PADI materials actually do stress this point repeatedly. For one thing, in all of the materials, including in the quizzes and exams, students are told and asked to reiterate the importance of getting some kind of mentor/guide/experience program every time they dive in a new place or in a new environment. In PADI parlance, this experience is called Discover Local Diving, though I don't know a single shop or instructor who sells any dive program under that exact label. Regardless, the objective of the DLD experience (or whatever it may be called by a particular shop) is precisely to get divers up to speed when they encounter new conditions. This could be something as simple as transitioning from boat diving to shore diving, or as involved as transitioning from warm water gear to cold water gear. Furthermore, as a condition of certification, every Open Water student must read and sign a statement to the effect that they understand that they are certified to dive unsupervised in conditions similar to those under which they trained. If conditions present challenges that they have never experienced, they must seek further training in some guise, whether that's through formal instruction or by way of a mentor. I make my students read this statement first silently and then aloud and then I ask them to paraphrase it. If any new PADI Open Water diver comes away from the course without having this clear in his/her mind, the instructor has failed in his/her duty. For this reason, I don't believe that certifications should indicate training conditions. That's what dive logs are for.

 

[DCBC]

I think that it depends largely on the Instructor and the training program. In warm water, divers are often trained to minimum Standards. In cold water the training course can be a whole different beast (as a PADI Instructor cannot change the PADI training program regardless of the diving environment, they are the exception [see "When is a Skill Mastered"]). For the training program to adequately address the requirements of the cold water environment (which often includes low visibility, tidal flow, currents, waves and surf) what is required for certification can change as well. In other words, the diver is often expected to possess a higher degree of in-water ability and fitness to deal with the conditions.

As the conditions become less stressful, it's reasonable for the Instructor to expect less from the Student to dive safely in these better conditions. Many warm water Divers may not possess the skill-sets to deal with more harsh conditions and at the least, have no need to prove that they do before OW.

I guess what I'm saying is that if someone gets certified in Canadian waters (for example), I have an understanding of what they usually go through to become certified. Having lived in Indonesia and other 'warm water' countries, I've observed that Student Divers generally have a much different training experience than in cold water countries. My courses have been the same wherever I've taught, but the warm-water Diver has had a much easier road to hoe.

People are individuals and as such have different levels of skill, fitness and academic ability. People that graduate from a local community college may have the same intellectual ability as a student from MIT or Harvard. I would suggest however, that on average, schools that require more comprehensive requirements will likely result in better qualified people (which is why Graduates of these schools are more attractive to employers). Regardless of warm or cold water, the higher the training standard, the higher the likelihood that the Students will be more competent than those requiring a lower standard.

Running a mile (no matter how many times you do it) is not the same as running a Marathon. The majority of people that can run a mile, can't run a Marathon. One Hundred Percent of Marathon runners can run a mile.

 

[NW Dive Dawg]

My original post was intended to point out my personal opinion that it is both easier and safer to make the transition from cold to warm than the reverse. My comment suggesting separate certifications was probably a bit overboard.

 

[covediver]

I think you proceed from a false assumption, that is the myth of superiority of a cold water diver. The topic is more than perrenial, it seems to predate the invention of scuba, going back to hardhat diving. Perhaps this is a self-fulfilling prophecy since you dive in the warm water of Puget Sound and I can see why people trained in such conditions would feel inadequate.