Failed PADI Rescue....now what?

[Lorenzoid]

What exactly did you seek by posting here in the "Q&A for scuba certification agencies" branch? Most of us assumed you were here asking for guidance from instructors familiar with your agency. But then you seemed to refuse to listen to anyone. If all you wanted to do was vent, this is probably not the best place. When you were unreceptive and seemingly stamping your feet and blaming the instructor, people started making harsh comments. If you simply explained what you hoped to achieve by posting here and gave all the relevant facts in the very beginning, people might have made more constructive comments sooner. Even your first post was worded childishly--you weren't asking a question--you said nothing more than you failed PADI Rescue and "now what?" That's kind of open-ended. What did you expect?

 

[nldiver1984]

Move this thread or delete it

 

[oly5050user]

I have nothing new to add to this thread. I'd close it if I could. If I get no satisfaction from the shop tomorrow I will make a formal complaint to PADI or use legal action if necessary.

PADI will kindly take your statements, may even contact the instructor,but it will end there. As long as a standards were not violated,and it appears it was not, and the course was conducted in a safe manner, again , as it appears to have been done, nothing will be done. PADI will tell you they have nothing to do about any business decisions that the LDS or instructor may make about fees or unused rentals. The 20 year old instructor passed numerous exams and demonstrated that he or she is quailied by their standards to conduct courses from openwater to divemaster. There appears to be no reason for "legal action" as you signed up for a course that you seem to have been unprepared for and as such failed due inability to meet standards. Want special treatment due to the fact that you were unprepared? Be prepared to pay for it as you paid for a group rescue course and a group rescue course was delivered. It is not the instructors fault that you could not meet the objectives and standards in the course time frame you paid for. In the 40 years I have been an instructor ( I was the 20 year old instructor at one point)there have been some that I failed for the same reasons you have. Some have stepped up and met the challenge and some simply quit or went elsewhere. Being stressed out in the pool during rescue breathing because of water splashed on you during the skill is a big sign that you are not ready. Get comfortable with diving where a bit of water in the face is nothing , where a leaking mask or no mask at all is nothing, where a fin strap is loose simply fix it, low pressure inflator inoperable= no big deal, continue to dive and just orally inflate bcd and go on with the dive. These are all issues that can cause stress that should be addressed in a openwater course, not in a rescue class, learn how to deal with it and do something to correct the problem before doing a rescue course again.

 

[jimbeeler]

Please close this thread as I'll no longer be diving. Everyone here can very easily point out faults without even knowing anything about me. I don't think I was treated the same as everyone else in my class due to my lack of confidence. If I ever do take up diving again (a far stretch) then it will be in another country with another shop and instructor. For anyone else taking the rescue course it's not as enjoyable as what the instructors make it out to be. In the end when you think you have done everything right they bring you aside and tell you that you have to do the course over again. This is why I'd never want to be an instructor. They think they know everything but really they don't. Who am I to say though, I'm just the stupid diver.

Unfortunately on an internet forum, a lot of what's said can be taken as mean spirited criticism. Some of what's been said here is certainly that. From what I've read, a lot of the messages are clearly meant to make you safer. We don't know how many dives you have under your belt but many have suggested that you don't have many.

Personally I took the rescue class with somewhere around 50 dives. I was pretty comfortable diving. Even with that number of dives and a good comfort level it was a very challenging class for me.

Nobody wants you to become a statistic, another dead diver. We want to you become a good, safe diver. To that end, many have suggested that you do a lot of dives and become more comfortable. Becoming comfortable under the water is paramount to becoming a good diver. It helps air consumption, buoyancy and will enable you to progress in the sport. The only way to become more comfortable is to dive, dive and dive some more.

Bottom line... Dive, dive and dive. Get experience and ALWAYS keep an eye on your air (I check mine about every 5 minutes).

Good luck.

Jim

 

[Mike]

I think that, many times, these stories have two sides, but as this thread has progressed, it looks more and more as though there is only one story here. We have a student who is in poor shape to do what he has embarked upon doing; who has demonstrated some serious faults in learning and/or temperament; who has been informed by his instructor/s that he falls so far short of the standard of performance that the certification cannot be granted -- and worst of all, the student feels ill-treated by this. A combination of lack of preparation, lack of aptitude, and poor attitude is possibly insurmountable. The instructor/s may have been doing this student a favor.

Well done.

I have all my scuba gear up for sale .

Really with no disrespect to you, this is probably your best course of action, because continuing to never have any self accountability will probably end up with getting injured in a dive accident or worse someday. Not everyone should scuba dive, no shame in realizing it and moving on.

 

[MaxBottomtime]

For anyone else taking the rescue course it's not as enjoyable as what the instructors make it out to be.

This may be a significant part of the problem. Rescue class is not intended to be enjoyable. Mine involved a ton of work, most of which went well beyond the standards. My instructor told us that the most likely time to perform a rescue was at the end of the day when a victim was tired and unable to help themselves. We had to run up and down several flights of stairs in full gear before making a long surface swim to tow a tired diver to shore. It felt like torture at the time but we all eventually passed. Each student had to show the skills required to not only perform the rescue techniques but to be able to assess a situation and take charge as needed. It was the hardest course I ever took, and the most worthwhile. I thanked my instructor for making the class what it was.
I can't imagine any student entering a rescue class expecting it to be enjoyable. The only suggestion I have for the OP is to fold up tent and quit as he/she has posted or to just dive. Get in a few hundred dives until he/she is comfortable with all facets of local diving before signing up for another class. Being comfortable in the water and being able to gear up, check your own gear and complete dives without having close calls is extremely important. Whichever choice you make will probably save your life and make you a happier person.

 

[Freewillow]

+1 with Mike and Maxbottomtime.

 

[Dr. Lecter]

I don't think I was treated the same as everyone else in my class due to my lack of confidence.

I would hope not. Treating students differently because of race, sex, whatever...not very rational. Treating would-be rescue divers differently because of a lack of confidence...the very definition of rational. Would a green PARTICIPANT ribbon have made you feel better?

 

[RayKay]

I just wanted to speak from the point your raised about being exhausted with cold water diving (the surface swims, the equipment, the weight). I absolutely agree that cold water diving in itself has a learning curve all to itself, and when you are a new diver it can be overwhelming. You are dealing with heavy weights, drysuits (and if you have a different rental drysuit everytime, it can be new experience everytime!), various underwear layers, tight hoods, dry gloves, sorting out how to get your equipment to work together (and sometimes finding out out underwater it doesn't...brrr!). You may have long shore entries with all this equipment strapped on (I am short and light, and believe me, I can relate to how exhausting it can be to do a long shore entry, and then a surface swim even though I would consider myself quite physically fit!). And yeah, all the cold water diving I have done also has the added factor of low to terrible vis. I much prefer warm water diving but I also live in Canada and I want to dive so I dive where I can most of the year.

I say all this because I did my rescue course in low-vis, cold-water too. I had no "rescue experience" before I took my course. But, I did NOT do my rescue course until I had reached a comfort level with cold-water diving (and all it entails), felt a good comfort level with my own diving skills (as learned in OW/AOW and various specialties), equipment, and ability to handle myself under water, and so on. I spent many dives fine-tuning my equipment, my skills (along with my buddy) before I felt ready to do the Rescue Diver course. This should not be about badge collecting, it should be about advancing your skills...but not before you have developed the skills that come before the new ones. It's the whole "you need the strong foundation before you build the house" thing. I DID enjoy my rescue course, mainly because of what I learned and those I did it with, but it was also not overly "easy", (especially since we did have long shore entries, surface swims, heavy weights, hoods, drysuits, dry gloves...etc).

I am sorry to hear that you are basically "flouncing" from diving based on not passing your Rescue the first time around. Obviously we only hear your side of the story, but part of being an emotionally mature adult is also being able to examine your own part in this and going back to that instructor to ask them what exactly you did wrong, and what you need to do to qualify as a Rescue Diver. And quite honestly, some of that may be needing more time in the water to be comfortable with being in that underwater environment, and in developing your OWN basic skills and awareness (for example, I find it very concerning, as others did, that you found yourself low on air/needing to do a CESA during your AOW and did not call your dive long before you got to that point). Also, it is quite possible to enjoy diving and become a competent diver without doing the Rescue Course, or to just be a warm water diver when you go on vacations (I know many who live around me who only dive warm water, after all). However, if you are not prepared to reflect, practice some self-awareness, and all of that - it perhaps is best you do sell off your gear. Not only for your own safety, but for the safety of potential buddies or would-be-rescuers, whatever water bodies you are jumping into.

 

[jpecht]

Not to mention (besides the other issues identified, including monitoring air so that the situation could have been avoided), if this was an AOW class, there should have been plenty of other students (or at least the instructor) who could have provided an octopus allowing for a more safe ascent.

You didn't handle the situation properly. In fact, you never should have been in the situation in the first place. Your "problem began" long before you looked up and couldn't see the surface.

AIR
How did you get so "dangerously low on air" at 100ft? If you were SO LOW that you panicked you must not have been monitoring your air during the course of the dive.

OVERHEAD ENVIRONMENT
What were you doing in a situation where you did not have direct access to the surface? As a diver who is untrained in overhead diving you had no business being in such a location.

BUDDY
Your observation that "Not all AOW students stick to that rule" is right. In your case, there were TWO students who didn't stick to the buddy rule. Did you lose your buddy, or did your buddy lose you? If you were 50% of the buddy team, you have 50% of the responsibility for staying together. When was the last time you checked in with your buddy? As often as you were checking your air? Possible that your buddy didn't want to follow you into an unsafe overhead environment?

So, to sum things up for you:

If you were so "dangerously low on air" at 100ft that you were "out of air" after a panicked swim to the surface you were within ~60sec of being...

• COMPLETELY OUT OF AIR
• IN AN OVERHEAD ENVIRONMENT
• WITH NO BUDDY

I hope you realize - and I don't mean to be melodramatic here - that it's a miracle that you're still alive. Seriously.