Well, I have no source except for myself. Very few things in this world are hard facts. Opinions abound, though. I will explain my reasoning below.I'd like to see your source for that "fact"
#1 without a SCUBA set it is not a SCUBA dive. Hence, equipment is required.
#2 if the dive is doable as a freedive, then it's not "mandatory SCUBA". Hence, classifying it as a SCUBA dive is a little bit odd. I could spend 30 sec at 3 feet with SCUBA gear, but would that be a SCUBA dive really? Yes and no! I would prefer "no" though. I prefer to assume the "mandatory" here. If it requires SCUBA, then its is a SCUBA dive, if it doesn't, then it's just an excessive equipment dive.
These requirements are done by me, but you'll understand that they are obvious.
Now, PADI has some requirements for "SCUBA dives counting as enough experience for course X". That is a diffrent thing. PADI does not define SCUBA. It only defines its own internal requirements. The same applies to CMAS, NAUI, SSI, and others.
I do a lot of SCUBA dives to three to ten feet depths. Usually these dives last between 15 to 45 mintes. Corporation X may or may not accept some of these, but that's irrelevant unless I want to attend some of their courses.
Trueand I figure that was a typo and logging dives has nothing to do with whether the dive was through a paid charter.
I agreeTo the best of my knowledge, any scuba dive can be logged regardless of how long or deep it is.
Correct. You're on the point.Now whether or not you'll be taking an advanced course some day and someone will look at that dive and say "Sorry that one doesn't count" is another matter. But it's not like there's a hard and fast rule.
I do count two things:I logged a pool refresher dive once, it's in my logbook but I don't count it towards the overall number of dives, in other words in Subsurface digital logbook there's no dive number next to it. So that's another way to handle a marginal dive.
- Non-pool dive #NR
- Pooldive #NR
This is possible e.g. through tagging dives with keywords.
I have 700 records in my dive logging app, but I only count them as 425 dives. Some records are clearly spurious (e.g. removing fins under water, 1-2 min). Some are parts of a multi-dive-event (many short dives in a sequence to achieve a goal), some are with one tank but many submersions. Hence, accepting divelogs is an unexact science. I tend to record most everything, and if someone asks for detail, I will provide it, and let them choose how many dives they accept as experience. An example: If you would like to take a hypoxic trimix course, then it might be your normoxic trimix dives only, that count - not your air dives to 60 feet...