Technical Training Road Map decision

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Pinto

Contributor
Messages
107
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Location
Massachusettes
# of dives
200 - 499
I'm trying to decide which path to take in regards to training and would like to hear from others who have already progressed through Cave Certification, Wreck, and Deco training. I have only just begun to research these options so forgive my ignorance.

I'll complete Cavern next month. My interest are in wreck penitration and introduction to cave diving.

Questions: It would seem that in an overhead envirement you can't controll nitrogen time simply by ascending to a lesser depth. Does it make sense to receive DC dive training as a first step?

My assumption is that some of the principle knowlege needed to dive caves or wrecks crosses over between them. Which of the two will better prepare me for the next?

The response to this question will likely have all the usual answers but I'm more interested in why one feels one is better than the next.

Which Certification/Training Programs would you reccomend to a family member:confined::confined:and why?


thanks
 
My advice would be to take a look at the diving you will do most often, and shape your training toward that.

Cavern is a good basic class to introduce concepts of precise buoyancy, trim, and non-silting propulsion, as well as some basic line running which will be needed for either cave or wreck penetration diving. Cavern, if you have access to caverns, or a class like Fundamentals or Intro to Tech, is a good place to start.

Then, if your most frequent diving will be on deeper wrecks, transitioning to doubles and doing some type of decompression training is probably a good next step. It would be my personal feeling that your first staged decompression dives shouldn't involve wreck penetration, as you are getting accustomed to watching your run time and staying on your schedule. Add complexity in steps!

If your cave diving will primarily be in Florida, at the cavern and Intro level, it's not difficult to avoid going into deco. Especially in high flow caves like Ginnie, diving 6ths won't let you stay long enough to do it! (I have a whole list of 23 minute dives in Ginnie -- 17 in, six out . . . :) )

Caves really don't prepare one for wrecks, and vice versa. Caves have navigational issues that wrecks don't, and wrecks have far more entanglement hazards, as well as the considerations of the open water portion of the dive (eg. the need to keep all your bottles with you). But cave diving will give you a lot of line running practice, if you are diligent; many cave dives will involve running more line than the length of the typical wreck!

As far as training programs go, at the technical level, it is, even more than at the recreational level, about the instructor. But I'll beat my usual drum . . . GUE takes great pains to select and train good instructors and monitor their performance. A GUE student can't get his certification card without filling out a QA form, and issues ARE followed up on. As I have spent more time with other technical and cave divers, and talked to them about their classes, I've become more and more grateful for the attention to detail and the high standards of the classes I've taken, even though I have often struggled with them. And the academic portion of GUE classes is very extensive, compared with some others.
 
It's very easy to stay out of decompression obligations within the cave environment. However sites like Little River, Ginnie, Jackson Blue, Hole in the Wall, Several of the large river caves in Jackson Co, etc do make it possible for a diver to hit deco on 1/6ths. I think Basic Cave should be followed with a decompression course, but I don't believe that you NEED it before hand. Worst case, you're 3-5min into deco unless you plan the dive extremely poorly.

If I had it to do over again, I would go GUE. Too many people price shop for instructors, and then they turn around and recommend their instructor because it's all they've ever known. When someone recommends their instructor, ask why? what dives are you doing? what skills were the hardest and how did the instructor help you get past those?
 
Where do you plan to do your wreck diving? Out of MA? I lived and dived there for several years, and I'd suggest cutting your teeth on the shallower wrecks off Cape Ann or Cape Cod before thinking about any local wreck penetrations. The North Atlantic offers some wonderful diving, but experience is just as important (if not more so) than good training.

When I looked into a decompression course in the area with about your dive experience (~100 dives), one of the more experienced captains told me to call Ed Hayes in CT and take the GUE Fundamentals class. I did. Best money I've spent on diving. Really opened my eyes to what I didn't know. After that, I continued to build experience for another year on the local MA wrecks. Then I went about getting trimix and staged decompression training.

I still don't do any "real" penetrations, but the training I did get made my diving a whole lot more fun. If you're looking to gain experience in MA, get out on the Gauntlet (Northern Atlantic Dive Expeditions - Wreck Diving, Technical Diving, Deep Exploration), and for exceptional training, call Ed (GUE Instructor résumé | Global Underwater Explorers).
 
There's some good ice diving opportunities in Mass. It is a nice introduction to overhead environments, extends diving to a year round activity, and is generally a really fun, social event (at least around here).

It's a nice mid-way point between technical diving and recreational diving as it takes you into a true over-head environment and you start to learn something about handling ropes, planning for rescue procedures, and so on. It won't take you into a wreck, but run well, it's a great stepping stone to penetration diving -- everything you learn will be applicable.
 
If you're within a couple of hours of Hartford, I strongly recommend talking to Ed Hayes about a Fundies Class. If you want to travel, the cenotes in Mexico are a beautiful place to dive. There is a GUE shop there if you want to finish Fundies first, but there are lots of instructors from the other cave diving agencies. I was happy with Protec in Playa for Cavern/Intro and will be returning in March for my Full Cave with them. I can also recommend Tom and Denise Johnson at Dayo Scuba in Orlando for cave and tech training.
 
I think advanced nitrox/ deco (or similar variation) is a great foundation to build on. Fundies is great and it will teach you basic skills, but I think you should have those before you go into technical diving anyways. AN/DC helps to develop the mindset that all problems must be solved in the water, goes into complex dive planning, and gives you a lot of practical application of the fundamental skills. Doing deco in open water, in current, under a bag is a lot more difficult then doing it in a cave. If you can execute a proper decompression profile in OW, you can do it in a cave, but the opposite is absolutely not true. Even if you learn basic decompression protocol (not theory) in a cave class, it does not make you prepared to do it in the blue. This will also give you a good opportunity to spend a lot of time in doubles and doing gas switches which will be beneficial in cave diving. I did Adv Nitrox/ Deco, Intro Cave (in doubles), Apprentice/ Full Cave, Trimix, then Advanced Trimix. I always felt that my deco/technical training assisted in my cave diving, and vice versa.
 
Too many people price shop for instructors, and then they turn around and recommend their instructor because it's all they've ever known. When someone recommends their instructor, ask why? what dives are you doing? what skills were the hardest and how did the instructor help you get past those?

Amen!

I couldn't agree more.

Last year, I had the (mis)pleasure of watching someone teach a tech class which involved a total of 28 minutes of bottom time, and under 70 minutes in total of time in water. The students raved about the course - they got to go to 45m, hooooYA!

The instructor only teaches, and doesn't dive for pleasure any more at all. Their goal is to maximise income for minimum effort. In terms of price, yes the course was cheap... I think the students paid $600. But if you divide that by the number of minutes of in-water instruction you are paying around $10 per minute.

I compare that with my first tech course that cost me $1200.... yes, more expensive. But with over 600 minutes of in-water time, it was only $2 per minute.

So which is better value???
 
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