10 yr old Wreck Diver

[Mr.X]

Oh come on, I don't know the details of that wreck but based on the video, it looks like swiss cheese. It looked more like an advanced swim through that OW divers are escorted through all the time. It certainly wasn't any Andrea Doria penetration dive.

I can only hope to do as thorough training with my daughter as Dumpster is doing with his sons.

At the end of the day you can do what you want to do with your own kids. That being said as an instructor, or as a dive supervisor you don't take teen divers into an overhead situation. Swiss cheese or not. Period.

Also, there are plenty of adults who decided they had the requisite skills to dive the interior of the Doria. It's no cakewalk. I know. Plenty of adults never made it out. However, they were informed adults making their own stupid choices. The sad part about these dead divers was the anguish they caused to their loved ones and the subsequent lawsuits which resulted.

X

 

[Blazinator]

They are minors.... who are legally deemed unable to understand and calculate personal risk and consequences. This just isn't legal "You're gonna die!" naysaying.... it is a great deal of common sense.

Just to add a little peace to this rather polarized thread, I do not think that those like Devon that are opposed to taking a ten year old wreck diving are idiots or jerks. I am very glad for safety conscious individuals - who knows, they might save my life someday. I just think that being too safety minded creates a tunnel vision that excludes seeing a bigger picture. Of course, the reverse can be very true. And Devon specializes in Tech, so of course he will be overly safety minded.

I am glad DumpsterDiver elaborated on the training he gives his kids - pretty much what I thought an instructor would be toward his most valuable students. The Ultimate in home-schooling.

I will give you this - This issue would be easier if the boy in the video were closer to fourteen years old. But then again, I was far less able to understand and calculate personal risk and consequences at 24 years old than I am now, let alone 14.

 

[DevonDiver]

I see 0 issue with the video. They seem to be doing fine considering the conditions.

That's because you are a novice diver, not professionally trained and educated.

Being ignorant of the risks, does not mean there are risks.

Thumbing your nose at the experience and recommendations of the entire dive industry and accumulated wisdom and experience of dive professionals who dive day-in-day out, year-in, year-out... reeks of stupidity.

Ugh.. No rules in SCUBA, just guidelines.. Before there were agencies and greedy people seeking instant wealth, people dove because they wanted to damn the risks!

So, agencies imposing recommendations in an effort to increase safety equals greed?

Also...nobody (except retards) ever dove "damn the risks". At every stage in the evolution of diving the pioneers strived to extended the limiting boundaries whilst minimizing the risks associated with them.

Millions of dollars and countless educated individuals have been involved in complex and ground-breaking research and testing to get us where we are now (and we still have a long way to go...).

Industry 'recommendations' are based, very firmly on statistical evidence (dead divers) that provides us with reasonable limitations.

You seem to believe that the sport of scuba diving was pioneered by a bunch of reckless pirates, thumbing their nose at the 'establishment' and beating their chests in a testosterone fuelled rampage of risk taking.

Wake up.........

My kids all dive and I am sure we are not on many peoples fav list because we dive our own way..
I dont see different as "dangerous"..

Yep...that pretty much sums up an accurate description of the sort of diver I would turn-away from diving with me..........

 

[DevonDiver]

Oh come on, I don't know the details of that wreck but based on the video, it looks like swiss cheese. It looked more like an advanced swim through that OW divers are escorted through all the time. It certainly wasn't any Andrea Doria penetration dive.

Blazinator already made a comment that, as tech instructor, I am probably more safety-orientated than others.... and I think that is a very fair comment.

The further I progressed in my dive career, the more dangers I have become aware of... the more real incidents I have had to deal with...

Experience replaces ignorance...and that changes your attitude.

I am not, by nature, a 'safety-consious prissy'.... I have enjoyed a long list of challenging and inherently risky experiences in my life...ranging from jumping out of planes, to deep technical dives, to climbing mountains.....the list goes on.

As a military veteran, my appreciation of 'combat' changed a great deal once I had experienced it. It is a good analogy to diving. Until you have experienced something, it is easy to scoff at it or create fantasies about it.

Oh come on, I don't know the details of that wreck but based on the video, it looks like swiss cheese. It looked more like an advanced swim through that OW divers are escorted through all the time. It certainly wasn't any Andrea Doria penetration dive.

I knew people who died inside of wrecks. I read fatality reports about wreck diving deaths on a regular basis. I was on a dive boat when we found the corpse of a very experienced diver who had been lost 2 years previously in a wreck. I teach technical and recreational wreck diving.

Divers may want to dismiss certain penetration dives as "swiss cheese"....but people still manage to die regularly on swiss cheese dives. That's why the industry have strong recommendations on the training, equipment and limitations imposed on wreck penetration. Those limits evolved from the deaths of people who didn't know better.

Now...we can either learn from those diver's sacrifices or we can ignore them and face the same possibilities ourselves.

People dismiss these 'recommendations' due to ignorance. As ignorance is replaced by experience, people tend to change their views....and some die before they have sufficient experience to replace the ignorance.

Personally, I could guarantee that anyone who did wreck training with me would never voice opinions like mkutyna's. Why? Because I would show them the risks and dispel their ignorance. It is amazing to see the change in a student during the course.....

I can only hope to do as thorough training with my daughter as Dumpster is doing with his sons.

To add some balance to my posts.... I would also like to state that I am absolutely sure that Dumpster has trained and educated his son to an exemplary level of diving. I am sure that Dumpster, as trained diving professional, conducted a reasonable risk assessment on his activities and fully considered the strengths and capabilities of his son. I am also sure that Dumpster was fully capable of controlling and responding to any emergencies that could have arisen.

However, on prinicple I still do not agree with what Dumpster did.

 

[AquaExplorer]

Ahh....back in the old school days. Back in the time of twin hose regs, shiny silver wetsuits, masks like bathtubs and..........shockingly high accident mortality rates.QUOTE]

You got data on the "shockingly high accident mortality rates"? Like deths per 1,000 dives? There was a lot of problems in the first 15 to 20 years, starting in 1945, as they were putting it all together, but I have never seen any data. When did diving become safe? You got a year?

As for twin hose regs, my 6 year old loves my RAM on a 40 in the pool and they are more rubust then most of the modern regs.

As for the kid on the dive, well I know a lot of "Adults" who should never go deeper then a bathtub. The father has to determin the level his kid can opperate at.

Penetration diving? This video shows penetration diving like cavern diving is to full cave. I never saw a distance more then 25 feet or so to an opening and many openings in view that can be got out of. The one shot showing sand being distrubed show that silt out was not going to happen. Who would use a reel in that wreck?

Boat handling, that was great! The kid is learing boat skills that he may need in a real emergancy - like the captain being ill, falling off the boat, etc. The kid should have a fair chance of getting to someone in the water. I would hope that he also knows how to start the boat, use the radio and or a cell phone if you are within cell range, and read the GPS to report his position.

I guess some here would FREAK to know that 10-year old's pilot airplanes too. Yup...we have a pilot/owner/instructor that lets his 10-year old fly, supervised of course.

Life is to be LIVED, not wrapped in bubble-wrapped and sterilized and made "safe" to the point that one is living a facsimile of the real thing.

 

[diver 85]

It's not a quarry.... The current was probably 1.5 to 2 kts on that wreck. The video from the surface shows the surface current was around 4.5 kts (or mph), but that was further offshore while following a drift deco in 230-250 ft.

What do you expect a person to do in those types of currents?

Answer to your question----Sometimes in life, Mother Nature wins-----ie in outdoor sports & lightening/bad weather comes, you call the game(or put it off for a while)...I even call offshore trips when I get to the jetties & KNOW it's 5 to 7 running that day, take it as a $75 loss & turn it around & head home.......

IMO, a little common sense goes a LONG way.....----but----it's your kid, you do what you want........I personally would not be too proud of it.....In the long run, living your life thru your kids' lives isn't going to get you far---I know, I've watched parents try to do this many a time while our's were growing up...When you're almost 60 & all your kids are grown & gone, report back & tell me what your life experiences were on this matter....

 

[HowardE]

Wow that kid was awful -- hanging on to the wreck, swimming with his hands...yeesh.


...and don't get me started on the quality of the video.

Which would be better? Hanging on to the wreck, or swimming hard, and maybe kicking up silt? Hanging on and/or pulling yourself uses less energy than swimming in a current.

You have made ridiculous claims about currents before, and still do so. If the current were 1.5-2knots, most scooters wouldn't make headway, much less a person.

How did you VERIFY the current, other than saying "hmm.....looks like 4.5 knots......" ??

The currents in Florida can easily be 1.5 - 2 knots. Yesterday, I was diving the Bibb. The current was easily 2 kts if not somewhat greater between 40-80 feet. We easily check the current, by stopping the motors, and drifting. If there's no wind, and the boat made a speed of 2 kts (according to the GPS) then the current is moving at 2 knots. Inside the wreck however, there was no current.

 

[DevonDiver]

Life is to be LIVED, not wrapped in bubble-wrapped and sterilized and made "safe" to the point that one is living a facsimile of the real thing.

If you believe that quote to the extent that you would be willing to speak it, face-to-face, to a grieving mother... then fair enough.

Otherwise, don't say it.

it's your kid, you do what you want........

I know this is taken out of context to the overall tone of your post, BUT.....

Parents cannot do "what they want" with their kids. If they could, we would have legalised child abuse, child prostituion, child labor....and.....

...irresponsible parents generally exposing children to unaccaptable risks.

I am not a lwayer... but if there had been an injury/fatality on the sort of activity undertaken by Dumpster.... I am quite confident that some authority would seek a legal case on child abuse, neglect etc.

 

[marinediva]

I liked the video,
Some kids are mature at ten and quiet capable.
Would rather see kids out building bonding relationships with their father, than being taught how to use a gun and fight as rebels in some other countries.
He shows courage.

 

[psychocabbage]

Yep...that pretty much sums up an accurate description of the sort of diver I would turn-away from diving with me..........

What I find funny here is that YOU assume I would WANT to dive with you.. hahaha

Diving with my crew, thats a special thing and people like you are definately not invited.

We have very different viewpoints to look at this from. If I were to worry about lawsuits and liability non stop for all of our endeavors, my kids would be locked in their rooms with food shoved under the door.

Instead, I take my kids racing. BMX and cars. Soon, I will be getting them a shifter Kart so they can really get some crazy racing going on. I definately should not of put them into Kuk Sool Won if I was thinking that they may get hurt.

There are so many people out there that are not doing their kids justice. They are so over protecting them that they are putting them more at risk as the kid gets older and eventually just bolts from the house and tries to do whatever they want.

Easiest way for me to put this in perspective all can understand.. We have a huge tree on our rental property. Rule was any of my kids could climb it as high as they wanted.. Neighbor kids can just watch. They were not my kids but my kids on my land could do whatever. Could they fall and be paralyzed? Yup. My wife works with children with disabilities daily. We know what could happen and we are very aware of it all. Perhaps thats why we allow our kids to do so many things. In the blink of an eye, it can all change. My daughters all ride English. Is that dangerous? You bet it is. Controlling a huge horse is not that easy.. They have attitudes and at times get spooked.. But its part of it their lives and they do more by noon than most adults do all day.

Contrary to popular belief, we do not push our kids. While on vacation in Cozumel, the rule was everyone got on the boat. That did not mean they had to dive. That just meant you had to go out on the boat with us. From there you decided if you wanted to dive.. A few times my kids just used the boat as a huge diving platform while we were all diving. Were we worried? Not at all. Could something horrid of happened? Definately.


There is a huge difference in assessing risk and still performing the task or seeing the risk and then deciding that its not worth it. Some people get paralyzed by the fear alone. I cannot say that about me. I dont get scared of anything (not beating my chest) just honestly had to answer some questions recently and tried to find a phobia and because of how I was raised and my life choices, I found that nothing brings fear to me. But I have been on the verge of death many times. I have had guns pointed to my head that were not held by anyone I was in control of. When you have that, you realize that its all over in a flash and at that moment you can see what your regrets are. Mine, on those days, was that I wouldnt get to say good-bye.. but aside from that, I was not afraid and it was not in the plan for me to die those days. So I keep attacking life with vigor and find that while I am fearless I am not reckless. This Friday will be my 16 yr olds first time drag racing. Is it dangerous? Yes. Will that stop either of us from going? Not at all.. She will make a couple of passes with me while I explain everything we are doing then I will let her take the seat and hope we dont eat the wall or fly into the path of whoever is next to us.

Reading so many conservative views really says to me that we crippled so many people by the term lawsuit.

Definately do not go to my website. I have my kids shooting guns! OHH NOES!

People definately need to lighten up.