rockystock1
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Hi all my names Mike and I'm from Sheffield uk. I'm a relative newbie to diving, I usually go for a dive on holiday just using my old scuba diver card which I attained in Mexico (great holiday) I have so far got 8 holiday dives under my belt, but have recently compleated my OW and currently completing AOW+3 in uk..
My very 1st diving experience was on holiday in Turkey 8 years ago, me and the wife decided to give scuba diving a try after a few beers in the sun. We walked over to the nearist dive school which had the padi logo scrawled all over it, and said we didn't want lessons we just wanted to have a go. Before I knew it money was taken out of my wallet, we was wet suited and BCD'd up and on a boat heading out to a wreck.. (A sunken pedlow)
On the boat was just me my wife and the instructor, we didn't go far out I could still see land. He absolutely loaded us with weights I don't know how much but I remember having difficulty holding them up filled up our bcd's and gave us a pep talk on the big stride so we jumped in, we bobed about a little, he demonstrated how to dump air from bcd's and we copied and down we went.
Almost immediately my wife's mask began to fill with water, she began finning to get back up, the instructor Pumped air into both our bcd's and we surfaced where he gave us a quick demonstration on how to clear a mask, we calmed down and down we went again, this time we landed on the bottom (about 8mtrs) and he told us to kneel by the pedlow, my wife's poor fitting mask filled up again, she was struggling to clear it water was coming in so fast, she then breathed in water through her nose spat out her reg and bolted for the surface, the DM followed her up and left me kneeling on the bottom looking up. He sorted her out by inflating her BCD and left her bobbing on the surface and came back down to me. He signalled that my wife was ok found an urchin and broke it we fed the fishes for 10 mins all the time I could see my wife's legs above us, we surfaced with no safety stop got back on the boat and dive over..
At the time I had no idea about panicked divers, lung expansion, or de compression.
Luckily my wife was fine but vowed never to scuba dive again
I enjoyed the experience of feeding the fish and took lessons on my next holiday to gain my discover scuba card, it wasn't until then I realised how dangerous this situation could have been..
I often wonder if this school is still just randomly taking tourists into open water and how many other padi schools in tourist packed holiday destinations carry out the same practices.
The dive Centre I attend at home is fantastic
The regulations are tight, my teacher is experienced we have pool sessions and open water quarry dives and it all costs a fortune, but money well spent in my book.
Do padi carry out random checks on dive centres ?? or have powers to have people struck off? Maybe they should carry out a secret tourist operation on random dive centers around the world.
Has anyone else's witnessed any crazy practices at dive centers whilst on holiday??
Many thanks
Mike
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
My very 1st diving experience was on holiday in Turkey 8 years ago, me and the wife decided to give scuba diving a try after a few beers in the sun. We walked over to the nearist dive school which had the padi logo scrawled all over it, and said we didn't want lessons we just wanted to have a go. Before I knew it money was taken out of my wallet, we was wet suited and BCD'd up and on a boat heading out to a wreck.. (A sunken pedlow)
On the boat was just me my wife and the instructor, we didn't go far out I could still see land. He absolutely loaded us with weights I don't know how much but I remember having difficulty holding them up filled up our bcd's and gave us a pep talk on the big stride so we jumped in, we bobed about a little, he demonstrated how to dump air from bcd's and we copied and down we went.
Almost immediately my wife's mask began to fill with water, she began finning to get back up, the instructor Pumped air into both our bcd's and we surfaced where he gave us a quick demonstration on how to clear a mask, we calmed down and down we went again, this time we landed on the bottom (about 8mtrs) and he told us to kneel by the pedlow, my wife's poor fitting mask filled up again, she was struggling to clear it water was coming in so fast, she then breathed in water through her nose spat out her reg and bolted for the surface, the DM followed her up and left me kneeling on the bottom looking up. He sorted her out by inflating her BCD and left her bobbing on the surface and came back down to me. He signalled that my wife was ok found an urchin and broke it we fed the fishes for 10 mins all the time I could see my wife's legs above us, we surfaced with no safety stop got back on the boat and dive over..
At the time I had no idea about panicked divers, lung expansion, or de compression.
Luckily my wife was fine but vowed never to scuba dive again
I enjoyed the experience of feeding the fish and took lessons on my next holiday to gain my discover scuba card, it wasn't until then I realised how dangerous this situation could have been..
I often wonder if this school is still just randomly taking tourists into open water and how many other padi schools in tourist packed holiday destinations carry out the same practices.
The dive Centre I attend at home is fantastic
The regulations are tight, my teacher is experienced we have pool sessions and open water quarry dives and it all costs a fortune, but money well spent in my book.
Do padi carry out random checks on dive centres ?? or have powers to have people struck off? Maybe they should carry out a secret tourist operation on random dive centers around the world.
Has anyone else's witnessed any crazy practices at dive centers whilst on holiday??
Many thanks
Mike
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
