A Wreck Dive Costs This Unprepared Instructor His Life
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Wookie
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"Eric Douglas co-authored the book Scuba Diving Safety, and has written a series of adventure novels, children’s books, and short stories — all with an ocean and scuba diving theme. " Looking at this footnote I'm going to hazard a guess this is fiction.
I read that one when it came out in print a few months ago, in their regular "Lessons for Life" column. Not sure what the point is of just posting a link to a magazine article, or if it should be this forum.
Here's what the magazine says about this column:
"We're often asked if the Lessons for Life columns are based on real-life events. The answer is yes, they are. The names and locations have been removed or altered to protect identities, but these stories are meant to teach you who to handle a scuba diving emergency by learning from the mistakes other divers have made. Author Eric Douglas takes creative license on occasion for the story, but the events and, often, the communication between divers before the accident are entirely based on incident reports."
Here's what the magazine says about this column:
"We're often asked if the Lessons for Life columns are based on real-life events. The answer is yes, they are. The names and locations have been removed or altered to protect identities, but these stories are meant to teach you who to handle a scuba diving emergency by learning from the mistakes other divers have made. Author Eric Douglas takes creative license on occasion for the story, but the events and, often, the communication between divers before the accident are entirely based on incident reports."
Oz Chris
Contributor
AOW student at 30+ metres for more than 74 minutes, the last 10 being pretty stressful, on a single tank? I call fiction.
I, too, cannot believe that this story is anywhere close to a real event. It is borderline absurd. If you are trying to make stories that teach lessons, they have to be believable.
Being below 100 feet for 74 minutes is absurd enough (if the diver had an excellent SAC rate, he or she would have run out of gas with double AL 80s). There are even basic factual errors. For example, it says that the US Navy NDL limit for 100 feet is 20 minutes. Nope--that is the PADI limit. The US Navy limit is 25 minutes. It then says he would have required "nearly 75 minutes" of deco. I don't know what algorithm that was based on, but the one I use would have called for 120 minutes.
Being below 100 feet for 74 minutes is absurd enough (if the diver had an excellent SAC rate, he or she would have run out of gas with double AL 80s). There are even basic factual errors. For example, it says that the US Navy NDL limit for 100 feet is 20 minutes. Nope--that is the PADI limit. The US Navy limit is 25 minutes. It then says he would have required "nearly 75 minutes" of deco. I don't know what algorithm that was based on, but the one I use would have called for 120 minutes.
Wookie
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Not to be really snotty, but there is a reason SB is one of the only Scuba forums left. I started with RDS D2D, but it just wasn't real....
Bert van den Berg
Contributor
The best way to stop this thread from appearing on the recent threads is for no-one to respond to it any longer.
Agreed. (Sorry I had to)
It's good this article of fiction can be addressed, the thoughtful replies are valuable at least.
It's surprising how much misinformation gets passed around the dive community. Especially antidotes told by instructors to scare the new divers. I overhear them nearly weekly in this topical location, plenty of dive lore floating around colder climates too.
Regards,
Cameron
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