Agencies and Nitrox

[Scuba446]

I am looking into taking a Nitrox course and have found soome surprising differances between some agencies!

SSI's course is 12 classroom hours, written exam and NO dives for their Nitrox certification. Cost is $125 + books. (About $140 total).

PADI is 12 classroom (or homestudy hours), written exam AND 2 OW Nitrox dives for cert. Cost is $150 for everyhting.

So I am curious now - whats YMCA and NAUI doing?

Anyone know?

 

[chuckrt]

Hi Mike, I think I did the course in two classes at the shop with Michael, it was a couple years ago. I don't see why you would need open water dives as you don't do anything differently.

chuckrt

 

[Scubaroo]

"Required" Nitrox dives are a joke - as long as you get to do some hands on analyzing of the oxygen content of a tank during your course, there is no point to doing the dives. There are no skills learnt on the dive specific to Nitrox, except for the pre-dive planning, ie. choosing an appropriate O2 content for that dive, and hands on experience of using the new tables. All stuff you learn during the course.

I was put through both the PADI and TDI Nitrox courses parallel by my instructor - you learn the same material. TDI put more of an emphasis on the theory, PADI put more of an emphasis on examples. But in reality, it's just as easy to sign up for whichever course is the most convenient for you to attend.

 

[kcanty]

There was just a thread on a different 'group'
about this subject and the most telling message
was from an instructor. He stated that the most
important part of a nitrox course could/would be
recognition and rescue of a buddy with o2 tox.

I thought about this statement since I did TDI nitrox
with no dives and realized he was correct ( in my
opinion ) Yes usually it's just figure the MOD and
go dive but really there is a danger due to o2 tox.

I wish I had gone through buddy tox and recovery
techniques ( not just rote conVENTID ) during my
nitrox class.

Kell

 

[boomx5]

kcanty once bubbled...
the most important part of a nitrox course could/would be
recognition and rescue of a buddy with o2 tox.
Kell

I took the PADI Nitrox course and we did no training for emergency situations. What agency is he an instructor for?

 

[Waterlover]

It was a NAUI class. I bet YMCA and GUE also cover rescue in their programs.

 

[O-ring]

There was just a thread on a different 'group'
about this subject and the most telling message
was from an instructor. He stated that the most
important part of a nitrox course could/would be
recognition and rescue of a buddy with o2 tox.

I believe this is covered in Tech1, but I could be mistaken. I will tell you next year!

 

[Walter]

There is considerable disagreement over the requirement to actually make dives as part of a Nitrox course. Some agencies require it, other don't. (My goodness, another example of agency differences)

Some agencies teach you to calculate the best mix for a dive, others don't.

Dealing with victims of Ox tox should (IMHO) be required by all agencies. I've not looked at Nitrox standards, so I can't tell you if this is or is not the case.

Course prices are not set by agencies, but by the instructor and/or shop offering the course. You'll find agency A has the lowest cost in one city while it has the hishest cost in another.

YMCA requires 2 dives, NAUI (according to a usually accurate source) actually has two different Nitrox certifications, one requiring dives, the other not.

My original Nitrox certification was through NAUI and I was very pleased with its organization. I teach YMCA Nitrox and an equally pleased. There are only minor differences between the two. This is expected because both texts have the same authors.

 

[jbd]

Nitrox recognition course--you take the course and thats it. No certification.

Nitrox certification course---you take the course and do at least two dives including one repetitive dive. Certification card recieved.

Course is about 8 hours of classroom time, which is plenty IMHO.

 

[notabob]

Anyone know if the SSI nitrox course cover o2 tox recognition as part of a standard curriculum? Or would it be up to the particular instructor teaching the course to impart that wisdom upon us?

-Roman.