An Open Letter of Personal Perspective to the Diving Industry by NetDoc

[tursiops]

I believe the supposition that buoyancy is high in Bear Lake is BS. It is VERY unlikely it is as high as normal salt water, so the kid was still overweighted a LOT. Even if it were like the Great Salt Lake, which is NOT likely, the kid was still overweighted. You can look at all the formal geological and limnological doscuments for Bear Lake and anamalous buoyancy is never mentioned. The mineral load in the water is mentioned, but it is nothing special, and would not likely cause any noticable buoyancy effects to a diver.

 

[demed]

The questionnaire was emailed to me and my son. It would not be hard, or overkill, to create a program that automatically emailed the questionnaire to every DSD. I am sure it was an automated email that we received.

do you work with surveys?
the problem is not to send the questionnaire - is to expect that people who had a 1 hour experience while on vacation take the time to provide meaningful feedback - if the answers you get are unreliable garbage, the data you extrapolate from it will be unreliable garbage

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:09 PM ----------

...

My point is, why are we assuming facts not in evidence? And why are we assigning blame to the victim or his family, especially since the source of that blame has not even been confirmed? Why are we assigning blame at all?

so falsifying and counterfeiting the medical questionnaire and physician's clearance bear no responsibility in your ethics?

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:11 PM ----------

Had an asthma attack been a contributing factor in this incident, would the agency have paid $800K to settle?

your ignorance of the court system is appalling

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:14 PM ----------

I understand.

But once you establish a reputation for paying ransoms, where does it stop?

How is it that their pockets are deep enough to make payouts when they have no fault but they do not have the resources to effectively enforce standards?

No you don't understand, you don't even begion to understand.

This is no matter of how deep pocketed the defendant is, but rather limiting the impact of bad PR, the cost of ongoing litigation and potentially appeals, the risk of disruption to the ongoing business as a result of adverse verdict.

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:17 PM ----------

Whether we like it or not, the instructor's lawyer is going to argue that any action that the instructor took is irrelevant since the boy would not have been in the water in the first place had the parents been honest with the camp medical form.

in fact the medical celarance was not signed by a physician and apparently there were several omissions in the form altogether. in any case, the instructor's lawyer obviously has *not* consulted with you before asserting the defense strategy, and unfortunately liability cases do not work that way.

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:21 PM ----------

Just an aside, the instructors I know who have been kicked out of PADI just signed up with SDI or SSI and are still teaching. Removing them from one agency doesn't neccesarily fix the problem.

All the expulsions from PADI are public knowledge - if another agency makes a conscious decision not to consider the available information about the instructor's record, how serious and reliable is that agency?

the only mitigating circumstance would be if the instructor decided resign or not to renew with PADI before an expulsion is communicated.

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:24 PM ----------

...

Unless PADI regional QA managers are willing to show up uninvited to strike terror into the hearts of the [-]franchisees[/-] partner orgs and send them scurrying around tidying up...

I see you subscribe to the positive reinforcement school of learning from Nazi germany that has been such a pedagogical success

 

[KevinNM]

"Arterial gas embolism is a major cause of death in diving and the initiating cause (pulmonary barotrauma) usually goes undetected. Caused most often by the expansion of respiratory gases during ascent, it also occurs when the breath is held during ascent from a dive, when there is local pulmonary pathology, when there is dynamic airway collapse in the non-cartilaginous airways and if there is low pulmonary compliance, particularly if this is not distributed evenly throughout the lungs. Boyle's law is the physical law controlling the event. Experimental evidence indicates that intratracheal pressures of about 10 kPa (4 fsw or 1.22 m. or ascending from 170 feet or 51.82 m. to 120 feet or 36.58 m.) are all that's needed for it to happen. Distention of the alveoli leads to rupture, alveolar leakage of gas, and extravasation of the gas into the arterial circuit.

This is why I suggested way back in the thread that dragging a pair of untrained novices up from 15 feet in response to the other diver bolting has the potential to kill them, and hence is not a good plan.

 

[demed]

Pete, I'll have to check as I only know who they teach for know. It is entirely possible that after some incident, they applied for membership in another organization before PADI kicked them out.

Hmmmm.... and the other organizations do not check the PADI quarterly bulletin of expulsion?

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:34 PM ----------

wow. clearly you don't actually know Brian.
Brian wrote this letter leading up to DEMA because the industry HAS to address this. Yes, Brian leads a competitor to PADI but who else could write a piece that would be taken seriously?
Brian also said that he was not going to continue the conversation as I suspect he knew it would lead to pissing and name calling.
TDI/SDI has exceptionally high standards and the TDI/SDI I have met have both a passion for the dive industry AND a passion for excellence.

Brian clearly has two sets of morals - the ethics of integrity he advertises for his agency and total the lack of ethics he personally practices and demonstrated with his letter (and to me personally on a separate incident).

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:38 PM ----------

So, you want a Scuba Police force. Sounds like fun.

The Scuba STASI, with fake customers and double agent instructors... a model worth aspiring to...

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:40 PM ----------

wow. clearly you don't actually know Brian.
Brian wrote this letter leading up to DEMA because the industry HAS to address this. Y

A man of integrity would publish a retraction or an apology, like other CEOs do, or journalists.


An industry player would work in the appropriate forums like the RSTC if were sincerely and honestly looking to change standards.

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:44 PM ----------

They are contractually obligated to do so. Willis insured the instructor and the shop. Willis also happens to insure TDI. Willis' relationship with TDI/SDI is not the same incestuous relationship that V&B has with PADI. I had Willis (and Marsh, before Willis) long before TDI was an agency.

you're barking at the wrong tree:

1. the insurer can drop the insured who has knowingly violated a standard

2. apparently willis is incestously covering the PADI asia pacific instructors and shops

---------- Post added December 23rd, 2014 at 08:47 PM ----------

Believe what you read, but PADI has continually blocked any tightening of the standards at the most recent RSTC meetings. You see, it's a case of requiring a unanimous vote to change a standard, not a majority, so if 4 other members decide they want a 2:1 ratio for DSD, and 1:1 if the DSD participant is a minor, and one member votes no, then the standards don't get changed. Some folks participating in this thread have said repeatedly that PADI is all for changing the standards. They get their information from PADI. I get mine from the other 4 members of the RSTC. PADI doesn't want any standards tightened, and they have veto power, so the standards aren't getting changed.

This thread is more full of BS than a Kansas feedlot.

you are clearly quite ignorant of the RSTC procedures and would rather repeat secondhand stories than inform yourself - which is your choice. when you coose to repeat them in public you are only embarassing yourself

 

[Zippsy]

This is why I suggested way back in the thread that dragging a pair of untrained novices up from 15 feet in response to the other diver bolting has the potential to kill them, and hence is not a good plan.

This is why every time you or someone else repeats that line, someone has to post the same reply: the instructor should have grabbed the other two and ascended at a SAFE NORMAL speed. A wise instructor would neither follow your advice to do a dangerous rapid ascent nor would they follow what was done in this incident and dangerously abandon two untrained children. Why risk creating two or three victims when you already have one??? Get it?

 

[The Chairman]

Some might misinterpret that as your being deceptive: http://www.keysso.net/aboutso/aboutso.htm

There is no deception: We are without a KLPD. Like every county, Monroe has a Sheriff's department. We also have a huge presence of Highway Patrol and Florida Wildlife Commission officers. I'm more likely to see FWC, then FHP and that's more likely then a Sheriff here on the roads in the Keys. When my son died, the nearest investigator lived just south of Marathon, well over an hour away. I don't believe that you understand the difference between those entities and how it affects the demeanor of the locale.

You asked an ignorant question because you don't have the requisite experience and you hadn't done your homework. You're still ignorant about the situation here in the Keys and that's OK: it really doesn't affect you at all. The same could be said about your ideas for enforcing instructors. You're ignorant of the situation since you aren't an instructor and don't seem willing to understand our issues. Maybe for an encore, you should try your hand at nuclear regulation or perhaps policing all of the infectious diseases we have in the US. I hope this doesn't come across as harsh or condescending, but until you swim a few miles in my fins, and have taken the classes to understand the situation, I don't think you can fully understand the current state of teaching Scuba.

 

[The Laconic]

What bugs you about putting the standard in? I am somewhat bothered that they... won't understand them. But in my mind letting the students know what they should be taught is important...

But I don't think the standards cover what they should be taught, at least in general--that's what the manuals and videos are for. The standards may cover some things incidentally, e.g. what skills are to be demonstrated in an OW course, but then that's already in the manual.

That said, I don't know the reason for hiding the standards from students, either. I agree that some wouldn't understand them, but some might take an interest. A student that has some familiarity with the standards could at least catch and report gross violations.

So how about this: PADI could include a reasonable, understandable condensation of the standards in about one page in the relevant manual, and encourage students who see practices to the contrary to call PADI with "questions". Bad idea? Does something like that already exist?

 

[TTPaws]

Believe what you read, but PADI has continually blocked any tightening of the standards at the most recent RSTC meetings. You see, it's a case of requiring a unanimous vote to change a standard, not a majority, so if 4 other members decide they want a 2:1 ratio for DSD, and 1:1 if the DSD participant is a minor, and one member votes no, then the standards don't get changed. Some folks participating in this thread have said repeatedly that PADI is all for changing the standards. They get their information from PADI. I get mine from the other 4 members of the RSTC. PADI doesn't want any standards tightened, and they have veto power, so the standards aren't getting changed.

This thread is more full of BS than a Kansas feedlot.

Damn and here I was going to stay out of this thread. What makes it worse is I usually enjoy your post Wookie, but I can't let this go by without a comment.

Your last sentence actually applies to your 1st paragraph. This is the kind of unsubstantiated FUD* that causes the pissing contest between agencies and lead to divisiveness like the Carney letter in the first place. Do you have minutes of the meetings? Do you have a record of the question asked and the votes on it? Do you have any documentation that "PADI doesn't want any standards tightened"? Hearsay gets us nowhere in the discussion. With something this important, the other four agencies should come out in writing with their standing on the issue, as a dissenting opinion or quit whining.

Everyone has their opinion, but to report opinion as fact is incorrect.

 

[Zippsy]

So how about this: PADI could include a reasonable, understandable condensation of the standards in about one page in the relevant manual, and encourage students who see practices to the contrary to call PADI with "questions". Bad idea? Does something like that already exist?

i like that idea even better. Are the agencies listening?

 

[boulderjohn]

Damn and here I was going to stay out of this thread. What makes it worse is I usually enjoy your post Wookie, but I can't let this go by without a comment.

Your last sentence actually applies to your 1st paragraph. This is the kind of unsubstantiated FUD* that causes the pissing contest between agencies and lead to divisiveness like the Carney letter in the first place. Do you have minutes of the meetings? Do you have a record of the question asked and the votes on it? Do you have any documentation that "PADI doesn't want any standards tightened"? Hearsay gets us nowhere in the discussion. With something this important, the other four agencies should come out in writing with their standing on the issue, as a dissenting opinion or quit whining.

Everyone has their opinion, but to report opinion as fact is incorrect.

What is interesting is that the OLD PADI standards are there fore anyone to see by going to the RSTC site and looking at them there. They are not the current PADI standards, though, because PADI added significantly to them this year. So, I guess Frank is saying that PADI prevented the RSTC from adding to its standards while it was at the same time adding to theirs. That would be a really unusual position to take.

---------- Post added December 24th, 2014 at 07:51 AM ----------

This thread is more full of BS than a Kansas feedlot.

I would say that all the threads (I think there are five so far) on this topic are full of BS. It would be interesting to go back to the first pages of the first threads, the ones about PADI throwing an instructor under the bus, and see who was putting most of it out there.