dfx
Contributor
I've seen this so many times now that I have to ask... New divers, newly certified OWD, finish their OWD cert and head right into the AOW course, sometimes without even doing a single dive on their own in between.
What's the idea behind doing this? I'm not PADI trained and it seems to be mostly (only?) PADI divers who do this. I've always been under the impression that AOW makes sense only after gaining some real-world diving experience (at least that's what I remember from the SSI system), but this common immediate OWD/AOW combo contradicts this.
Not trying to stir up anything, I'm genuinely curious about what the reasoning is. Do they feel that their OWD training was inadequate and they hope to fill the gaps through AOW? Not enough pool time in OWD and they want more before they start diving on their own? Or is it the depth limitation of the PADI OWD level (what is it, 60 ft?) that they think is not enough for what they want to dive? If that's what it is, what does the AOW teach them that OWD didn't, that would let them go beyond the OWD depth limit?
What's the idea behind doing this? I'm not PADI trained and it seems to be mostly (only?) PADI divers who do this. I've always been under the impression that AOW makes sense only after gaining some real-world diving experience (at least that's what I remember from the SSI system), but this common immediate OWD/AOW combo contradicts this.
Not trying to stir up anything, I'm genuinely curious about what the reasoning is. Do they feel that their OWD training was inadequate and they hope to fill the gaps through AOW? Not enough pool time in OWD and they want more before they start diving on their own? Or is it the depth limitation of the PADI OWD level (what is it, 60 ft?) that they think is not enough for what they want to dive? If that's what it is, what does the AOW teach them that OWD didn't, that would let them go beyond the OWD depth limit?