Berating an "Instructor" on a dive boat. How should I have handled differently?

[lowviz]

Must be something defective about people from New Jersey. .

I would love to "like" your post. But it spans several levels and I'm not sure which you are speaking to.

Yes, this is NJ and it is all about survival, at times grace and manners go begging. The RR bridge is a common OW proving ground, but not without its teeth. Beautiful and benign until you get too close then it is ass over tin cups, or worse...

The buddy system
Tropical destination diving shops training locals
What can possibly happen? I paid a lot of money for this training...

 

[cb5150]

I'm in the "Mind your own business" camp.

 

[agilis]

I would love to "like" your post. But it spans several levels and I'm not sure which you are speaking to.

Yes, this is NJ and it is all about survival, at times grace and manners go begging. The RR bridge is a common OW proving ground, but not without its teeth. Beautiful and benign until you get too close then it is ass over tin cups, or worse...

The buddy system
Tropical destination diving shops training locals
What can possibly happen? I paid a lot of money for this training...

The "Jersey" remark was, of course, a joke, based on other people's comments that I have endured in the past. I was being sarcastic. I'm New Jersey born and bred, and some of the world's best divers call this state home. Diving here can be difficult and challenging, but there is, I think, no shortage of grace and courtesy. I've had very bad experiences in other places. I've seen boats drop divers directly on top of other divers who were there first, run over lines, all kinds of things that seem to reflect the angry crass stupidity that develops when there are just too many people competing with one another, a common situation in warmer, clearer waters far to the south of my home base.

You are certainly right about the RR bridge. The student died needlessly. An instructor with too many students doing initial open water in a spot where the tide shifts can be overwhelming got impatient and deviated from common sense and basic safety. I knew this individual slightly. His shop, which disappeared forever, was located almost within walking distance of my house. I was not present at the tragedy but know a couple of people who were.

People sometimes get careless when they are rushed, trying to do too many things at once while dealing with a group of bumbling awkward first-timers. Instructors should never deviate from the most strict safety standards when training new divers for many reasons beyond basic caution.

I suppose my point is that instructors can be as foolish and dangerous as any other diver. Buddy systems are of very doubtful utility unless the divers are experienced, competent, and have developed a strong diving relationship. On new diver initial open water dives the instructor usually becomes the de facto buddy for the whole group of students.

 

[boulderjohn]

Does PADI require a redundant scuba system for this type of overhead diving?

Neither PADI nor any other agency requires anything on any dive a diver does outside of training. Its rules govern instructors doing training only. It has no power to make such a requirement. It certainly does recommend lots of things for your diving.

As I said above, the course "Understanding Overhead Environments" does not teach how to dive in overhead environments in any way. It just teaches about the nature of the different kinds of overhead environments. It teaches about the relative dangers associated with different kinds of environments. It also teaches what kind of training is appropriate for certain kinds of environments. Divers wishing to take such training can take courses that will teach appropriate skills, including cavern diving, wreck diving, and technical diving courses. Those courses will teach things like redundant air sources.

 

[danvolker]

In some tourist destinations there will be the "party style Pontoon boats", or even traditional dive boats that hold 30 to 45 OR MORE divers (and are the 'worst" in what the "party boat" name-tag suggests)....
These will pile a wide range of dysfunctional divers with skills ranging from good ( but obviously with bad judgment), to fair, horribly unskilled, to down-right dangerous.....

They are usually cheap compared to other dive operations, and dive classes for first time students, or Rambo types can be diving off the boat at the same time. Bedlam can be continual during both surface intervals and during dives. The only thing standing in the way of daily deaths on these boats, is that diving really is so easy, that even the worst divers have to screw up very badly to die. And of course, they do screw up like this from time to time, and we read about the "Accident"...even though it was waiting to happen.

If one of us...that knows better, was to decide that he/she HAD to dive on an Easter Sunday and then used a Party boat because all the other boats were full.....Aside from the fact that this is about as prophetically defective as asking a bunch of drunks in a car, to give you a lift...and expecting everything to be fine.....this would be indefensible, and the diver doing this should keep it to themselves--or not do it!

And as to bitching out anyone on the party boat for their poor diving skills or behaviors....this is like going to a beer blast at a Frat Party, and then loudly complaining that people are drinking too much....


In DIR ideology, there is the clear Rule about not diving with UNSAFE DIVERS....THE "DONT DIVE WITH STROKES" RULE.... The Party Boat diving falls under this....and is so obvious it should not need to be elaborated on.

 

[boulderjohn]

I am pretty sure I have dived off of the boat mentioned in this thread on more than one occasion. It is the only pontoon boat I know in that area, at any rate. I would not call it a party boat. I did some dives off of it while I was doing my technical diving training. If it is going to a site like the Copenhagen or the nursery, there will be a lot of beginning divers on it because those sites attract beginning divers. It goes to other sites as well, and when it does, it attracts a more experienced clientele. It has attracted some very serious clientele, in fact.

 

[Akimbo]

…While I can't speak for PADI's class, the big takeaway from the SSI "Wreck Diver" class is how easy it is to die in one, and to stay the hell out of anything that isn't obviously wide-open with easy access to the surface.

There's no "Open Water" specialty class that teaches safe overhead diving…

There is only one safe way to explore inside wrecks, sitting onshore and driving a ROV (Remote Operated Vehicle) via a satellite link. Diving inside wrecks is never “safe”, as-in without risk. As far as that goes, being on a boat is not safe. What wreck classes teach is that gray area of how to minimize risk to more acceptable levels.

Cousteau and thousands of other divers learned techniques to reduce risk while diving wrecks, sometimes the hard way. In the beginning everyone was ignorant and a few decades from now today’s advanced wreck certifications will probably be viewed as dangerous.

 

[The Chairman]

There aren't many Corinthians on the East Coast of Florida, so I think I know the boat too. Anything but a party boat the times I have been on it. It's not against the law to have fun while diving.

 

[danvolker]

And I am not zeroing in on one specific boat...I am discussing this as a category of boat choice.
It would be my contention, that in a place like Lauderdale, or Palm beach, or Miami, the Keys, or Cancun....there are going to be boats that "tend" to market to specific types of diver populations....

• There are boats that cater to students and shallow.
• there are boats that cater to spearfisherman
• There are boats that cater to photographers
• there are boats that cater to certified divers of reasonable competence, that don't want students most of the time--because students wreck the diving options for the decent divers--what dive sites the boat can choose
• There are boats that cater to very experienced divers and tech divers
• There are many boats that try to "mix" some of these categories together, when they can..some pull this off and everyone stays happy..some fail badly with this.
• There are some great boats, and a few horrible boats.
• Party boats to me are horrible. They typically have many students and poor instructors ( good instructors would have chosen a better boat). Pontoons DO NOT make a boat a party boat....With the right captain, and a good group of divers on it, a pontoon boat can be awesome.

• Choices in marketing, pricing, POOR CONTROL of diver behavior, too many students or new divers way out of control, and what divers the boat caters to, are what makes a PARTY BOAT. A captain of what is normally a "good boat", could make a very bad call on a given day, and resemble a party boat for that day..the good captains don't allow many repeat performances like this ....... The really big boats, require a better captain, to make sure none of this bad stuff happens--as it gets bad much faster when the boat can hold 45 divers rather than only 11.

 

[flots am]

• Party boats to me are horrible. They typically have many students and poor instructors ( good instructors would have chosen a better boat). Pontoons DO NOT make a boat a party boat....With the right captain, and a good group of divers on it, a pontoon boat can be awesome.

I know this is unbelievably stupid, but in not-great dive spots, I have actually grown to enjoy party boats for the entertainment value.

It's like being on a whole boat full of the stayed-up-late-got-drunk-almost-missed-the-boat guy in the old SSI Stress and Rescue video tape. Sometimes I don't even get in the water, and just do a little snorkeling then take a nap.

OTOH, it's only fun when I'm not responsible for anybody.

flots.