The worst practice I see, is part of the "standards" practice of many agencies.....it has them doing an OW I class at the BHBm with 4 different dives to be conducted--and the first one, the one where potentially zero skills exist, has them doing essentially a RESORT Course run with 6 to 12 or more students( with one or 2 instructors/assistants). And we have seen larger than this! This first step needs to be removed as a choice for them. I have no problem with an instructor taking one, maybe 2 students on a resort course swim and tour over the BHB area, IF they are able to absolutely control the bouyancy of the 1 or 2 students during this tour. In 99% of the first dive OW classes we see running at the BHB, the majority of the students are up and down and all over the place, and the instructors are so overwhelmed by having this number of non-divers in the water with them, it is all they can do to prevent drownings or embolisms. Bouyancy swings are ignored, and the bottom gets trashed with rototilling. Typically they weight the non-diver students 5 or more pounds too heavy, to prevent them from floating up to the surface without wanting to...This causes the rototilling, with head up and fins down, into the sand and hydroids and nudibranchs, etc. This behavior must not be allowed to continue in the primary life concentration areas of the park.
Either they need to spend 15 minutes swimming around north of the west fishing bridge--in the sand, and just getting comfortable with breathing underwater and figuring out what they don't know....or, maybe they need to be no longer do this tour dive first.
Next, is the dive where they wil typically kneel on the bottom. This must change from them doing this whereever they want to ( as in on top of nudiworld), to either north of the west fishing bridge in 12 feet of water, or some place far east out by the docks on the east side in 12 to 18 feet of water. The best place of the two, for minimal impact to the park, will be north of the west fishing bridge, since all the silting that will result from the kneeling and thrashing will have the silt headed north toward MacArthur Park, and this will in no way degrade the BHB Park. The East area by the docks, while not as concentrated in marine life in the sandy areas by the docks, can still have the silt kicked up, be held in suspension and carried west to degrade vis and add turbidity to the environment at the West side. Still, this is much more desirable than what has been going on...at least to me.
I would love to get permission to add a large underwater deck that is 30 by 30, to the far east bottom, in 18 feet of water, and have classes use this....but that would be a major permitting issue--not imossible at all, but a lot of work for a few of us.
There is also a dive in the series where the students must do simulated ascents and OOA drills...with lots of bottom to surface and back to bottom runs....there is constant standing on the bottom with this, and constant silting, and next to zero awareness for what is about to be under the fins, when they hit bottom. This can't be allowed to continue a the West Side by the nav channel...not the way it is done by most now, with total disregard for the environment. The far east side is better for this, due to lower concentration of life, and the silting won't be quite as bad for the non-student population that is having it's dive quality ruined by the silting and poor vis this form of class will cause.
Things can only get far worse, as the BHB gets even more publicity, and many more divers. And it will continue to gain many more divers per day...there is no changing this. For now, instruction done incorrectly, is the biggest problem most of the regulars see.
The instructors are going to fire back about the photographers lieing on the bottom shooting pictures--however, they look carefully where they are positioning themselves, and they are putting very low pressure on the parts of the bottom then touch with--meaning little chance for damage, when compared to rototilling, or falling to the bottom from 18 feet, and impacting with fins. The instructors taking this anti-photographer position will be a tiny minority voice, with the large majority voice speaking against only the poor instruction practices mentioned so far.
Please add your thoughts to this, and hopefully some of you will think of much better solutions than I have.
