Catalina Diver died today w/ Instructor

[openmindOW]

. . . instructor's SA . . . .

What is SA?

 

[Leejnd]

::::Sigh:::: Are we really back to this?

So many of us have tried to speak to Thalassamania's insistence that if ANYTHING (barring an act of God, e.g. meteorite) goes wrong on a dive with an instructor , then it's the instructor's fault...somehow, some way.

It's an indefensible position...but he will defend it to the end.

I say, give it up. He will continue to hold his "blame the instructor for everything" mentality, regardless of how illogical it is...regardless of how many people, including instructors, come in here to explain to him the lack of logic behind it. Some people simply can't be swayed. It's kinda like religion. Some people's beliefs are simply unshakable, despite the total lack of logic or reality behind them.

 

[openmindOW]

. . on one hand I can see that within the commercial confines of the industry as it is structured today an instructor running an AOW has to take on faith something that we all seem to know is rather shaky: the ability of a "certified" diver to perform even the most basic skills; on the other hand I must admit to having some problems with anyone who knowingly buys into the aforementioned known problem who does not take sufficient care to protect their students from themselves and what they do not know that they do not know ...

I am glad that you see the difficulty facing the average AOW Instructor. Practically speaking, Instructors who working in the recreational industry have to "accept" the students, who are certified divers, who come to us for training. To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld, we have to train the divers we have, not the divers we wished we had.

If I couldn't do that, especially given the problem outlined above, I, at least, would not be able to teach an advanced class in good conscience.

But if a diver wants to get training, then we should provide it. They're certified divers and they want to dive. It's positively good that they get an Instructor to teach them to be better divers.

They won't be Scripps100 divers, but they will be better.

 

[drbill]

Mike... as you know, standards of certain agencies allow dive training in the Casino Point dive park to be considered in "confined space" (I hope I'm saying that right... instructors correct me if I'm wrong). Of course instructors I know practice certain skills in the pool prior to coming out with their students to dive park.

This may be viewed as good or bad. Personally I'm of two opinions (I'm a Gemini after all): too much focus on pool work can give a student a false sense of confidence that falls apart when they hit the ocean AND plenty of practice in the pool gives students additional confidence in certain basic drills that can make the ocean experience easier.

I'm just glad I'm NOT an instructor myself. I'm happy just sharing my knowledge of marine ecology with the divers who come out.

 

[drbill]

::::Sigh:::: Are we really back to this?

Yes. To me it seems to be a more germane issue than discussing whether the valve was turned off, on or only partially open. First, if the total dive duration was on the order of 14 min as I have heard but not confirmed, it would have been impossible for the valve to be off and highly unlikely that the valve was only partially open for such a long period of time unless the majority of that time was spent in pretty shallow water.

 

[ItsBruce]

Through this thread we have heard what are probably accurate facts as to what happened. We may not know why it happened, but we have a good idea of the actual data: A diver ascended at a rate that was greater than what is considered "safe;" the diver died. I think it is safe to conclude that the mechanism of death was a lung expansion injury. We also know an instructor was present and made at least some effort to slow the diver's ascent.

Question: Is there anyone here who thinks there would have been a different outcome had the instructor not been present, i.e. the diver was just out doing a dive with a dive buddy or was diving solo?

Next question: Is there anyone here who believes an instructor is the guarantor of a diver's safety during the course of instruction?

 

[Teamcasa]

... I also believe the state of dive training needs to be taken up a notch. But in my opinion a long expensive training system will not generate the numbers of new divers needed to support the dive equipment industries.

It does, indeed, sound to me like you are willing to kill off people to assure that, at a minimum, the status quo of the diving industry is maintained.

You said it best but this time it applies to your post above.

That's the logical fallacy of reductum ad absurdum which wastes all our time and only serves to obfuscate

OK guys, we get it, now may we let it go?

I agree or at least take it here http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/advanced-scuba-discussions/313998-diving-education-today.html

 

[Cave Diver]

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A ScubaBoard Staff Message...

The ensuing discussion from this comment has been moved here: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/ad...ontinuing-education-split-catalina-death.html

Some off topic conversation has been removed

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So, let me see if I've got this right, if, after demonstrating/teaching a skill to a student, the student then demonstrating several times in both shallow and deeper confined water that he/she has mastered the skill (by performing the skill flawlessly with no perceptible difficulty several times) the student then has some sort minor problem on a subsequent repetition of the skill and panics, that then indicates a "failure" on the part of the instructor to have either adequately trained the student or a failure to detect some "incipient" problem before it develops into panic, this simply denotes an incompetent instructor? I suppose I'd just better toss in the towel because sometimes "***** happens." The only way to avoid all problems is to just live in a padded cocoon and even then a plane could fall out of the sky or a meteor could strike. It is utterly unreasonable to expect any ordinary human being to be able to anticipate any- and every- thing after taking all reasonable, appropriate, customary and prudent steps.

 

[Ken Kurtis]

Next question: Is there anyone here who believes an instructor is the guarantor of a diver's safety during the course of instruction?

Yes. They're known as "Plaintiff's Attorneys."

 

[D_B]

...

Next question: Is there anyone here who believes an instructor is the guarantor of a diver's safety during the course of instruction?

I'm going to say here that I did, OK, maybe not a guaranty, but pretty close .. not knowing what you don't know, how many newbie OW trainee's do you think would think otherwise ?

Or, are you referring to someone that is already a certified diver ?
I think at that point you should have some understanding of the risks involved in diving , but still, I think that you would more than likely feel safe under the instruction of a certified instructor