Choosing Between Various Nitrox Classes

[ScubaFeenD]

Personally I never got tables in my nitrox class (other than air tables).

I liked the tables I got with the course at first, but really it is soooo much more useful to just convert to EAD and then plan dives with an Air table. I guess having tables for gases handy is nice if you stay at one EAN%, but the air tables just give so much versatility.

 

[Sas]

Yea agreed. Most places use partial pressure blending here so helps to do this if I don't get exactly what I was asking for

 

[vladimir]

Hi,

SSI decided some time ago to split the EAN course into 2 - Level 1 up to 32%

What do I do if I have a level 1 certification and the 32% that I asked for tests out at 33%? Am I certified to dive that?

 

[ScubaFeenD]

What do I do if I have a level 1 certification and the 32% that I asked for tests out at 33%? Am I certified to dive that?

Nope. Too dangerous

 

[vladimir]

Nope. Too dangerous

That's what I figured, but I wasn't sure--I'm only certified to 32%, after all.

 

[Dive Hawk]

That's what I figured, but I wasn't sure--I'm only certified to 32%, after all.

Haha, nice one.

 

[Mod63]

Just to clear up the confusion, this is straigt from the current SSI Standards:

13. Qualification (1): The program may be taught in 2
parts — EAN 32% or the complete program of EAN
40%.
Certified Enriched Air Nitrox Divers 32% may:
• Dive in open water up to EAN 32% based on AIR
dive planning or computer settings not to exceed
100 ft/30 metres (maximum operating depth) and 60
minutes bottom time.

14. Qualification (2): Certified Enriched Air Nitrox Divers
40% may:
• Dive in open water with up to EAN 40%. Based
on the specific EAN mix, dive planning or EAN
computer settings are not to exceed the breathing
gas MOD (maximum operating depth) and CNS
exposure time (PO2 bottom time.)

 

[Herk_Man]

What do I do if I have a level 1 certification and the 32% that I asked for tests out at 33%? Am I certified to dive that?

That's easy. Just open up the valve and let a little bit out. Oxygen is lighter than Nitrogen so it will be at the top of the bottle and will come out first.

 

[JonKranhouse]

Stuff you probably won't learn from your Nitrox instructor, regardless of agency...

Download for free the “DAN Nitrox Workshop Proceedings” PDF from the Rubicon Foundation - WHAT YOU LEARN MIGHT SAVE YOUR LIFE.

In 2000, near DAN’s headquarters at Duke University, an invitation-only “summit” meeting was held with 34 CEOs and senior leadership of the prominent training agencies, manufacturers and publishers -- ostensibly to determine the recreational dive community’s “standards of care” for Nitrox. At times, the meeting turned highly argumentative, as you can read in the transcript...

-- A RARE GLIMPSE INTO THE SAUSAGE FACTORY! --

...pages 65 to 120 are particularly "interesting"... how the industry ignored the scientific testing that determined the more conservative Nitrox 1.3 PPO2 standard used by the US Navy, to set recreational diving’s more liberal 1.4 - 1.6 standard, based upon what leaders believe to be “reasonably safe” based on experience, but not based upon scientific data. My personal belief is that PPO2s > 1.3 can be safe in SPECIFIC circumstances; the OSHA standard seems, in my opinion, too simplistic (e.g. it avoids exertion parameters that vary with unpredictable ocean current vs. quarry diving).

 

[ScubaFeenD]

Stuff you probably won't learn from your Nitrox instructor, regardless of agency...

Thanks for the link to the pdf. It is a really interesting read.