Death by Diving

[Kingpatzer]

No matter how good your training is, no matter how good your instructor is, as long as people have free will, there will always be that small subset of people...

Which goes back to an earlier comment about individual attitude and willingness to learn.

Thal is quick to dismiss and belittle PADI instructors, regardless of their background or his ignorance thereof, without recognizing that part of the instruction PADI student receive is a strong admonition to continue their training in both formal and informal ways, to always observe the safety rules they've been taught, to continually practice and refine their skills, and so on.

People like me who settle on what to him amounts to life threatening training still somehow manage to turn into moderately competent divers because we do those things. Learning to clear a mask or do an air share is easy. Continually practicing and refining those skills is a matter of individual attitudes. It is not something an instructor can ensure, no matter how good they happen to be.

 

[Backflush]

At least two of these deaths could have been prevented by staying with your buddy. I would never stay down if my buddy signaled to go up. If one goes up we both go up. No exceptions.

It would not hurt to not only check your own pressure, but to also give your buddy the check pressure signal when you get below 1000 psi.

One issue I ran into recently with my buddy's BCD. On the surface everything checked out ok. We both did giant strides into the water, but this forced my buddy's bcd up which pulled the shoulder straps tight. Well the dump value pull string on the shoulder was so tight that the valve was pulled open from the string tension and would not close. At first he was OK until he realized his problem and started to freak out. I immediately grabbed his tank valve, pulled him up to the surface and back to shore ending the dive for the day.

Never leave your buddy.

 

[PfcAJ]

I'd bet that if the OW class was longer/harder/more comprehensive than today's PADI OW (which is by far the most popular and the most limited), the people with the wrong attitude wouldn't take it.

The result is twofold. A) only the students who really want to learn take the classes, and b)they are taught more stuff to a higher standard.

I went to a diver factory in Thailand this summer. They crank out an OW class in 4 days and its bare bones minimum. This really opened my eyes to how shoddy a lot of training is. Its unfortunate, because people that genuinely want to dive take these classes, and end up having less than awesome experiences post-class due to not being able/comfortable with diving. We probably lose a lot of diver in the long run due to insta-classes than we gain from them.

 

[Cave Diver]

I'd bet that if the OW class was longer/harder/more comprehensive than today's PADI OW (which is by far the most popular and the most limited), the people with the wrong attitude wouldn't take it.

Or...

You would get the macho badass personalities who want to prove how manly they are because they completed the toughest training out there, so now they're ready to take on the world.

Personally, I think instead of us creating laws and warnings to protect people who want to become Darwin Award candidates, we should put them in an express lane and get them out of the gene pool as quickly as possible. Maybe that would give people more pause to think about their actions.

<CD running for cover behind a flame proof wall. >

 

[TSandM]

I think instead of us creating laws and warnings to protect people who want to become Darwin Award candidates, we should put them in an express lane and get them out of the gene pool as quickly as possible.

Sort of an equivalent to my suggestion of breeding for common sense?

 

[captain]

Or...

You would get the macho badass personalities who want to prove how manly they are because they completed the toughest training out there, so now they're ready to take on the world.

Personally, I think instead of us creating laws and warnings to protect people who want to become Darwin Award candidates, we should put them in an express lane and get them out of the gene pool as quickly as possible. Maybe that would give people more pause to think about their actions.

<CD running for cover behind a flame proof wall. >

Sort of goes along with what is said here often "you don't know what you don't know".
That also applies to stupid people, they don't know they are stupid so they continue to do stupid things.

 

[Peter Guy]

One thing no one seems to be discussing here is the typical time passage between being "trained" (at whatever level) and when "the typical recreational diver" actually goes diving. A friend of mine is probably not that atypical in that he has had some good training but only dives every couple of years or so.

Because he has had "good training" (and because he considers himself an athlete) he just figures he still knows it. My guess is that one of Thal's students, who for whatever reason quit scientific diving, might still consider herself "well trained" and ready to do a "simple recreational dive" while on vacation several years later. Might she miss something during setup or the dive? Of course -- and then we'd say, "What a horrible instructor for not teaching her X, Y or Z."

It is, of course, possible (although maybe not probable) that ALL of Thal's students would never follow that scenario due to their thorough indoctrination (training ) in the dangers of diving. But, it IS possible!

Too may people think that "Once a diver, always a diver" and when the skills are really rock solid to start with.....

 

[DevonDiver]

Darwin's Law....

We'd still be living in caves if it wasn't for people genetically pre-disposed to thinking Spare Air was awesome!

 

[Kingpatzer]

One thing no one seems to be discussing here is the typical time passage between being "trained" (at whatever level) and when "the typical recreational diver" actually goes diving. A friend of mine is probably not that atypical in that he has had some good training but only dives every couple of years or so.

Because he has had "good training" (and because he considers himself an athlete) he just figures he still knows it.

This is a point we cover in our OW classes. We continually comment that if a diver has been a while without diving, they should take a review course. We charge $30 for them to get into our pool and have a DM go through skills with them. The number of people who take advantage of that offer is almost non-existant.

Yet the vast majority of our customer base are vacation divers who only dive once every year or less.

 

[EastTNDiver]

This is a point we cover in our OW classes. We continually comment that if a diver has been a while without diving, they should take a review course. We charge $30 for them to get into our pool and have a DM go through skills with them. The number of people who take advantage of that offer is almost non-existant.

Yet the vast majority of our customer base are vacation divers who only dive once every year or less.

Between certifying in 1984 and my son's certification in August of 2009, I faded out of the sport for a few years. When my son expressed an interest in getting certified, one of the first things that crossed my mind was a refresher course for myself. However, not really knowing the instructor that would be teaching my son, AND having been out of the sport for a while, I decided to take the full OW course with him...both to audit the instructor in whose hands I was placing my son's well being, and to learn what had transpired during my hiatus. It was a good move, and I just don't fully understand the resistance to doing this, or at least taking a refresher course...especially at just $30 for a skills session with a DM.

Do you think there may be a tendency for some people to be embarrassed by such an elementary reveiw? I know I've seen people exhibit various levels of poor attitude when asked to demo skills before being allowed to dive with certain dive resorts. Do you think the two attitudes are related?