divers and smoking

[DementialFaith]

I actually don't think you should go into indepth lecture to those smokers... it mind end up annoying them. Just express your opinion to them in an at least respectful if not nice manner.

 

[John C. Ratliff]

Raises a few issues beyond the health concerns. If you paid for your DM course, you are a customer. If a customer complains about smoking it is the shop's responsibility to ask the smokers to stop smoking around you. To have instructors or DMs smoking in plain sight just looks plain unprofessional. The others should start getting some practice in because the smokers where I work may have to do without for 8 hours at a stretch. On my boats, only customers are allowed to smoke, not the staff, and only at the back when the boat is moving.

Concerning smoking, I feel it should be outlawed. In addition to the above, you can mention this:

--One Scuba Board member (me) has a Mom who died of lung cancer complicated by emphasema, both caused by smoking. She died in her early 70s, and my Grandmom died in her early 90s. It cost my Mom twenty years of her life, and the ability to see her grandsons get their degrees, and go on to high accomplishments. In addition, it made this Christmas a bit lonelier.

--In scuba instruction, we emphasize the need for our compressed air to be clean. It must meet grade D breathing air standards. But the air around smokers, which is second-hand smoke, cannot meet these standards because of contamination by carbon monoxide. Breathing it before a dive will load your red blood cells with some CO, and that displaces oxygen in the blood stream for a period after the last smoke. This will inhibit any breath-hold diving, and could also inhibit their ability to function during highly stressed diving (such as rescueing you).

--If anyone has a CO load on their blood system, they are more suseptable to a heart attack.

Talk to the dive shop about this, and ask that they prohibit smoking on their premises and during sponsored dives.

SeaRat

 

[fairybasslet]

Concerning smoking, I feel it should be outlawed. In addition to the above, you can mention this:

--One Scuba Board member (me) has a Mom who died of lung cancer complicated by emphasema, both caused by smoking. She died in her early 70s, and my Grandmom died in her early 90s. It cost my Mom twenty years of her life, and the ability to see her grandsons get their degrees, and go on to high accomplishments. In addition, it made this Christmas a bit lonelier.

--In scuba instruction, we emphasize the need for our compressed air to be clean. It must meet grade D breathing air standards. But the air around smokers, which is second-hand smoke, cannot meet these standards because of contamination by carbon monoxide. Breathing it before a dive will load your red blood cells with some CO, and that displaces oxygen in the blood stream for a period after the last smoke. This will inhibit any breath-hold diving, and could also inhibit their ability to function during highly stressed diving (such as rescueing you).

--If anyone has a CO load on their blood system, they are more suseptable to a heart attack.

Talk to the dive shop about this, and ask that they prohibit smoking on their premises and during sponsored dives.

SeaRat

Bravo! I cannot believe that the most addictive substance on Earth is legal. Sorry about your mom.

 

[Tom Yerian]

i've been a diver for almost 10 years now, so this year i decided to go for my davemaster course, i found a dive center to do the course, they are friendly enough
i started the course, but i feel i cannot continue as the instructors all smoke, i don't like smokers at the best of times, but at each session when we get sat down everyone lights up
so i have quit, the course cost me a lot of money,and i am very disapointed, but i am too shy to go in there and complain, after all if that's how they want to run business, who am i to tell them otherwise
i also signed up for a few club trips before i really got into it, the thought of driving long distances with a bus full of smokers, it didn't appeal
i know i should complain but i don't really know how to go about it, i half expect it is my problem as i am the one who has quit
they've tried to make contact, but as i have no idea what to say to them i have not replied
any idea's

... After all is said and done, politely explain your situation to owner of the facility. If they say , no, its policy, or give you the run around, call their organization!! You want your money back, explain of course. Inform them you will get an attorney and will pursue action. Remember, smoking is a health hazzard, and you were forced to endure their unsafe habit, and it affected your health. This is a sport where respiritory health paramont, You will get your money back; all of it!!p.s. Stand up for yourself, no one else will!!!....Capt Tom

 

[RumBum]

at each session when we get sat down everyone lights up

from a smokers point of view (well, I am quitting again as of 5 days now), I can tell you that most smokers realize it's a dirty habit and will understand if you say it bothers you. I do think that it is probably less offensive to say you are allergic to it than just "that's gross!" If you ask them to set up smoke breaks where they can all go outside to smoke I would think that shouldn't be a problem. You really should approach this instead of just tucking tail and losing your money. I would say to them exactly the same things you said here, you don't want to be pushy and tell them whether to smoke or not, you just can't be around the smoke yourself.
Good luck!

 

[lakewinni]

Thats why GUE is so awsome, you cant take most of their classes if you smoke. That solves that problem.

 

[moon_light_diver]

i quit smoking 3 years ago
when i'm sat down with them and they are smoking i cough myself almost inside out, to the point of almost being sick
not once did they ever think about putting out their ciggerattes
so i quit, if and when i can find somewhere else, a non smoking dive center i will resume the DM course

 

[DiverBuoy]

My grandfather died young of heart disease from being a chain smoker. My father quit smoking for 9 years right up and through my certifying him, and a few scuba trips that we took. Now we are planning another trip, but somehow he has started smoking again, and not cigarettes this time but cigars! I've come down hard on him and reminded him that smoking and diving don't mix. I think I'll plan a non-smoking live-aboard, yeah that's the trick. Once we are out at sea I'll remind him there is O2 tanks on board these things so smoking is not prohibited. Nah I won't be that harsh, but I will tell him he's got to quit, even if temporarily, before we take our trip. Personally I hate the smell and despise having the joy of my next inhalation interrupted by it. I'm really happy it's become much harder for smokers in California to practice their disgusting habit in most public places, the second hand smoke is just as deadly. Last year I took a trip to Indiana and almost didn't remember how to respond to the question in my first restaurant visit - smoking or non-smoking. I asked "Pardon me, but (cough) is the non-smoking section (cough) in a seperate structure?", dramatically gasping for air on that last part, to get the words out. The matre'd just smiled. I left.

 

[moon_light_diver]

Thats why GUE is so awsome, you cant take most of their classes if you smoke. That solves that problem.

first off, what is GUE
second off
what kind of idiotic idea is it, 'to smoke just becuse someone else in the room is smoking'
have you not got a brain



it's funny, i was under the impression that lungs are good thing to have working propperly for diving
i know there are more than the occasional diving smokers out there
but sugesting i smoke because because others in the room are
give that man a peanut

 

[DiverBuoy]

moon light diver www.gue.com - Global Underwater Explorers.