DM blew me off

[brnt999]

At what point do you stop blaming the training and put the responsibility on the individual diver? It does not take a ton of reasoning to realize that in order to participate in this sport you will need to be dependent on a life support system. When one is on life support it is a serious matter...in any conditions. To take that lightly and follow a DM blindly is well...not the brightest thing to do. It does not take further training to recognize this, it is common sense. Always look out for #1.

I will point out that 25 dives later I am still breathing. I will point out I was totally aware of where my air was and what I was doing and I made a decision that at 10 bar one way or another I was getting air or going to the surface. I made that decision. If I had to go to the surface I was 12m down and I did have enough air. So I wasn't blindly doing anything-I had a plan and I carried it out./

 

[InTheDrink]

It's not just me. The rescue skills I teach to OW students are taught to every SEI trained diver. It is one of our standards. Along with being not only encouraged, but required, to add knowledge and skills that in our judgment will add to our students safety based on the conditions they are likely to encounter and to test on those as a condition of certification. We can deny certification if they do not meet these added requirements as we are the judges of their skills, knowledge, and ability. And we, not the agency, have the final say. So to keep things going we train so that students succeed. And personally I feel that my students are a reflection of me. For them to fail or give the impression that they are less than skilled, safe, competent divers who do not need to be baby sat is unacceptable. I want ops to look at them and say we don't need to worry about or watch those divers and for others to say I want to look like that. Who trained them?

Why every professional doesn't seem to want the same is baffling to me.

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Jim I really admire SEI's approach to training. Presumably your training is more expensive than PADI, SSI etc? And where is it available? GUE training is amazing too but you rarely hear of someone taking this as their first class and never as a vacation diver class.

PADI's genius has been to lower the bar just low enough to keep price minuscule and injuries/deaths at acceptable levels IMO. But it's a real shame for the sport. That additional day independent diving that another poster mentioned would pay such huge dividends. Yet will never happen mass market.

---------- Post added March 20th, 2013 at 03:07 PM ----------

I will point out that 25 dives later I am still breathing. I will point out I was totally aware of where my air was and what I was doing and I made a decision that at 10 bar one way or another I was getting air or going to the surface. I made that decision. If I had to go to the surface I was 12m down and I did have enough air. So I wasn't blindly doing anything-I had a plan and I carried it out./

Not that I blame you but 10bar @12m with uncaring DM is not a great plan. You were blindly doing something but I blame the DM for this not you.

 

[brnt999]

Question for the OP. If the shop that you went to denied you a card. How would you have reacted? Please be honest.

I would have felt bad--for myself--but I would have lived with it. There was a guy who I crossed paths with who didn't pass.

 

[Oldbear]

I will point out that 25 dives later I am still breathing. I will point out I was totally aware of where my air was and what I was doing and I made a decision that at 10 bar one way or another I was getting air or going to the surface. I made that decision. If I had to go to the surface I was 12m down and I did have enough air. So I wasn't blindly doing anything-I had a plan and I carried it out./

I know it is 25 dives later and mostlikely within that 25 dive span your learning curve has dramatically increased. But if you have not figured out already, a good "Rule of Thimb" for recreational diving is to END a dive (be on the boat or at least the surface) with no less than 50 bar of gas remaining...

Happy diving...

~Oldbear~

 

[brnt999]

I know it is 25 dives later and mostlikely within that 25 dive span your learning curve has dramatically increased. But if you have not figured out already, a good "Rule of Thimb" for recreational diving is to END a dive (be on the boat or at least the surface) with no less than 50 bar of gas remaining...

Happy diving...

Yes I know that now. At the time I had no conception of a certain number of bars equals so many minutes of air.I was just winging it as I was down there and calculating as I was going that 10 bar was the drop dead limit. (I know saying drop dead will provoke flames)

~Oldbear~

Yes I know that now. At the time I had no conception of a certain number of bars equals so many minutes of air.I was just winging it as I was down there and calculating as I was going, and decided that 10 bar was the drop dead limit. (I know full well saying drop dead will provoke flames)

 

[InTheDrink]

Yes I know that now. At the time I had no conception of a certain number of bars equals so many minutes of air.I was just winging it as I was down there and calculating as I was going, and decided that 10 bar was the drop dead limit. (I know full well saying drop dead will provoke flames)

Dude now you're really scaring me.

 

[nimoh]

Yes I know that now. At the time I had no conception of a certain number of bars equals so many minutes of air.I was just winging it as I was down there and calculating as I was going, and decided that 10 bar was the drop dead limit. (I know full well saying drop dead will provoke flames)

no, the drop dead limit isn't for a few minutes after 0 bar

 

[brnt999]

There are some adventure activites, bungee jumping, zip lining, tandem skydiving come to mind, where all the details of the adventure and safety precautions have been built in such that a participant can have minimal training and supervision and experience the adventure. Sadly it seems that some people have equated scuba diving with that type of activity and assume the safety details are all worked out for them by whomever is arranging their dive. I think some of the marketing in the sport lends itself to that belief - take a quick class, jump on in and enjoy the fun.

You know that is the model I was thinking about. It isnt your cup of tea and honestly it is not what I want to do with diving, but there are people out there that want that. That is all they want out of diving. It seems like a win win. Dive shops still make money by training people for these de-risked dives, they make money by taking people on these de-risked dives--the whole diving community is safer because there is no ambiguity. I keep thinking about that young Asian woman who recently died and the misconceptions she had and the misconceptions the dive boat had.

 

[Scott from LongIsland]

You know that is the model I was thinking about. It isnt your cup of tea and honestly it is not what I want to do with diving, but there are people out there that want that. That is all they want out of diving. It seems like a win win. Dive shops still make money by training people for these de-risked dives, they make money by taking people on these de-risked dives--the whole diving community is safer because there is no ambiguity. I keep thinking about that young Asian woman who recently died and the misconceptions she had and the misconceptions the dive boat had.

That is called Discover Scuba.

How on earth do you know what either party was thinking in the Miami accident?

 

[TSandM]

You know, it is really easy to beat on new divers about the things they don't know, and the questions they don't ask. But when I look back at my own training and realize what I've learned since, I realize I didn't ask many of the right questions (and I'm an inveterate question-asker). It is a case of not knowing what you don't know. But there are some common sense things, like not staying underwater until you run out of gas, that I think are independent of what you are taught . . .

The solution to the training problem is complicated, because the training problem exists for a whole set of interdependent reasons. But there is hope -- we have a lot of instructors here on SB who have been influenced by one another to improve training classes and adopt different techniques, and some of those ideas have even made it into the professional journals of the large agencies.