Doc Deep dies during dive.

[Lorenzoid]

An interesting read. Thanks, Jon (assuming you'll see this eventually).

 

[Wookie]

An interesting read. Thanks, Jon (assuming you'll see this eventually).

Considering he is on his honeymoon?

 

[wnissen]

No small irony that the ads on the page are plugging equipment on the basis of a 245 m / 800 ft. dive. It's true, everyone's first question is "how deep have you gone?" But the pursuit of depth for depth's sake is so frequently lethal.

 

[Jack Hammer]

@kierentec
Jon, Thank You for being so honest and open to write such a GREAT article!

 

[drrich2]

It was an impressive, very frank and open article with important philosophical issues. IIRC, earlier in this thread, there was criticism about people around the deceased basically feeding into his ambition, and how once 'group think' sets in, people in the group who think the goal is a bad idea may remain silent to avoid conflict. I think the idea people in a potential support role (e.g.: dive shops, instructors, family and friends) who try to avoid feeding into excessive risk taking is a good one and many of us would approve.

But how far does that go? This statement from the article sums it up nicely - "So where do we go from here, knowing that these reckless boundary pushing personalities will always exist?"

Not everyone wants to carefully advance at a slow, studious pace and stay within mainstream practice. Some want to set records. Whether that rises to the level of 'reckless' is sometimes a judgment call (in Dr. Deep's case, pretty clear judging from feedback from technical divers here).

He said "I absolutely should not have been qualified to teach Guy Garman technical diving." It's not clear to me what more was necessary to qualify himself, or what he'd have done differently. This next bit gets at what I'm concerned about:

"However since working with Guy, I’ve refused to issue certifications, withdrawn students from classes, and severed working and personal relationships when I see individuals unwilling to accept that the limits apply to everyone. It’s a tough discussion to make, but as instructors we need to try to guide students in a responsible way.

This doesn’t mean we need to condemn pushing the limits. Most of us are here because we want to discover what we are really capable of. But mentoring divers to show them what limits can reasonably be pushed, and which ones (like depth records) simply cannot, is important.

Pushing a boundary should really only be tolerated if there is something to learn or discover, in other words, if it’s a risk worth taking. Otherwise we’re just apes beating our chests."

If I read between the lines correctly here, he's proposing technical instructors assess the personality and mindset of students and potential students, not only to intervene and give wise counsel to dangerous poor judgment, but at times deny training to people based on a subjective impression they might decide to take risks later (not in the course) the instructor doesn't agree with. I get the argument to avoid putting dangerous knowledge and certifications into the hands of obvious reckless fools, but how far does that go?

He claims boundary pushing should really only be 'tolerated' (interesting word choice; it implies others decide whether one's allowed to do it) if there's something to learn or discover, implying it's otherwise not a risk worth taking. What about people who consider setting a world record valuable and worth the risk?

A number of technical instructors are ScubaBoard members; anyone care to comment on how much you 'police' your student's ambitions? If someone demonstrates proper skills, knowledge and conduct in the course, and does nothing wrong yet seems to be overly ambitious or a bit grandiose about their potential, do you deny a technical certification?

 

[KevinNM]

I took a course from a well-known instructor and my instructor and and another were discussing a student who seemed to have a lot of “bad luck”. Like accidentally going diving without their rebreather having any sorb installed, then luckily being found and rescued when they passed out under water. Basically ‘how can I keep this person from killing themselves?’

 

[PirateFoxy]

It was an impressive, very frank and open article with important philosophical issues. IIRC, earlier in this thread, there was criticism about people around the deceased basically feeding into his ambition, and how once 'group think' sets in, people in the group who think the goal is a bad idea may remain silent to avoid conflict. I think the idea people in a potential support role (e.g.: dive shops, instructors, family and friends) who try to avoid feeding into excessive risk taking is a good one and many of us would approve.

But how far does that go? This statement from the article sums it up nicely - "So where do we go from here, knowing that these reckless boundary pushing personalities will always exist?"

Not everyone wants to carefully advance at a slow, studious pace and stay within mainstream practice. Some want to set records. Whether that rises to the level of 'reckless' is sometimes a judgment call (in Dr. Deep's case, pretty clear judging from feedback from technical divers here).

He said "I absolutely should not have been qualified to teach Guy Garman technical diving." It's not clear to me what more was necessary to qualify himself, or what he'd have done differently. This next bit gets at what I'm concerned about:

"However since working with Guy, I’ve refused to issue certifications, withdrawn students from classes, and severed working and personal relationships when I see individuals unwilling to accept that the limits apply to everyone. It’s a tough discussion to make, but as instructors we need to try to guide students in a responsible way.

This doesn’t mean we need to condemn pushing the limits. Most of us are here because we want to discover what we are really capable of. But mentoring divers to show them what limits can reasonably be pushed, and which ones (like depth records) simply cannot, is important.

Pushing a boundary should really only be tolerated if there is something to learn or discover, in other words, if it’s a risk worth taking. Otherwise we’re just apes beating our chests."

If I read between the lines correctly here, he's proposing technical instructors assess the personality and mindset of students and potential students, not only to intervene and give wise counsel to dangerous poor judgment, but at times deny training to people based on a subjective impression they might decide to take risks later (not in the course) the instructor doesn't agree with. I get the argument to avoid putting dangerous knowledge and certifications into the hands of obvious reckless fools, but how far does that go?

He claims boundary pushing should really only be 'tolerated' (interesting word choice; it implies others decide whether one's allowed to do it) if there's something to learn or discover, implying it's otherwise not a risk worth taking. What about people who consider setting a world record valuable and worth the risk?

A number of technical instructors are ScubaBoard members; anyone care to comment on how much you 'police' your student's ambitions? If someone demonstrates proper skills, knowledge and conduct in the course, and does nothing wrong yet seems to be overly ambitious or a bit grandiose about their potential, do you deny a technical certification?

It seems to me that what most people can do, really, is decide if they personally are going to participate in the person's risk-taking behavior. They are not obligated to do so. He is just reminding instructors that they are also not obligated to do so, and to think about where that line is for them personally.

In terms of the psychology of it, someone taking a risk and getting seriously harmed or dying after you've trained or assisted them in getting to where they could take that risk is not actually harmless for the instructor/dive shop owner/whomever - it's quite normal for people to feel guilty and somewhat responsible. As such, it's quite reasonable imo for someone to say "Look, you do you, but I am not putting myself in the position where *I* feel like I contributed to this activity, I need to protect my own mental health."

Odds are pretty good that unless something is so stupid that literally no one should be doing it at all because it's simply impossible, there will be someone out there who can be convinced it's worth doing. But an instructor (or dive shop owner, or whomever) can decide that the someone is not them.

 

[Germie]

Interesting to read. Judging instructors is done everywhere. For example the question, why did you teach flying to the people who flew in the world trade center? But normally you don't know the plans of your students. You can ask of course. But do you get all answers? But is it wrong if a student tells that he wants to do deep diving? And what if the answer is: I don't know yet. Do you refuse?

In diving, if you do all courses with the same instructor it is because that instructor is easy. If you take every course with another instructor it is because the instructor before did not found you good enough to proceed. So as a diver or student, you always do it wrong.

I think it is quite hard to find out all the reasons why a student wants to take a course. And even if the reason is 'legal' when he or she took it, it can be that the diver changes in the future.

For example, I was interested in technical diving during my ow course. So was I then a bad diver? I don't think so. But because of the opinions or complaints of other divers when I did night dives to 24m depth as open water diver, I decided to hurry up my certs, so that nobody could ever complaign again about doing something outside a certification limit.
This meant I had to do adv. nitrox, normoxic trimix and full trimix. And yes I did. Not fast in amounts of dives, but fast in time. Dive 521 was my first 100m dive, 103m exactly. It was just 2 years after my open water course.

I did a full cave class just because to have all the tech certs 'complete'. To have no limits anymore. Is that a wrong argument? I never did expect that I would became cave instructor myself. If you had asked me about my motivation for signing up the 'zero to hero' full cave class with a 1 week duration, I would have answered: I don't know but I want to have the option in future to dive caves and to complete the list of tech certs. So was that a wrong argument? And nice to know maybe: dive 390 was my certifying dive.

I did a full trimix course not only to complete the row of deep certs, but deep in my head I had the wish to ever dive in future 100m. It felt like I have to complete something in diving. It was a magic number. That must be done once in my life. But when I signed up for this class I just said I don't know what I want to do with the cert, but I only want to have the option to visit wrecks deeper than 60m. I did not tell about my future 100m plans. Would I have been refused if I told my real reason?

I have done now 'quite' a lot of dives over 100m. But there must be something to see if I go that deep. I don't have any need to go to 200m. My deepest now was 135m, but for me there is no need to get a deeper number on a computer. Just if there is a reason I will go.

Becoming an instructor was never high on my list, I just wanted to dive without limitations. But now I am instructor and yes, sometimes you grow away from students because you and students interests change. Is that wrong? I don't think so. So what I read about Guy who wanted deeper and the instructor not, this happens.
It is not a fail for the instructor, you cannot blame yourself.
You can ask yourself what a wrong argument of taking a course is, but a student can lie and not tell his real reason to do something. I think you can make a list for yourself to say yes or no. But you cannot know everything, so things will happen that you do not like that much. You only can step away. I have done that also in a few times.

 

[Lorenzoid]

I did a full cave class just because to have all the tech certs 'complete'. To have no limits anymore. Is that a wrong argument?

Completing Full Cave did not mean that you no longer had limits. As I see it, completing Full Cave meant your instructor judged that you were now mature enough in your cave training to set your own limits.

 

[Germie]

Completing Full Cave did not mean that you no longer had limits. As I see it, completing Full Cave meant your instructor judged that you were now mature enough in your cave training to set your own limits.

True. You are free to set your own limits, but it is not done by a cert anymore. That is what I mean.