Have training standards "slipped"?

[The Chairman]

You've made no case, you've made a claim with no support,

There is a new phenomenon and it's called Nitrogen Narcosis. Your bovine index increases exponentially with your depth. When you hit 130 fsw you have the reasoning abilities of a cow. Even cows have enough sense to not dive this deeply on air.

 

[underwasser bolt]

But seriously, what does the current discussion have to do with slipping standards??

Certification Smurftification, anyone with a C-card can get gear and dive to about any standard, or substandard, they want to. Some charters may check, others will certainly not. It is an honor system at some point: dive to your ability. Just don't take anyone else with you.

 

[jeckyll]

Really though, I don't understand why anyone would want to dive air below 100 fsw. Personally, I've had varying experiences up to 110 and I've never gone deeper on air. Never plan to either. *shrug*

A good buddy of mine dove when air was all there was and has plenty of deep air experience and air deco as well. Even he has days where he's not good at 100 fsw. But hey, if someone has the stats to prove deep air is safe, we better educate all the folks wasting money on He

 

[Mako Mark]

Nicole,

Buddy breathing as you havedescribed it has been an optional skill for many years, many instructors believe it to be redundant in the fact that we all dive with alternate air sources now, so sharing a single mouthpiece is unessecary. In some places like Australia, it is illegal to teach it.

 

[Thalassamania]

What agency is that, specifically?

Again, this seems to be reenforcing the idea that we've moved away from "one hard to get certification for ALL diving" to a graded set of certifications designed to allow a reasonable progression in diving envelope as skills are progressively demonstrated.

Based on Thalassaminia's post, that seems to be the extreme case. You can't go below 30 ft with the most basic cert, as opposed to yesteryear's one big cert - go dive however you like.

Again, this seems to be a case of standards changing, not slipping.

Yes, we are out at one extreme. These are the standards developed at Scripps in the early 1950s that have been the backbone of university diving programs and that now form the basis of the guidelines promulgated by the AAUS. All of the recreational diving agencies can trace their standards to these standards, and the history of recreational diving can be described as one of continuous standard slipage. Most of us who've been around long enough to see it will agree to that.

These standards were the Alpha of diving, pre-dating military and recreational use of OCS and today seems to be the Omega when it comes to minimizing diving risk.

 

[The Chairman]

But seriously, what does the current discussion have to do with slipping standards??

It's proof that SOME agencies evolve their standards to EXCLUDE dangerous protocols. I would hasten to add that our understanding and application of bubble models has also advanced. Computers have aided our ability and our enjoyment of our diving.

 

[bookboarder]

Nicole,

Buddy breathing as you havedescribed it has been an optional skill for many years, many instructors believe it to be redundant in the fact that we all dive with alternate air sources now, so sharing a single mouthpiece is unessecary. In some places like Australia, it is illegal to teach it.

Ok... I see... I think. (Not being snarky, but still kind of curious as to why the descrepencies... But, I supposed that I shall remain in the dark on that... ) My buddy and I are able to do it, although, obviously, we'd use our octo first, if we had to, we could do buddy breathing.

 

[under water]

I'm quite curious as I was just certified last year. We did do emergency swimming ascent, buddy breathing (i.e. share one reg and pass back and forth), mask pulled off of face, take off all gear and replace it, and take off weights and replace all under water. We had to tread water for 10 minutes, and swim 100 yds.

Is that not the norm?

Hi Nicole, Were you trained by NAUI? Your experience was similar to mine whch was NAUI. I am not aware of what the differences might be in PADI or others.

 

[DivingsInMyBlood]

I'm no expert on any of this but it does seem like the whole back in my day when men were men and when we went to school we walked up hill both ways in the snow kinda thing. Just seems like the times have changed to make diving alot safer to do.

 

[jeckyll]

Do a search. I believe Walter produced a rather comprehensive skills comparison some time ago. Last year? Year before. I don't recall. Sorry

Bjorn