Is 130 ft too deep?

[HammerNoMore]

I think we can dispense with the personal attacks in this thread. If you can't make your point without insulting others then go play somwhere else.

James

 

[dweeb]

So when you teach open water divers and you take all those eager beavers in the deep blue sea for the first time they are all able to survive the dive without help and they understand gas and decompression planning?

Based on my discussions with Mike about his instructional approach, I'd say yes.

Eventually we all encounter some level of "trust me" dives.

Sure, the one weekend wonder divers do it in their OW dives, but not all of us choose training on the basis of what is quickest and easiest. It's entirely doable to prepare a student to make their OW dives without the instructor being anything more than an observer.

 

[dweeb]

But have some respect for the guys that have been there.

Why? Having been there, and $4, will buy you a cup of Starbuck's finest.

I've been diving since that phrase had meaning using the figure of 25 cents. Doesn't mean anyone's cut me any slack, and I doesn't mean I expect them to.

 

[dweeb]

I'm sorry just had to toss that in. It just chaps my hide to see a newby crackin' on a vet.

Why? Tenure doesn't make him right.
If Boogie's remarks about taking inadequate bailout gas
are, as I suspect, based on Curt's own admission in this
forum, then it definitely doesn't make him right.

Look, how long someone's been at it is not a valid support for their assertions. Nothing Curt's offered so far constitute a sound basis for his assertion that "trust Curt" dives, let alone any "trust me" dives are prudent.

However, his assertion that it's OK to make dives you are not PREPARED AND TRAINED for, just because he's at your side, seem a very good reason to question his judgment in this matter. why not just elminate the whole OW class, and just take anyone off the street diving, with max depth a function of their guide's years of experience?

 

[wedivebc]

That wasn't Mike ... it was Boogie ...

http://scubaboard.com/showpost.php?p=655694&postcount=3

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Thanks Bob

and thank you Boogie

 

[GreenDiverDown]

Why? Tenure doesn't make him right....Look, how long someone's been at it is not a valid support for their assertions.

No...TENURE doesn't make him right... Never said it did...wouldn't be prudent!

When the cardiovascular surgeon is discussing a proceedure with his patient and the student/intern disagrees, then he/she should THINK TWICE about HOW to voice that disagreement or whether or not it is wise to speak at all. If the student speaks up, then the patient would be wise to consider who is speaking. It's one thing to have knowledge and training...it's another thing to have expertise. Maybe not the perfect analogy...but I'm hoping that you'll get where I'm drifting.

For the same reasons that you and Boogie have mentioned, I would advise against this dive and I personally wouldn't take her that deep on a trust me dive... but I don't pretend to have Curt's expertise. Would I go with him to 130? In a heart beat. 160? Maybe...

Stephen

 

[Daryl Morse]

Diving is a progressive sport and you will not learn from those who do not know more than you.

While this can be said of any sport, I think diving is a pretty special case. As a newbie, I'm currently logging dives that are organized by the LDS. Given the choice, I'll always buddy with a more experienced diver. I appreciate every chance I get to do so, because it affords me an opportunity to learn. At this point, it's a pretty one-sided exchange, but everyone I've dived with said they'd dive with me again.

I try to learn something new or at least improve on what I already know I should be doing every time I dive. I want to learn new skills and I'd prefer to do so from the example of more experienced divers. I'm in no big hurry to dive deeper than my AOW Deep Dive (95 fsw), but at some point, I will and when I do, it will be with someone I trust who's been there before, not someone who's doing it for the first time.

Curt, given the opportunity and the right circumstances, I'd dive down to 130 fsw with you anytime.

 

[dweeb]

When the cardiovascular surgeon is discussing a proceedure with his patient and the student/intern disagrees, then he/she should THINK TWICE about HOW to voice that disagreement or whether or not it is wise to speak at all.

This is more akin to the surgeon and one of his interns discussing a proposed NEW procedure in a seminar setting or even over a couple beers at the bar near the hospital.

Also, when he says he'd gladly take an unprepared novice to 160, that's like the surgeon saying "and then we'll apply a neck tourniquet." The standards of the various agencies, which place his proposed ultra deep experience in the ultra-bad category, were not exactly promulgated by babes in the woods.

For the same reasons that you and Boogie have mentioned, I would advise against this dive and I personally wouldn't take her that deep on a trust me dive... but I don't pretend to have Curt's expertise. Would I go with him to 130? In a heart beat. 160? Maybe...

Right up until he started swaggering and boasting he'd take a novice to 160, I'd have gone with him to 130 in a hearbeat, too, but then I'd go there without him, as well.
I wouldn't go with him to 160 unless I was also willing to go without him.

The real question you want to be asking yourself is, would you be willing to take a 30 dive novice, who doesn't understand how to plan air consumption, and who uses an online forum as a primary source in a field of study where she hasn't yet learned enough to know what she has to learn, to 160 fsw? I don't know about you, but I've worked too hard for the assets I have to risk them that way. Now, maybe he's just indigent, and thus unrecoverable (after all, he's still putting in 60 hours a week in the dive industry after 20+ years) but then we get to questions about an ethical sense of responsibility beyond civil liability, and that's something you should seriously examine in someone you MIGHT let take you to 160 without the requisite training and experience.

 

[MikeFerrara]

Yes, I have a complete different opinion about trust me dives and training dives.

How does that idea jive with the standards of the agency(ies) through which you are certified as an instructor?

I would take that girl down to 160 feet, if she wanted me to. And it would be a complete trust me dive.

Personally I have no doubt that you are skilled enough to take her to 160 with you doing the diving for both of you. However, I think you mentioned that you were an IANTD instructor and I'm too lazy to check right now but if so per IANTD standards...

Before you could take her to 160 you'd first have to get her through the Advanced Nitrox and Deep diver course, experience pre-reqs (I don't remember what they are exactly but we could look them up easy enough) and all the confined water and shallow water skills work for the tecnical diver class.

Once she met all those requirements you could take her to 160. Of course by then there's a pretty good chance that she could take you to 160. LOL

I'm not misunderstanding IANTD standards am I?

I also feel I need to repectfully point out that encouraging one to engage in technical diving without proper training is in violation of the Scubaboard TOS. Offering to take her to 160 or suggesting that it would be wise for her to do such a dive, even with some one of your reputation, makes it sound like you're doing just that.

 

[GreenDiverDown]

This is more akin to the surgeon and one of his interns discussing a proposed NEW procedure in a seminar setting or even over a couple beers at the bar near the hospital.

Yah...that's better...but what I said still applies...even in your setting.