Bingo.
Is horizontal position really better?
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David Novo
Contributor
Not much has changed since early 2000 or may be even earlier on the topic.
Agency couldn't careless.
What is your own experience on other divers over your side?
As I had mentioned already it is very rare to see divers diving horizontally in SE Asia. What is happening?
Some of you can keep preaching the superiority of the technique but there is very few listeners. Keeping trying.
Guille G
Contributor
I assume your were smacked twice for redundancy. Or is the tsk-tsk considered a sufficiently redundant corrective measure?
@boulderjohn and co published this article over ten years ago: http://utahscubadiver.com/wp-content/uploads/USJ2Q11.pdf
With the exception of RAID, the WRSTC agencies (including ones for which I'm a member) in general haven't evolved much. DAN in their 2016 report stated (Introduction - DAN Annual Diving Report 2016 Edition - NCBI Bookshelf):
- Ten Most Wanted Improvements in Scuba
- Correct Weighting
- Greater Buoyancy Control
- More Attention to Gas Planning
- Better Ascent Rate Control
- Increased Use of Checklists
- Fewer Equalizing Injuries
- Improved Cardiovascular Health in Divers
- Diving More Often (or more pre-trip Refresher Training)
- Greater Attention to Diving Within Limits
- Fewer Equipment Issues / Improved Maintenance
I underlined the 3 underlined items are all tightly coupled and start with proper weighting (which should include distribution of weight). However, other than RAID.
Now I had a number of key people help me to teach neutrally buoyant and trimmed. To pay it forward, I wrote this blog series:
Teaching Neutrally Buoyant and Trimmed -
A hot topic among instructors in the industry is whether or not students should be taught their Open Water Course on their knees or hovering nuetrally buoyant. We have written several articles on this very topic in the past, but now one of our members is taking a turn and explaining his...
www.tdisdi.com
Teaching Neutrally Buoyant and Trimmed: Pt2 - Mask, Snorkel & Fin Skills -
What if mask skills weren’t new to your students when taking them underwater for the first time? Have you ever thought about teaching finning with just a mask and snorkel? Learn how you can teach mask and skills to your students in chest deep water before putting them in scuba gear with just a...
www.tdisdi.com
Teaching Neutrally Buoyant and Trimmed: How to weight properly, Part 3 -
We’re back with part two of our teaching neutrally buoyant series! This month’s article breaks down the reasons overweighting students is harmful and what to do instead. Kosta shares a mathematical formula he developed for getting a student’s base weight right before they even get into the water.
www.tdisdi.com
But then the following blog entry was posted:
Neutral Buoyancy—Let’s Get Real! - International Training - SDI | TDI | ERDI | PFI
Have you fallen into the neutral buoyancy debate? Or worse, have you been victim to the internet trolls who patrol the internet for photos and videos of divers doing something “wrong.” In this article we have Jeff Bozanic here to explain why it’s actually helpful and sometimes carries less risk.
www.tdisdi.com
Now it could be coincidence or was directed at my posts. Doesn't matter. Jeff Bozanic is one of the biggest names in the dive industry. He did write the bible on rebreathers. That's a name that people will listen to much more than say me. I'm no one in the dive industry. I am fully aware of this. But his blog post is detrimental towards getting divers off the bottom. I don't know Jeff personally, otherwise I'd have asked him what the F he was thinking when he wrote that.
Argumentum ad absurdum alert: no one said that touching the bottom is a crime that should be punishable by death a la Spanish Inquisition. But shouldn't we as an industry move in a direction that DAN recommends? We want to avoid touching the bottom in order to protect environmentally sensitive habitats. We will NEVER eliminate all of them, but we can reduce them. And we can make divers safer.
Now I hope people will evaluate the ideas being presented and ignore the people saying them (as must admit that I've gotten myself embroiled in way too many stupid bicker fests).
With sufficient instructor skill, it isn't hard to teach neutrally buoyant and trimmed. We as an industry could be doing far better.
Now many may dismiss as what I will now say as simple cynicism. The reality is dive instruction is a business. It is my perception that most instructors cannot teach neutral buoyancy and trim. Those instructors pay dues. They certify students. They generate most of the income for agencies.
What agency is going to kill their cash cows by requiring improved training? While I think RAID leads the pack with requiring skills to be performed neutrally buoyant and by giving guidelines on instructors on how to teach (which regular divers and instructors from other agencies should read), I don't know what it will take for other agencies to evolve in that direction.
I simply have no idea on how to achieve that while not disrupting agency revenue.
This is an issue that will never die. I'm pretty sure I will write pretty much the same thing every few years, as I've already done so in the past.
Agency could not careless.
I have to travel to dive and not aware that the knowledge/skill/technique have improved over last 20 odd yrs. Actually I will say the opposite: getting worst!
Instructor is the main culprit, followed close second by the operator.
To be clear, students learn only what an instructor or mentor teaches and practices. Change the instructors' outlook and you've changed diving.
They were never taught.
Who specifically? You're hating a bogeyman in my opinion. A mythical creature you think hated you first. GI3 influenced DIR divers are about the closest you could come to that, but even they never held to never breaking horizontal. You're tilting at windmills as far as I can tell.
MichaelMc
Working toward Cenotes
There is some element of not discouraging new divers. BUT, "Don't kick up the bottom and destroy it for others" seems very similar to "Don't litter in the parks and destroy them for others". When litter is expanded to "permanently destroy things as you go past."
I think few visiting our local or national parks would defend their right to trash the place or would criticize signs saying "don't litter" as elitist. Well, few except the most self centered who do not give a **** about others.
I agree it is not taught and likely many teachers currently do not do it themselves. And I think "It's fine to be an underwater rototiller, as long as you orient your legs over sand while you look at the rest of the reef" isn't a viable method.
I think few visiting our local or national parks would defend their right to trash the place or would criticize signs saying "don't litter" as elitist. Well, few except the most self centered who do not give a **** about others.
I agree it is not taught and likely many teachers currently do not do it themselves. And I think "It's fine to be an underwater rototiller, as long as you orient your legs over sand while you look at the rest of the reef" isn't a viable method.
1. Far too many students are still taught all skills while kneeling and fully upright.
2. Far too many of the instructors who teach that way to not spend much time at all with students actually swimming while neutrally buoyant, either in the pool or in the OW--the focus is just on the kneeling skills. Once the skills are done, the class is over.
3. In order to teach students on their knees, the students must be significantly overweighted, or they will bounce around, tip over, etc.
4. Trim weights are rarely used, so all that overweighting is on the hips.
5. The overwighted divers need significant air to become neutral. With jacket BCDs, that will be on the upper body.
Summary: Students were taught to dive in an upright position, and when diving overweighted with weight on the hips and compensating buoyancy on the upper part of the body, the diver will naturally be in a legs down position.
I do not believe any agency advocates any of that, but that is what is happening as a natural consequence of focusing OW instruction on teaching basic skills on the knees.
Instructor would not be able to change much if it is not required in the syllabus. And they would not have the time to introduce the technique let alone fine tuning it. If the instructor could not adjust the buoyancy of the student accurately there is no chance to dive horizontally. All of these require time and cannot be done in 3-4 days.
No body specifically.
It is beyond "over zealous" for some of them and they do not need to drink Kool-Aid.
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