Old time scuba divers

[OnTheMark]

I was originally certified in 1987 in college. I dove some but got married the next year and my wife had zero interest (actually afraid to go underwater) in scuba. Years later (2020) I got recertified with my two, now, adult sons. Now in 2020 when I got certified it was to a maximum depth of 60 ft. To go beyond that you need advanced training. However, in 1987, I am almost certain that we were trained to go deeper. I remember learning about decompression tables as well as safety stops. Unfortunately, I cannot find my old scuba book. Was anyone been certified that long ago? Was deep diving training part of your certification? Is advance training for deep dives something that has come along in the past years or an I just misremembering? In 1987 I was certified under IDEA; in 2020 under PADI in case it is agency related.

 

[Eric802]

I was originally certified in 1988 through PADI. I believe it was 60ft then as well for open water. Deep “training” came with advanced open water, although the training really just amounted to learning a little about narcosis and doing some math on a slate during the dive (I think mine was to 85ft in a quarry).

 

[lexvil]

1971, NASDS, no limits that I recall

 

[rhwestfall]

YMCA - 1988. Recreational limits taught how to dive with limits being the tables with 130' maximum (Instruction was based on Navy Tables). Learned how to plan decompression dives....

 

[lowwall]

The certification limit for an open water diver was and is the recreational limit of 130' (at one time it was 140'). The 60' limit is only for the open water training dives.

However, you are encouraged to work your way to greater depths through some combination of experience and additional training.

That said, many dive operators place their own limits. The strictest tend to be 60' for OW and 100' for AOW.

FWIW, my first post-certification dive, with my instructor as the DM, was to 116'. This was in '01.

 

[BoltSnap]

1984 with NAUI. No required Deco diving but used US Navy tables. Max depth limit was 60ft for entry level then as it is now. More depth with more advanced training.


NOTE: I am saying that I am an old timer!!! I just was born too soon for my youngness!!!

 

[Trace Malinowski]

I was trained by PDIC in 1982. We used the Jeppesen manual and the Dacor version of the US Navy tables. We learned to plan dives to 190 feet because the tables and the manual had information for that depth. In the PDIC instructor manual (I became an instructor in 1989), standards for training limited us to 60 feet for the open water course and 130 feet for advanced open water. An open water diver was off the leash after the course and could dive an oxygen rebreather or dive to 400 feet on air right after class if he desired. Diver magazine in Canada contained an editorial in 1982 telling divers the benefits of getting a C-card. Many of the old salts never even had a C-card. I convinced Stan Waterman's wife's cousin and their broker, Mott Peck, to get a C-card through our dive shop. He had been diving with Stan for years and ran into a problem around 1989 in the islands because he didn't have a C-card. I met him when I was a lifeguard at my college pool. Mott had a swim membership. He saw me wearing a scuba t-shirt and asked if I ever had heard of Stan Waterman. "You mean the famous underwater photographer and cinematographer?" Mott and I often talked about diving. I finally coaxed him to enroll in a class after he had already been a diver for a couple of decades. He just produced a logbook without a C-card. Look at us now, huh? We even get a card for using a marine head as part of a boat diving specialty or as part of my underwater habitat specialty training course in Jules' Undersea Lodge.

 

[jonhall]

+1 to @lowwall 's comments. In PADI materials, you can't find where it states, you shall not go deeper than 60' if you are only an OW certified diver (at least I've never seen it,) yet many other non-PADI websites seem to interpret it that way.

As a vacation diver (not the type that specifically plans dive vacations,) my experience when I started diving (certified in '98, but didn't really start diving until 2005) and still true today, is that my type of diving is dependent on where you go to dive and the type of dive certification is not so relevant. I've been fortunate enough to go to some Caribbean islands - if a well known dive site is a wreck sitting on the bottom at 100', there's a good chance a dive op will take you to it. For boat diving in places like Cozumel and Grand Cayman, unless someone is requesting otherwise, the dive op will generally take you on a deep dive followed by a shallower dive, regardless of your certification and regardless if you have only 20 dives under your belt or if you have 500. Other places may only have shallower depths, so that's all that's available.

In my first 50 dives, ~25 were below 60' - 10 of those were 90-103'. My buddy, who at the time had a PADI Scuba Diver certification from a 1978 YMCA course, did 17 of those dives with me - he should have only been able to go to 40'! Someone finally recognized what his c-card was when we decided to get AOW in 2016. Fortunately things worked out but he had to officially get OW certified before he could get AOW certified.

 

[ROUS]

Certified under NASDS in 81. The only limit discussed was the general limit of 100' for sport divers. Matter of fact, I believe my instructor took us nearly that deep during our last OW dive. (Under those thermoclines, it was cold down there.)

 

[Belzelbub]

I was originally certified in 1987 in college. I dove some but got married the next year and my wife had zero interest (actually afraid to go underwater) in scuba. Years later (2020) I got recertified with my two, now, adult sons. Now in 2020 when I got certified it was to a maximum depth of 60 ft. To go beyond that you need advanced training. However, in 1987, I am almost certain that we were trained to go deeper. I remember learning about decompression tables as well as safety stops. Unfortunately, I cannot find my old scuba book. Was anyone been certified that long ago? Was deep diving training part of your certification? Is advance training for deep dives something that has come along in the past years or an I just misremembering? In 1987 I was certified under IDEA; in 2020 under PADI in case it is agency related.

I was originally certified through PADI in 1990, and again by YMCA in 1997.

The 60' "rule" is cause for some debate on this site. What seems pretty clear is that currently the max depth of the checkout dives does not exceed 60'. Deeper depths are generally not done in OW, but saved for AOW or Deep specialties.

My recollection from both my earlier OW courses is the same as yours. I don't recall any reference to 60'. When my children got certified in 2015 and 2018, there was mention of the 60' limit, as well as their Jr. OW limit which was 40' (or 45').

In most areas, there are no Scuba police. So, you can theoretically dive as deep as you are comfortable. What you will find, though is that many operators want to see AOW as a minimum for some dive sites. Their operation, so you've got to follow their rules.