One small card, one big step...

[leam]

Okay, so getting an AOW C card really isn't a big deal in the grand scheme of things. It's not even that big in the scuba world, given the zillions of people who are AOW or higher. Some PSD teams even require AOW as the minimal for operational readiness.

Which is exactly the point. Mel (Suthnbelle), Bob, and I have been doing a lot of training with our team. We started in Feburary/March time frame and already have more training events under our weightbelts than most of the old timers. Until today it was all training as we didn't have the AOW required to perfom a mission. Now we do.

Though we took a PADI class our instructor is also a PSD for a different team. I feel he did it for the humor value, between a couple of us doing our navigation in a very straight line going exactly the wrong direction to me plummeting to the max depth at high speed. Mel said I looked like Tom Cruise in "Mission Impossible". My theory is that since I'm more at home in the muck at the bottom might as well get there and get going. :14:

Bob and I were talking on the drive home and while we congratulated each other on our success we also started talking about things we need to practice and get better at. Long list but we're comitted to it.

ciao!

leam

 

[Gary D.]

Good job.

We don’t require AOW in-fact I prefer to get non-divers on line. If a candidate is already certified with a very open mind OK, but it’s much better for us to teach from scratch than convert from the sport mindset to PSD.

We have three getting certified in a few weeks. There will be four in the class and that fourth person either has to be a department member of afflicted with another department so we can do the training we need done from the very start.

They will basically get OW, AOW and a few other specialty courses all rolled into one geared towards PSD and not sport. Once they are through that and get their OW we get them.

I go and watch the in water training. I don’t get involved with the classes but just watch to see who is strong or weak in what areas. That way we know what to work on later. It normally results in some stronger students.

That list you and Bob were talking about may never get shorter. It seems like the more years you do this the longer the list gets. That's one reason training is so very important.

Gary D.