PADI Deep Diver Standards

[h90]

Actually, this brings up an interesting question. What is your risk tolerance? All diving is about risk management and risk tolerance to acheive a goal - usually sightseeing underwater.

Which would you rather be, the diver in a single tank with your average rec dive buddy hanging out at 100' or a diver with entry/pre-tec training (Advanced Nitrox, rec trimix etc) who is diving redundant gear and is capable of primary self rescue?

Me, I don't like diving much without any redundancy at any depth but that's more to do with equipment familiarity than a real need. In a purely OW case, anything below 60-80 is definitely in gear with redundancy. Of course, I don't like taking needless risks and I see diving to 100' without a redundant airsource a needless risk.

For the course, I took IANTD Deep and Advanced Nitrox. All rec depths (130ft max) and still 'sport' diver. If well taught, it covers what you ought to know to dive to these depths.

To be a little bit provocative......
for 100 feet and without deco stop I see a normal gear as close to 100 % safe.
I never heared that you can't get any air anymore, a failure always (or almost always) results in freeflow of air and at 100 feet and planning the dive with 50 bar still in the tank when you come back you can't die from a failure of the gear.
If entangled in something down, a buddy is a good help.
If your body has a problem (unconscious for example) your redundant equipment won't help you.

 

[MikeFerrara]

To be a little bit provocative......
for 100 feet and without deco stop I see a normal gear as close to 100 % safe.
I never heared that you can't get any air anymore, a failure always (or almost always) results in freeflow of air and at 100 feet and planning the dive with 50 bar still in the tank when you come back you can't die from a failure of the gear.
If entangled in something down, a buddy is a good help.
If your body has a problem (unconscious for example) your redundant equipment won't help you.

Equipment isn't the only issue.

I dived wrecks in the 100 ft range in the Great Lakes and on the east coast with a single tank and only recreational training. I didn't enjoy it much and never strayed far from the down line. I saw lots of divers come scurying back real low on gas or out.

I knew something wasn't right but I wasn't sure what until I had a lot more training, experience and even equipment.

I don't generally go anywhere near 100 ft with a single tank and a single output valve. Oh, I should be able to survive a free flow at 100 ft on a single 80 and no redundancy but it will be a lot easier with more margin if I have my double 104's

I wouldn't bother planning a 130 ft dive as a no stop dive. The bottom time is just too short to bother with and the gas margins are just too slim. I'd rather dive that same 130 ft wreck with plenty of gas and time (margin) and make a good 30 or 40 minute dive of it.

No matter how you do it you stand a good chance of living through it but I've found that I enjoy it more the way I do it.

My single tank/single output valve diving is all pretty shallow. Mostly above 80 ft and shallower yet in cold water.

 

[Thalassamania]

Anything deeper than about 100 is a technical dive IMO. I would recommend at least a recreational triox course.

As one who was an editor of aquaCorps Magazine I was witness to the birth of the term, so I feel competent to comment on this. The original concept of “Technical Diving” came from “Technical Climbing.” The idea was that at the point you become equipment dependent rather than skill dependent for your survival it became a “technical” dive and needed to be approached differently. Clearly this involves two potentials: a ceiling or being too deep to get to the surface with a free ascent. So (at least in the begining) a "technical dive" had little or nothing to do with the depth, duration of the dive, or breathing media per se, except as that impacted on decompression or conducting an ESE.

For me a quick bounce to 150 is not a technical dive, but a task that takes 70 minutes at 60 feet is. For someone else a dive to 30 feet might be viewed as a technical dive; but all dives with either a hard or virtual ceiling should also be seen that way.

Hummm .... every single training agency and the US Navy disagree.

I wasn’t aware that Navy had a definition of Technical Diving, especially since they switch to a hose at 130.

Its not that you need the tech classes to dive more than 100ft. What it will do for you is give you that more understanding of what to do if you have a problem when you are that deep and end up in deco.
Did I say that correctly?

That’s a really good point and not one that was ever well addressed. Dives can start off recreational and turn technical in the blink of an eye as a result of some problem or other, requiring the diver to change gears ... right now! If there is no second gear, or it the diver is slow to recogninze the problem, or if the diver is slow to switch conceptual gears … there can be big trouble. This is a strong argument for the GUE approach, were a diver never faces this issue, since he or she starts out in a technical mode and frame of mind on even the most trivial dive or the research community's approach of enhanced skills with strong emphasis on planning, buddy diving, ESE training and practice, finely tuned situational awareness, etc. combined with rather rigid oversight by senior personnel. Both approaches work (I will point out the science approach has resulted in an exemplary safety record over the last 55 years). I suspect that the GUE approach is better suited to the general public.

Don't get too caught up on the exact definition of technical diving. There is not a clear line between recreational and technical. At that depth, the no deco times are very low, and it is very easy to end up with a deco obligation. You should have the training for that. I know of at least one agency that requires helium mixtures for all dives below 100 feet, and most would consider helium a technical diving gas.

I’d argue that there is a clear line, but it’s not depth, time or gas … it’s a diver’s ability to reach the surface unaided by equipment.

Actually, this brings up an interesting question. What is your risk tolerance? All diving is about risk management and risk tolerance to achieve a goal - usually sightseeing underwater.

Which would you rather be, the diver in a single tank with your average rec dive buddy hanging out at 100' or a diver with entry/pre-tec training (Advanced Nitrox, rec trimix etc) who is diving redundant gear and is capable of primary self rescue?

I think you hit the nail on the head. There are, in my mind, two answers to this question, both involve being capable of primary self rescue one is diving redundant gear and the other is not diving redundant gear and relying on ones ability to perform an ESE. This is an easy question for me to answer at the extremes, 20 feet: ESE, 200 feet: tech gear. But at 100 feet, I need to weigh the additional problems of redundant gear (mainly logistics and encumbrance) against my own comfort making an ESE, titrated against the conditions (way different on a NE wreck vs the calm, clear tropics.

In a purely OW case, anything below 60-80 is definitely in gear with redundancy. Of course, I don't like taking needless risks and I see diving to 100' without a redundant air source a needless risk.

For the course, I took IANTD Deep and Advanced Nitrox. All rec depths (130ft max) and still 'sport' diver. If well taught, it covers what you ought to know to dive to these depths.

For you. Others will place limits deeper and others will place them shallower.

To be a little bit provocative......
for 100 feet and without deco stop I see a normal gear as close to 100 % safe.
I never heard that you can't get any air anymore, a failure always (or almost always) results in free flow of air and at 100 feet and planning the dive with 50 bar still in the tank when you come back you can't die from a failure of the gear.
If entangled in something down, a buddy is a good help.
If your body has a problem (unconscious for example) your redundant equipment won't help you.

This entire discussion does seem to forget that a buddy can (and in my book should) provide significant redundancy.

 

[h90]

Equipment isn't the only issue.

I dived wrecks in the 100 ft range in the Great Lakes and on the east coast with a single tank and only recreational training. I didn't enjoy it much and never strayed far from the down line. I saw lots of divers come scurying back real low on gas or out.

I knew something wasn't right but I wasn't sure what until I had a lot more training, experience and even equipment.

I don't generally go anywhere near 100 ft with a single tank and a single output valve. Oh, I should be able to survive a free flow at 100 ft on a single 80 and no redundancy but it will be a lot easier with more margin if I have my double 104's

I wouldn't bother planning a 130 ft dive as a no stop dive. The bottom time is just too short to bother with and the gas margins are just too slim. I'd rather dive that same 130 ft wreck with plenty of gas and time (margin) and make a good 30 or 40 minute dive of it.

No matter how you do it you stand a good chance of living through it but I've found that I enjoy it more the way I do it.

My single tank/single output valve diving is all pretty shallow. Mostly above 80 ft and shallower yet in cold water.

You mean diving the wrack outside not inside or?
If you dive the wrack outside and you come back out of gas or very low, than you made something very wrong....

Of course it is much more comfortable with more gas and better equipment but not more safe considering that you dive with the single tank/single output valve just within the limits of the equipment (or what PADI is theaching).

But yes there are unbelieveable many divers who don't check their gas till it is finished, but thats not an equipment problem, thats a brain problem and more gas will cause them bends because than they won't check the time/deep...

 

[in_cavediver]

To be a little bit provocative......
for 100 feet and without deco stop I see a normal gear as close to 100 % safe.
I never heared that you can't get any air anymore, a failure always (or almost always) results in freeflow of air and at 100 feet and planning the dive with 50 bar still in the tank when you come back you can't die from a failure of the gear.
If entangled in something down, a buddy is a good help.
If your body has a problem (unconscious for example) your redundant equipment won't help you.

I'll play a little devils advocate to the safe comment. Simply read this thread for a bit of detail about what normal gear and no deco can cause.

These divers may have thought the same as you do.

 

[h90]

I'll play a little devils advocate to the safe comment. Simply read this thread for a bit of detail about what normal gear and no deco can cause.

These divers may have thought the same as you do.

just found another argument against myself: broken hose (Octo or first stage) may drop the pressure so that you can't get air out of the first stage/octopus anymore.
Is that right? Than you have without redundant systems no air anymore, right?

 

[MikeFerrara]

You mean diving the wrack outside not inside or?
If you dive the wrack outside and you come back out of gas or very low, than you made something very wrong....

Wrong compared to what? What recreational course standards requires the teaching of gas managment?

Of course it is much more comfortable with more gas and better equipment but not more safe considering that you dive with the single tank/single output valve just within the limits of the equipment (or what PADI is theaching).

My idea of the limits of a single tank with no redundancy is quit a bit different than PADI's.

But yes there are unbelieveable many divers who don't check their gas till it is finished, but thats not an equipment problem, thats a brain problem and more gas will cause them bends because than they won't check the time/deep...

If you don't know how to plan gas useage and when to turn a dive, looking at the stupid thing is a waste of time. Most of the recreational agencies just don't teach you how to figure out when you should turn back. You don't need ANY gas back on the boat. You need enough to get back on the boat!

 

[h90]

Wrong compared to what? What recreational course standards requires the teaching of gas managment?

Well if you are at 100 ft out of air, than you are wrong compared to human sense as long as you won't win the darwin award.

If you don't know how to plan gas useage and when to turn a dive, looking at the stupid thing is a waste of time. Most of the recreational agencies just don't teach you how to figure out when you should turn back. You don't need ANY gas back on the boat. You need enough to get back on the boat!

I don't think you need any agencies to understand that you shouldn't run out of air. Of course you don't need any air back on the boat, but it does not seem wise to me to plan a dive so you thouch the surface with 0 bar. For a plan: I keep 50 bar for safety just in case something is different than I planed, so I have 150 bar for usage 75 bar one way, when finished I turn back is not really rocket science.
Also if someone likes to dive, he/she will read more books than the PADI one, or?

 

[Blox]

No one has said anything about deep expierence. Only expierence which can be gained at any depth.

You are right. It was a misconception on my part, for which I apologize. I agree that nobody advocated mandatory deep dive experience before taking the Deep Dive Speciality.

The problem is depth compounds problems. You add a larger air consumption, narcosis, time constraints and at some locations, reduced ambient light. What might have been simple problem at 30ft now is more complex at 120ft.

I agree with this as well, however, or exactly because of this, I still stand by my point of view, that permitting new divers, fresh out of AOW and without additional dive experience, to take a Deep Dive Speciality is the right thing to do. We all know that the recommended depth limits for the respective course is one of the things that distinguishes AOW from OW, and I am quite certain that many new divers will perceive the course as "permitting them to dive deeper" and leave with a "I'm certified for deep dives" which most new divers will probably consider (incorrectly) as meaning "I am qualified to dive deep", and many will subsequently do deep dives with knowledge that has only barely scratched the surface of what it really takes to do the dives safely.

You could argue, that this is caused by PADI's standards, the way they are marketing and promoting the courses, etc. This is an issue, that has been argued over and over on these boards, and, IMHO, is pointless in this context.

Given the existing structure of courses, standards, etc., I think it is much more preferable to permit a new diver with less than 10 dives (OW + AOW) to go straight on to the Deep Dive Spec and get in some real world deep dives under instructor supervision, and gain some more knowledge and experience before venturing out on his own, rather than the same guy coming out of AOW with the "I'm certified = qualified for deep dives" perception, and doing deep dives with just one single prior deep dive under his belt (from AOW).

Would it be best if divers gained more experience, before diving deep? Yes, absolutely. Is it a realistic expection that this will happen, on a broad scale? IMHO it isn't, given that the vast majority of certified divers probably only dives during vacations. I'm a very pragmatic guy, and given the circumstances, I'd rather chose the lesser evil - permit people to take deep courses with little experience, rather than have the same guys go with even less experience/deep dives on deep dives during their vacation at some resort, because the LDS looks at their C-Cards, sees they are AOW cert'd, tells them it's no big deal, and the divers are unable to resist.

 

[Blox]

I think you missed the point some are trying to make. The point is that it doesn't make any sense to go deep if you haven't yet learned to dive well at any depth.

Mike,

I did understand that.

However, having read many of your posts in the past, I would be surprised, if you did not agree that although it may not make sense, still many people do it (think pure vacation divers).

The point that I am trying to make is that even if you consider the deep dive spec as an ill-conceived course, or at least less than ideally structured or typically taught, additional dives under instructor supervision (which would be the minimum you could call the Deep Dive Spec) will be beneficial, and a diver will be better off having done these dives under instructor supervision as "additional experience", rather than doing the very same number of deep dives right out of AOW on a resort vacation with an insta-buddy.