Pull Dumps — lose them

[Sevenrider860]

I am surprised at how many people are surprised that the this incident happened to an instructor. While we wish they all had thousands of dives, years of real world experience, and knowledge of every gear configuration known...lets step back into reality.

Capt Jim Wyatt is a Course Director at, what I believe, is the largest IDC Center in the Keys. Many of these new instructors have the minimums required to be an instructor. I am not saying this as a negative, it is simply a fact. I have met a number of outstanding “zero to hero” instructors. They may not have years of dive experience, but they are creating thinking divers with a good skill foundation. I have met “veteran” instructors with decades of diving and teaching experience who overweight students and produce what I call “dependent” divers...they are not capable of planning and executing a dive safely on their own.

I don’t know what caused the issue that Is being reported, but I am not sure that replacing the inflator hoses is the solution. How many divers have AquaLung or Scubapro BCDs? Do we replace everyone of them? I use plain elbows on my DSS and Apeks wings. I have a pull dump on the Scubapro, AquaLung, and Sherwood BCDs that I often use. I have no intention on replacing the assembly.

I have seen talk about disconnecting or removing the wire (or plastic in Scubapro). I would encourage you all to rethink that. I have seen that wire in regular, non-pulldump elbows...That wire prevents an overextension of the flexible hose that could result in a disconnect of the hose from the fittings if the cable ties fail to hold.

Since this instructor clearly lived to see another day, one would hope that a lesson was learned and he will produce future divers that will handle any future experience like this correctly.

 

[rsingler]

Capt Jim Wyatt is a Course Director at, what I believe, is the largest IDC Center in the Keys...they are creating thinking divers with a good skill foundation.

Respectfully, sir, I would disagree with your conclusion, though not with the statement above.
I am one of Jim Wyatt's former students, and he indeed runs a superb training organization. I do not know If he would agree with me, or if this instructor was even one of his former students or not. In any case, we as instructors are held to a higher standard than an open water scuba diver. The mishap that was described here was "self rescue 101". Struggling at the surface and not releasing weights in a panic mode is not the sort of conduct that I would expect of an instructor. In fact, it is just the sort of cause of death that we gingerly describe in our instruction, as we teach the emergency weight drop before students ever get to the ocean.
As you suggested, he may well turn out to be a superb instructor with this experience under his belt . However, right now, he is not ready to take on my kids as their teacher. It is time for some remediation for this instructor, and if it can't happen off-line privately, then it indeed should be raised with his certification agency. It shouldn't be the kiss of death, but it certainly should be a pause in his career. Some mistakes are "never events" in our business. Having rescued a panicked, certified diver in EXACTLY the same circumstance of not dropping weight at the surface, I can empathize with what was going through Jim's mind. That the victim was an instructor, new or not, is just unacceptable to me.

Your other point about not removing the wire was well taken. That is what I enjoy most about Scubaboard! I can shoot from the hip and propose a "solution" like that, and have a friend point out why it might not be such a good idea. We have an incredible resource here, and I am glad we all feel free to debate prickly topics.

 

[Marie13]

This thread has been educational. Are these type of pull dumps common on jacket BCs and not on wings? I have to admit I don’t think I even knew they existed!

 

[johndiver999]

How often do we read on this forum that divers really don't need ditchable lead? A BC can fail for a variety of reasons, neglect, abuse, accident etc., but hopefully, a good diver can survive this occurrence.

And yes BP/W do have pull dumps on the inflator, I have had one on my dive rite wing from the start, but I think "all" jacket BC's have pull dump valves on the inflator.

It is necessary that all students are taught this because if they don't understand the functionality, they could very easily be pulling down on the hose and venting the BC as they press the inflate button and since the deflate valve is designed to have a higher flow rate than the inflate, they could sink to their death while they press the inflate button.

Even if your BC does not have one, in a rescue situation, not knowing how the BC (of the victim) works could cause a negative outcome.

 

[Sevenrider860]

@rslinger...careful with the way you quote my reply...please don’t pick and choose from the text. That makes you no better than the news organizations that we see today.

I never stated that Rainbow Reef was creating thinking divers. I said I have met “zero to hero” Instructors that are doing this.

I don’t minimize your opinion, but the way you quoted my response definetly changes the message and I think it to be disingenuous.

 

[kelemvor]

This thread has been educational. Are these type of pull dumps common on jacket BCs and not on wings? I have to admit I don’t think I even knew they existed!

Mine came with my diverite wing.

 

[Sevenrider860]

@rslinger...careful with the way you quote my reply...please don’t pick and choose from the text. That makes you no better than the news organizations that we see today.

I never stated that Rainbow Reef was creating thinking divers. I said I have met “zero to hero” Instructors that are doing this.

I don’t minimize your opinion, but the way you quoted my response definetly changes the message and I think it to be disingenuous.

We don’t know how the individual resolved the situation do we? Did he or she ditch weight? Was he/she rescued by another diver? Did he/she figure it out after consist yelling and coaching from Jim? I don’t know.

I won’t contradict anything @Capt Jim Wyatt has stated. I personally feel his global statement that “pull dumps are bad” is not based on a large sample set and may be based on the observation of a single event.

 

[kelemvor]

@rslinger...careful with the way you quote my reply...please don’t pick and choose from the text. That makes you no better than the news organizations that we see today.

I never stated that Rainbow Reef was creating thinking divers. I said I have met “zero to hero” Instructors that are doing this.

I don’t minimize your opinion, but the way you quoted my response definetly changes the message and I think it to be disingenuous.

You may need to go edit your post if you intended to relay that you think poorly of the instructors Rainbow Reef produces. It reads to me like you are praising the instructors they produce. The text @rsingler quoted is in there, and his shortening of the quote doesn't change the meaning I thought I read in your post.

 

[Neilwood]

Respectfully, sir, I would disagree with your conclusion, though not with the statement above.
I am one of Jim Wyatt's former students, and he indeed runs a superb training organization. I do not know If he would agree with me, or if this instructor was even one of his former students or not. In any case, we as instructors are held to a higher standard than an open water scuba diver. The mishap that was described here was "self rescue 101". Struggling at the surface and not releasing weights in a panic mode is not the sort of conduct that I would expect of an instructor. In fact, it is just the sort of cause of death that we gingerly describe in our instruction, as we teach the emergency weight drop before students ever get to the ocean.
As you suggested, he may well turn out to be a superb instructor with this experience under his belt . However, right now, he is not ready to take on my kids as their teacher. It is time for some remediation for this instructor, and if it can't happen off-line privately, then it indeed should be raised with his certification agency. It shouldn't be the kiss of death, but it certainly should be a pause in his career. Some mistakes are "never events" in our business. Having rescued a panicked, certified diver in EXACTLY the same circumstance of not dropping weight at the surface, I can empathize with what was going through Jim's mind. That the victim was an instructor, new or not, is just unacceptable to me.

Your other point about not removing the wire was well taken. That is what I enjoy most about Scubaboard! I can shoot from the hip and propose a "solution" like that, and have a friend point out why it might not be such a good idea. We have an incredible resource here, and I am glad we all feel free to debate prickly topics.

For me that is the main issue. Irrespective of the equipment failure (which could happen despite having without prior warning), the "instructors" response to the failure is very very poor. Even new OW divers are trained that, should you have difficulty maintaining buoyancy on the surface that you should ditch your weights - no ifs, buts or maybes. For an instructor to fail to do what is rightly drummed into OW students is inexcusable. We would be the first to suggest that an OW level diver that had a similar issue should get some additional training - even more important for an instructor that has failed in such a basic task to get some remedial training and a chance to think about his future. I certainly don't expect an instructor to be perfect (no one ever will be) but that is such a basic failure that it should be reason for some reassessment - would you trust your family to an instructor that is teaching basic tasks like that but can't remember to do it himself? What happens if a student's equipment fails in the same way? Does he remember then?

 

[Sevenrider860]

You may need to go edit your post if you intended to relay that you think poorly of the instructors Rainbow Reef produces. It reads to me like you are praising the instructors they produce. The text @rsingler quoted is in there, and his shortening of the quote doesn't change the meaning I thought I read in your post.

I will certainly go back an review. I do not think poorly of Rainbow Reef IDC graduates nor do I hold them to a higher level. My comments on “Zero to Hero” Instructors is not directed to, or limited to, Rainbow Reef IDC Instructors. When you remove a lot of text, it is easy to paint that picture.

My EXACT comments were:

“I have met a number of outstanding “zero to hero” instructors. They may not have years of dive experience, but they are creating thinking divers with a good skill foundation.”

In that comment I am not attributing their IDC training to Rainbow Reef, nor excluding it.