stupid instructor incident last week

[JonnyB]

first of all i would like to respond to rick. Ok my friend messed up and she did not inflate the bcd. The is her fault, but the main problem here is not wearther or not there was air in the bcd or not. Even if there was air in it, the accident could not have been avoided as the instructor, not DM, the mistake the instructor made was to recommend to the student, who had not been to that place before, to make a giant stride entry when the depth was about 5feet.
Ok when i said it was a failry easy dive, i mean the dive itself is easy, but i know of many diveshops that will not take a complete novice there, especially without diving with the person before. There is quite a long walk from where you dress up to where you get into the water, and the last 40feet or something is balancing on rocks, jumping inbetween them. Then you have to enter the water, which is quite easy, you slowly roll on your back and swim out. the tricky bit is getting out of the water as the edges are very sharp and you do not really have anywhere to step. The only reason i brought up the bends incident is because i wanted to point out that the instructor, ignored the instructions he got from the physician and continued to dive so brief after a visit to the chamber. And i believe in buddy checks and when you have someone that is totaly fresh, with 4 dives, done 7 months ago and not with you. you ought to be more alert. that is my 2 cents. when i take people diving i try to do my best so they have the best time they can have. and if i have to point out things to them on the way, so be it. I dive for them, not for me. When i go on my ownm that is a different story...

kind regards Jonny

 

[downunderjenn]

This is a sad accident. I hope it does not discourage her from diving. 7 months is a long time to not dive for any level of experience.

 

[Diver0001]

.....snip.....

It is a shame that bad instructors like this guy can continue to ruin peoples lifes.

I'm sorry but I'm not finding your story very coherent. You start by saying it's an easy dive at 40ft and then later you say it's 80ft under water passage. Could you clarify that a bit please.

Clearly you're angry about what happened but reading your story doesn't convince me that the instructor was being negligent. It does, however, convince me that Murphy can be found on Cyprus and he's there giving people some sharp lessons. I bet your friend won't forget to put more air in her BCD next time......and I hope she makes a full recovery.

R..

 

[JonnyB]

ok i should clarify, the maximum depth is 40feet, but there is a underwater tunnel that is 80feet long, and that is located at about 40 feet depth. There are alot of tunnels in the area, some of them narrower than the other, some of which i have had to wear side mount in order to pass them, so you can satisfy most divers.

hope this clarifies abit.
kind regards Jonny

 

[Drew Sailbum]

Cypriot law may vary, of course, but a few questions would help clarify whether the instructor was negligent.

1. Did the instructor owe some sort of duty of care to your friend? Yes. Of course. Your friend paid for their service and relied on the instructor to provide direction to the dive site and provide a site description and briefing. Entry and exit techniques are a standard part of the dive site briefing.

2. Did the instructor breech his duty of care? You betcha. He told your friend to do a giant stride entry into water which may not even be over the diver's head. That's way too shallow, even if the BCD was fully inflated! Further, the instructor had specific prior knowledge about the undersea environment at this entry point and knew (or should have known) that sharp rocks were in the area.

3. Had the instructor not breeched his duty of care, would the injury have still occurred? Most likely not. His breech of his duty of care led fairly directly to a serious injury. If he had properly briefed a suitable entry technique, then the injury probably would not have occurred or would have been much less severe.

If the failure to exercise a duty of care which is owed leads to a loss or injury, that is almost the very definition of negligence.

If the training agency has not yet been notified, please do so immediately.

 

[95yj]

I agree that you are responsible for yourself, but in the first sentence, he stated that she decided to "go for the discover local diving." It was also stated that they were selling discover diving and introductory dives. This to me sounds like a dive/introduction for novices or non-certified individuals like the resort courses designed to get you in the water without having to get your certification. If this is the case, then the DM was TOTALLY responsible for making sure her BC was inflated along with air turned on and everything else. A normal buddy check would have also isolated this problem. Conversely, the fact that you have to enter caves would by definition weed out anyone with only an open water cert. I'll bet that there are two sides to this story, but this is a bad injury that should have been prevented either by the diver, the buddy or the DM or all three.

 

[aquaoren]

This is a very unfortunate accident that appears to could have been prevented.
I don't know how a buddy could have prevented it. During the buddy check, you squeeze the inflator once or twice to see whether it works. You don't inflate the BC completely or do you?
The injured diver carries some responsibility too. She had to look where she is jumping in. If it looks to shallow, you simply don't do it for your own safety regardless what someone said. But again, if the water is very clear, it is easy to misjudge the depth.
IMHO the DM carries most responsibility for the accident. He recommended an unsuitable entry way. I would have expected him to know better as a local and if he wasn't sure how deep it really was, he had the obligation to go first and check it.
The way it appears, it was about 1.5meters (~5feet?) deep. I am much shorter than the average person and I would have hit the buttom too even with an inflated BC. The injuries may have been not as severe but they would be there for sure.
So we shouldn't ask whether this accident wouldn't have happened with an other DM too but rather whether a different diver would have been injured too if following the DM instructions. Don't you agree?

 

[Diver0001]

I agree that you are responsible for yourself, but in the first sentence, he stated that she decided to "go for the discover local diving." It was also stated that they were selling discover diving and introductory dives. This to me sounds like a dive/introduction for novices or non-certified individuals like the resort courses designed to get you in the water without having to get your certification. If this is the case, then the DM was TOTALLY responsible for making sure her BC was inflated along with air turned on and everything else. A normal buddy check would have also isolated this problem. Conversely, the fact that you have to enter caves would by definition weed out anyone with only an open water cert. I'll bet that there are two sides to this story, but this is a bad injury that should have been prevented either by the diver, the buddy or the DM or all three.

Discover local diving is a PADI programme for certified divers.

One think to keep in mind is that we have 1/2 the story here... I'd venture a guess that the instructor would have a very different story and perhaps even a different set of facts (how deep the entry point was and the standard practice for entry at that location, for example. I don't want to cast doubt on JonnyB's integrity but if we're going to pass judgement on the instructor it's a pretty essential detail and should be cross-checked, don't you think?)

But anyway....

The reason that I said I wasn't convinced that the instructor was in the wrong is because I understood from the original post that the diver did the giant stride and then sank and upon sinking cut her leg.

That would mean that the giant stride was sucessful (ie, not ill advised) and therefore the entry itself wasn't the problem but the sinking was. And the diver herself was responsible for following her training and putting air in her bcd to avoid sinking upon entry.

The big question then becomes this: Is it the instructor's duty of care, in the roll of a dive guide, to ensure (force) that a certified diver follows their training?

R..

 

[Diver0001]

....snip.... You don't inflate the BC completely or do you?

You're supposed to.... if it's leaking it's a good way to find out before you're in the water...

....snip....
IMHO the DM carries most responsibility for the accident. He recommended an unsuitable entry way.

That's what it sounds like based on 1/2 the story, yes.

For the record, people, you need more than 1.5 metres (5 ft) of water to do a giant stride. Most divers entire bodies will sink under the water during a giant stride so about 3 metres (8-9 ft) is a safe minimum. If you have less then you do a shallow water entry.

R..

 

[aquaoren]

You're supposed to.... if it's leaking it's a good way to find out before you're in the water...



That's what it sounds like based on 1/2 the story, yes.

For the record, people, you need more than 1.5 metres (5 ft) of water to do a giant stride. Most divers entire bodies will sink under the water during a giant stride so about 3 metres (8-9 ft) is a safe minimum. If you have less then you do a shallow water entry.

R..

Aren't you supposed to check for leaks when setting up your gear and not during the buddy check?
But you are right with having only 1/2 the story.
Nevertheless, I think that regardless of what may have happened, the DM carries responsibility as the guide for this "expedition", unless she was doing exactly the opposite of what being told.