Suit filed in case of "Girl dead, boy injured at Glacier National Park

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

wetb4igetinthewater:
Sometimes where there's smoke, there's fire.. Not always, but sometimes.

I had someone try to talk me into taking his friend who had zero diving experience (not even a Try Scuba/DSD experience) out for a dive in Puget Sound.

Now tell me under what conditions is that a good idea? Same conditions for renting equipment for an uncertified diver, agreed?

Now if I have the facts wrong, I'll gladly recant my comment here, but if a dive center does something like this, doesn't it make you wonder what else they might be doing? Then there's this internal memo.
View attachment 735445
Just what is the purpose of an agency?
Click to expand...
Well you are kind of making half my point- since PADI standards have nothing to do with gear rental- and there is no “law” against renting gear- what does it matter someone rented gear they didn’t know how to use and wound up killing themselves - and what does that have to do with PADI, who found out a year later through third parties?
 
cerich:
if they are only scared they don't quite grasp it. They should be terrified and frankly they should already be in motion on a few things..
Click to expand...
I don’t agree at all. There is a fairly conservative circuit in that Federal court - which would certainly hear any verdict against an agent like PADI and ample precedent to argue they could have no liability as a matter of law (contract law specifically).

there is no privity here. NONE. so the only claim that can stand is agency- and the traditional agency tests fail to establish agency here because of the way PADI sets up its contracts, disclaimers, agreements, student materials and certification programs.

could a court find liability - sure- by stretching precedent. Could an appellate court reverse such a stretch…likely- especially in that circuit…
 
Omisson:
Well you are kind of making half my point- since PADI standards have nothing to do with gear rental- and there is no “law” against renting gear- what does it matter someone rented gear they didn’t know how to use and wound up killing themselves - and what does that have to do with PADI, who found out a year later through third parties?
Click to expand...
No one said that renting gear to uncertified divers. It matters from the perspective that such practices go against the grain of dive safety. I hope we agree on this.

This just leads one to wonder, just what else are they doing?

Do you know exactly when PADI found out about this fatality? When the conversation took place where the PADI employee acquired the impression that they didn't seem to have a grasp of standards?
 
Omisson:
I don’t agree at all. There is a fairly conservative circuit in that Federal court - which would certainly hear any verdict against an agent like PADI and ample precedent to argue they could have no liability as a matter of law (contract law specifically).

there is no privity here. NONE. so the only claim that can stand is agency- and the traditional agency tests fail to establish agency here because of the way PADI sets up its contracts, disclaimers, agreements, student materials and certification programs.

could a court find liability - sure- by stretching precedent. Could an appellate court reverse such a stretch…likely- especially in that circuit…
Click to expand...
we shall see. No question your legal expertise is actual expertise and mine is not at all.
 
wetb4igetinthewater:
No one said that renting gear to uncertified divers. It matters from the perspective that such practices go against the grain of dive safety. I hope we agree on this.

This just leads one to wonder, just what else are they doing?

Do you know exactly when PADI found out about this fatality? When the conversation took place where the PADI employee acquired the impression that they didn't seem to have a grasp of standards?
Click to expand...
Agreed: Of course I think it’s both unsafe and bad business to rent scuba gear to someone who is uncertified - but then again, there are lots of people -even on here- saying no one needs instructors , they can figure it all out on their own.

IMHO they don’t know, what they don’t know.

I also agree that it begs the question what else is that shop doing wrong-
IF the guy didn’t claim to have a cert without one- big difference if the guy represented he was certified, right?

So discovery will tell more about the “when” of these incidents, and their upload to PADI. But Until there is actual evidence, isn’t all this PADI animus both premature, and on the surface, unwarranted? I can name 12 standards violation by the instructor, four for the shop, plus two criminal violations…. That’s NOT on PADI and those are assuredly the proximate cause of this girl’s death. I also see clear evidence of Mill’s contributory negligence as well.

If adhering to PADI standards by the shop, instructor and diver would have prevented the causal chain that resulted in the death…then it’s not an agency problem. Even if the prior equipment death was squarely the shop’s fault (and I don’t have evidence either way - but at best it’s on both the diver who didn’t bother to get training just as much as the shop rental) - it still wouldn’t have affected Snow visa-vs PADI unless she was the one renting equipment to the uncertified diver. I see no indication of that anywhere.

So, how then was there any way to argue sufficient notice to PADI the shop would break local and federal law on THIS dive? Or that the instructor would disregard no less than 12 standards, and that the diver would ignore the basics of her prior training on THIS dive?

hint: there isn’t, thus -as of now- no way to argue PADI’s agency imputed liability for them….
 
Omisson:
Agreed: Of course I think it’s both unsafe and bad business to rent scuba gear to someone who is uncertified - but then again, there are lots of people -even on here- saying no one needs instructors , they can figure it all out on their own.

IMHO they don’t know, what they don’t know.

I also agree that it begs the question what else is that shop doing wrong-
IF the guy didn’t claim to have a cert without one- big difference if the guy represented he was certified, right?

So discovery will tell more about the “when” of these incidents, and their upload to PADI. But Until there is actual evidence, isn’t all this PADI animus both premature, and on the surface, unwarranted? I can name 12 standards violation by the instructor, four for the shop, plus two criminal violations…. That’s NOT on PADI and those are assuredly the proximate cause of this girl’s death. I also see clear evidence of Mill’s contributory negligence as well.

If adhering to PADI standards by the shop, instructor and diver would have prevented the causal chain that resulted in the death…then it’s not an agency problem. Even if the prior equipment death was squarely the shop’s fault (and I don’t have evidence either way - but at best it’s on both the diver who didn’t bother to get training just as much as the shop rental) - it still wouldn’t have affected Snow visa-vs PADI unless she was the one renting equipment to the uncertified diver. I see no indication of that anywhere.

So, how then was there any way to argue sufficient notice to PADI the shop would break local and federal law on THIS dive? Or that the instructor would disregard no less than 12 standards, and that the diver would ignore the basics of her prior training on THIS dive?

hint: there isn’t, thus -as of now- no way to argue PADI’s agency imputed liability for them….
Click to expand...
What is the purpose of an agency in your mind? What are yearly dues for? What are the expectations that instructors and the diving public to expect for the funds obtained from the dues of instructors and dive centers?
 
cerich:
we shall see. No question your legal expertise is actual expertise and mine is not at all.
Click to expand...
Actually, I thought Montana was 10th circuit- but it’s not- it’s 9th - so I’ll modify my statement to say:

the Montana district court is fairly conservative, no change there….the 9th circuit appeals court fairly crazy-and the most reversed in the nation- so depending on who winds up hearing the appeal- it could go either way- ….unless it goes up to SCOTUS- who would definitely be inclined against finding agency IMHO….

sorry for the confusion…
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
https://www.shearwater.com/products/perdix-ai/

Back
Top Bottom