"Term limits" on certifications

[stoddu]

around here a poll will run $50/hour so for 3 hours and six students it just pays for the pool. How about air, instructor pay, the classtime and video you mention and agency fees. As I said it costs that much just to replace a lost card. The agency isn't going to track this stuff and re-certify for free.

BTW, when was the last time you saw an agency video? Do you really want people diving that way? LOL

Around here, the shops that I have taken instruction from have their own pools. If you are renting large pools in your area for instruction, maybe piggy backing pool time with another class is possible. The store should benefit from in-store purchases from their goodwill service to the customer. And I think $20 for a replacement card is expensive. Ten dollars sounds more reasonable to me. What I am suggesting for a skills refresher would not require a card since the divers are already certified.

I was originally certified 20 years ago, but was out of diving for about 18 years. In January 2005 I made the decision to retake the entire OW, AOW, and Night diving courses to refresh my skills through PADI, so I have seen many agency videos recently. I would prefer to see a no sales B.S. DVD with the important skills demonstrated in a clear, concise manner. Maybe a project for Dr. Bill and some of his attractive diving buddies?

 

[DiveGolfSki]

You have no sense of humor? My comment was not intended seriously (I'm a marine ecologist not a psychiatrist!) nor was it directed specifically at you (or any other individual).

:11: I don't??? Must be that Californian sly, double entendre kind of humor that I hear so much about.

...It was in that respect that I've never been linked to GUE/DIR by anyone before. However, I do find their policies which you pointed out to be wise ones IMHO.

Dr. Bill

Sorry .... you looked vaguely familiar ... You could have a twin.

 

[IceDiverInCA]

An instructor should be able to make a reasonable amount of profit with 6-10 students in the pool for maybe 3 hours at $25 a pop. The out-of-pool time could mostly be covered with a video and a quick question and answer session.

Nope. I guess I was on the same boat as you are until I became an instructor. That's where everything hits you, things like liability insurance, membership fees, facility fees, rental gear, air fills, the cost for certification card, a mugshot if you want a PADI card, and let's not forget what you pay for the ITC. $25 a pop barely covers the card and my gas. Amortization ain't my favorite subject.

 

[Allison Finch]

"".........As far as the cop, do you know how much it costs to get one of those cop outfits dry cleaned? Get it wet just becouse it's there job, ya right!...I lit a cop up on camera one night in Sacramento for doing the very same thing. Watch a gal walk into the river and drown herself. He wasen't even damp! I had to wait for the DART team to show up and they found her body in 30 seconds. She was still right there. If I would have know that, Id have been in the river..........""

Actually, it is not the cop's job, as they are usually not trained for water rescue. Additionally, Paramedics usually arn't trained either. I used to be a Lifeguard for a number of years and the EMS personal would not take over untill we had the victim out of the water.

It not only isn't our job to perform water rescue, but think about this;

Obviously, one cannot wear a 20 lb duty belt (with a gun) into the water. To do so would be fatal to the officer. Would you suggest he/she leave their gun lying unattended on the ground for anyone to take? What would the liability be there? I admit that a life is worth more than the cost of a gun, but what if that gun was used by a kid and kills someone...or by a drug dealer...or a gang member to rob and kill? There ARE other issues here.

 

[jcm996]

Looking back at those age and weight charts. What is overweight? By who's standards? I'm 5'9" and have not been 150ish since i was in early high school. I was in good shape at 170-180, but then according to some chart I was overweight. I still had a 30 inch waist, if I would have been 150lbs, I would have looked like a scarecrow. I am now overweight, but can still run and swim. Just not as fast as before.

And if you would have to renew your card every few years unless you dove. What would stop someone from writing in 3-4 dives they never made. or would all dives have to be made with a "instructor" no more calling up a bud and going if you want it to count. And to get all the different cerifying agecnies to agree to this will never happen. It is sad but Darwin's theory does include the dumb one's and the weak not surviving.

 

[drbill]

It not only isn't our job to perform water rescue, but think about this;

Obviously, one cannot wear a 20 lb duty belt (with a gun) into the water. To do so would be fatal to the officer. Would you suggest he/she leave their gun lying unattended on the ground for anyone to take? What would the liability be there? I admit that a life is worth more than the cost of a gun, but what if that gun was used by a kid and kills someone...or by a drug dealer...or a gang member to rob and kill? There ARE other issues here.

Please understand, I have no quarrel with peace officers. However, there were 5 or 6 deputies standing there watching the drowning according to witnesses. While it may not be their "job," you'd think ONE of them would have made a move. The gun could be left with the other officers present... there was no risk there.

It wasn't the off-duty fireman's "job" either, but he did it. Had one of the officers acted before that, the diver might have been saved.

Dr. Bill

 

[drbill]

No. If a dive team has a problem during a dive it's a team failure and you are as much at fault and carry the same responsibility as your buddy...

What do you think is reasonably priced? At pool fees of $50/hour or so around here...

Disagree with the first statement, especially since the dive buddies were largely assigned to me by boat operators (however, it was understandable that they would not let me dive solo). If a buddy's equipment fails because it was not properly maintained, or they disappear from sight in less than a minute and are located on land already dressed and ready to go drinking with some guys she just met (after I did the proper search underwater, went to the surface and returned to look for the "body" for 20 minutes), am I at fault? I think not, but that's just my opinion.

Must admit that the issue of pool fees is one I never considered. Here we are lucky to be able to use the ocean itself so pool fees are not an issue. Definitely a valid point in potential recertification costs.

Dr. Bill

 

[MikeFerrara]

Around here, the shops that I have taken instruction from have their own pools. If you are renting large pools in your area for instruction, maybe piggy backing pool time with another class is possible. The store should benefit from in-store purchases from their goodwill service to the customer. And I think $20 for a replacement card is expensive. Ten dollars sounds more reasonable to me. What I am suggesting for a skills refresher would not require a card since the divers are already certified.

My shop is closed now but we were the only shop withing 60 miles or so. We traveled another 30 miles to get to a pool we could use. Adtually we had to use different pools at different times of the year. The distance varried but so did the price. Scheduling was always a nightmare.

It's the agency od course that determines the cost of replacing a card and the 20 bucks I stated was an estimate from memory but it's close.

If you have mandatory renewal and especially if it requires an actual refresher with an instructor, the instructor will have to send some kind of documentation to the agency who would likely send out another card with an expiration date. Usually that documentation takes the form of what PADI calls a pic or something similar. The PADI version costs the shop/instructor about $13. I suppose it could be done with dated stickers but either way they won't be free and some one has to maintain all the paper work. My shop has been closed for a year and a half or so and I still have to fight to find space to store all the records I need to keep for about 100 years. The stinking place is still a risk and costing me money. [/QUOTE]

I was originally certified 20 years ago, but was out of diving for about 18 years. In January 2005 I made the decision to retake the entire OW, AOW, and Night diving courses to refresh my skills through PADI, so I have seen many agency videos recently. I would prefer to see a no sales B.S. DVD with the important skills demonstrated in a clear, concise manner. Maybe a project for Dr. Bill and some of his attractive diving buddies?[/QUOTE]

I would prefer to see skills videos where the divers are diving rather than crawling on the bottom like salamanders. Most agency videos are an embarassment and I'd rather my students not see them.

 

[MHK]

If we can't trust this person to make reasonable decision about her own diving and her need to be here to care for her own children it seems that the only choice we have is to outlaw diving completely because it will never be 100% safe. Of course then she just would have went rock climbing or something. What kind of licenseing and restrictions do think should be placed on rock climbing?

It most absolutely is a rights issue. I can scubadive, ride dirt bikes, ride horses, climb rocks or whatever as I see fit. You are free to disaprove of how, why or when I do any of them but if you step in and try to stop me we' won't friends any more. LOL

Mike,

I agree that this is a tough issue and others will have varying points of view, but since I don't rock climb I'm not too worried about what they do ;-)

But not to split to fine a hair here, but it most definitely is NOT a "rights" issue. Whether we like this or not, and given that the subject of government intervention has been introduced into the thread, we need to be real clear here, there is no such thing as a "right" to scuba dive. Analaguos to driving, there is no right to drive a car. Our fine government considers this a "privledge" and absolutely not a "right". Freedom to Scuba Dive was left out of the Bill of Rights ;-), Legal gymnastics notwithstanding, my point is that we are vulnerable to potential government oversight if we continue to attract unwanted attention, and the fatality rate here locally is frieghtening, and Drifting Dan certainly didn't help. In the aftermath of that backdrop we really need to consider a look internally, and as my mom used to say " if you don't shape it up voluntarily, I'm going to do it for you".. The last thing I want is the creation of some bloated government committee studying and passing legislation regulating diving. It would be an absolute disaster of epidemic proportions, I can't think of one single program that the government is involved in that can't be done cheaper and more effeciently in the private sector, with perhaps the limited exception being the military, so while I hope we all agree that the last thing we want is government regulation, I suspect that we just have a different means to that end. And in my mind, if ideas like expiring c-cards help, then I'm all for them..

Regards

 

[lamont]

Freedom to Scuba Dive was left out of the Bill of Rights ;-)

gotta disagree, 10th amendment:

"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

of course the debate over that one is endless, but IMO there's a right to scuba dive in that sentence.