Training agency throws Instructor under the bus while misleading the court

[cerich]

I have certifications from 5 agencies, and one of them has an unusual policy for these forms. In most medical forms your statement is on paper, and a doctor's signature is good for a year. With this agency, the form--extremely long and detailed--must be filled out anew and online for every class, and there is no place for a doctor's signoff. The agency decides on your fitness to dive based on what you put on the form. The last time I took class with them, it was a one-night academic session, a class for which other agencies do not even require a medical form. I had just gone through that same long and frankly invasive questionnaire a couple months before for a different class, and I was irritated. When it came to the section where I had to list my specific medications and their dosage levels, which was the same as the last time, I just skipped it. Well, on my next diving excursion, I was rooming with an instructor from that agency. It was not a class--we were just diving. As soon as he had a chance, he went into my toilet kit, took out my medications, and wrote down what he saw. He was quite open about it--he felt that was his right to do that. He had obviously been told that I had omitted that information when I had enrolled for that one night classroom session. I do not know what level of training either he or anyone else at the agency headquarters had to determine whether anything I was taking was a problem.

Really, holy crap! That is beyond the pale and quite honestly I would have beaten the instructor.

 

[boulderjohn]

Really, holy crap! That is beyond the pale and quite honestly I would have beaten the instructor.

Well, I judt left the agency a month or so later, but it was mostly for different (but similar when you think about it) reasons.

 

[dumpsterDiver]

There is a legal advantage to using a standard form and letting the doctor make the decision as required. That way if anything happens and there is an ensuing lawsuit, your judgment will not be an issue. If you start making your own rules and making your own decisions based on what you see, then your decision-making may be called into play. This will be especially problematic if you are making such decisions with no medical training. If you are comfortable doing that, go for it. I am not comfortable doing that, so I won't.

I have certifications from 5 agencies, and one of them has an unusual policy for these forms. In most medical forms your statement is on paper, and a doctor's signature is good for a year. With this agency, the form--extremely long and detailed--must be filled out anew and online for every class, and there is no place for a doctor's signoff. The agency decides on your fitness to dive based on what you put on the form. The last time I took class with them, it was a one-night academic session, a class for which other agencies do not even require a medical form. I had just gone through that same long and frankly invasive questionnaire a couple months before for a different class, and I was irritated. When it came to the section where I had to list my specific medications and their dosage levels, which was the same as the last time, I just skipped it. Well, on my next diving excursion, I was rooming with an instructor from that agency. It was not a class--we were just diving. As soon as he had a chance, he went into my toilet kit, took out my medications, and wrote down what he saw. He was quite open about it--he felt that was his right to do that. He had obviously been told that I had omitted that information when I had enrolled for that one night classroom session. I do not know what level of training either he or anyone else at the agency headquarters had to determine whether anything I was taking was a problem.

So, as I said, if you are comfortable in that role, go ahead. I'm not. If you want people to be as pissed off at you as I was for getting that far into their lives, go for it. I don't see that as my role myself.

You should have just slipped a dirty, dripping bong into his carry on luggage. Then take a few pictures of him with the TSA clowns.

 

[The Chairman]

I have a few opinions on this: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/sc...sonal-perspective-diving-industry-netdoc.html

 

[Omisson]

From the sworn testimony in the case: The lake was flat "like glass" when the divers went in, with 20-30 foot of visibility. All three of the divers were neutrally buoyant -- nobody was overweighted. While they were underwater, the winds picked up unexpectedly and were blowing hard, creating 2-3 foot seas with whitecaps while they were underwater. When the adult made a sudden, unexpected and uncontrolled ascent to the surface, the instructor looked up from 14 ft., saw the surface conditions (with waves that were over the divers head), and determined that it was unsafe to have three inexperienced divers on the surface in these conditions. So he signaled for the boys to stop and wait on the bottom, ascended 14 ft to the surface, asked the adult diver if he was okay and immediately took him back down. The whole thing took just 25 seconds from bottom to top and back down again.

However, shortly after the instructor went up, the boy that died gave the "up" signal to the other boy and started to ascend. Not wanting to be left alone, the other boy followed. They did not turn around to look to see where the instructor and other diver were. They ascended to the surface but one boy stopped a few feet short. The other boy looked back down, saw DT hovering below the surface within arm's reach, with his regulator out and bubbles escaping from his mouth. The boy tried to bring DT to the surface but he was non-responsive. Eventually, DT sank back down to the bottom. The waves were such that boy could not see shore, but he could see a flag on a flag pole on a platform near shore, so he swam to this and then he was helped back to the dock.

These are the facts according to the testimony of the witnesses who were there. Now, have at it.

So subfiend- I thought the BCD supplied by your instructor worked and there was proper weighting of the student.. I also thought you claimed there was no basis for expulsion of your client - AND that Utah case law considered the incident report privileged.... Apparently you didn't get many of your facts right after all- did you?



http://www.padi.com/newsletter/02491878/default.html

 

[shoredivr]

Well, on my next diving excursion, I was rooming with an instructor from that agency. It was not a class--we were just diving. As soon as he had a chance, he went into my toilet kit, took out my medications, and wrote down what he saw. He was quite open about it--he felt that was his right to do that. He had obviously been told that I had omitted that information when I had enrolled for that one night classroom session. I do not know what level of training either he or anyone else at the agency headquarters had to determine whether anything I was taking was a problem.

That is outrageous.

 

[Roatan Joe]

So subfiend- I thought the BCD supplied by your instructor worked and there was proper weighting of the student.. I also thought you claimed there was no basis for expulsion of your client - AND that Utah case law considered the incident report privileged.... Apparently you didn't get many of your facts right after all- did you?



PADI Responds to an Open Letter to the Dive Industry, dated 12 November 2014

Thanks for posting the link to the letter.

This sort of stuff is all too common when you only hear one side of the story. I spent a long career in law enforcement and continually saw what was reported by the press (or claimed by the suspect) versus the whole story or truth. I find myself skeptical of just about everything I read, until I hear the whole story. It drives me crazy when I read or hear people assuming an accident happened one way or another based on fuzzy information from "people". I hope PADI files suit over this.

 

[boulderjohn]

I hope PADI files suit over this.

Back when I taught journalism, I had to teach about libel. I am not an attorney, but I would have to say that the Carney letter comes darn close. He either knew the statement that the instructor had not violated standards was false, or he showed a "reckless disregard for truth" in publishing that statement without checking it first. Even if he thought it was true when he first published it, he had to know it was not true by the time it was included in renewal letters to instructors--I got mine a little over a week ago. I also suspect it would be considered to show malice. As a TDI instructor, I am quite disturbed by it all.

 

[flots am]

As a TDI instructor, I am quite disturbed by it all.

I'm not disturbed by it anymore.

All this crap about standards and lawsuits and liability and insurance and legal maneuvering and corporate buy-outs and he-said-she-said has really sucked the fun out of teaching SCUBA.

I'm about 90% certain that I won't be renewing either of my agencies next time and will just stick with solo diving when I happen to feel like it.

flots.

 

[boulderjohn]

I'm not disturbed by it anymore.

All this crap about standards and lawsuits and liability and insurance and legal maneuvering and corporate buy-outs and he-said-she-said has really sucked the fun out of teaching SCUBA.

I'm about 90% certain that I won't be renewing either of my agencies next time and will just stick with solo diving when I happen to feel like it.

flots.

I see your point.

I have looked deeply into several cases lately that really concern me. The potential for a lawsuit seems to be unreal. In most, but not all, of the cases in which I thought someone was being sued for really ridiculous reasons, the outcome for that person was that the insurance settled for a relatively small amount that was cheaper for the insurance company than it would have been to continue hoping for a favorable outcome. Thus, the plaintiff was rewarded for filing a ridiculous suit. In the one that I thought was most ridiculous, they continued to a verdict and lost in an absurd decision. In another case that I studied deeply, even interviewing all the key people at length, the defendant essentially won the case when the insurance company settled for a piddling amount that the plaintiff eagerly accepted. But that was not the end of it. Friends of the plaintiff then went on a character assassination spree, releasing and distributing documents filed by the plaintiff in a highly successful attempt to smear the defendant's reputation--they did not win in the court of law, so they took it to the court of public opinion.

It has gotten very ugly lately. This case is just the latest step in that growing ugliness.