When does "Gas Management" get taught?

[Jim Lapenta]

Was taught basic gas management and calculating SAC beginning in ow classroom session#2. It continued all thru ow and aow and all my specialties, rescue and now DM. PADI, BTW. It is in the ow manual but it's not all tied together. My instructor teaches it in every ow class. The right instuctor can tie it all together in about 30 minutes. Is it required by PADI? No, but it is in our classes.

 

[MikeFerrara]

Was taught basic gas management and calculating SAC beginning in ow classroom session#2. It continued all thru ow and aow and all my specialties, rescue and now DM. PADI, BTW. It is in the ow manual but it's not all tied together. My instructor teaches it in every ow class. The right instuctor can tie it all together in about 30 minutes. Is it required by PADI? No, but it is in our classes.

Where is gas management in the OW manual?

 

[GDI]

It should have started in class one of the basic OW class and be an ongoing process.

Gary D.

I do teach this as part of my OW calss, I spend three session of teaching time on dive planning.

It is only glanced over in some OW agencies text books and in some cases not even until the Dm level.

To me it is a needed part for diving knowledge.
I can't say my classes are perfect but I can say I am always looking for ways to improve them

 

[Web Monkey]

Where is gas management in the OW manual?

It's there at least twice!

It says

• "Don't run out of air!"
• "Be back on the boat with 500 PSI"

That should be enough for anybody!

Terry

 

[DiveMaven]

My OW instructor talked about turn around pressure when planning a dive, but told us that turning around at 1500 psi (when you start with 3000) wasn't good planning in his opinion. He told us that planning by thirds is safer...one third out, one third back, and one third reserve...but you can definitely snoop around under the boat until you're down to 500-700 psi, then up to the boat.

 

[simbrooks]

I would go along with a few others here. Nothing from my OW instructor. First heard about it on SB, then bought the Dennis Graver's YMCA diving book which had this and a bunch of other info in it that my PADI OW manual didnt. I was then coached again during AOW and cavern by GDI - its kind of an automatic calculation now. I dont know if it was required in the course guidelines or not, but i am glad it was brought up.

 

[cerich]

You know my answer ...

It's part of my NAUI AOW class ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Bob, I'm loving ya man!

from NAUI S&P for Scuba Diver

In water skills

"mointor air supply and communicate amount remaining upon request and MANAGE air supply so as to surface within a pre planned mimimum air limit"

Planning skills

"Measure, record and calculate individual air consumption (as surface air consumption rate) using a submersible pressure gauge, depth gauge and timing device"


So it should always be introduced at Scuba Diver. There is no NAUI AOW bty:05: NAUI has an ADVANCED SCUBA DIVER class. I sometimes use the PADI term for the class as well.....eyebrow

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Bob, I'm loving ya man!

from NAUI S&P for Scuba Diver

In water skills

"mointor air supply and communicate amount remaining upon request and MANAGE air supply so as to surface within a pre planned mimimum air limit"

Planning skills

"Measure, record and calculate individual air consumption (as surface air consumption rate) using a submersible pressure gauge, depth gauge and timing device"


So it should always be introduced at Scuba Diver. There is no NAUI AOW bty:05: NAUI has an ADVANCED SCUBA DIVER class. I sometimes use the PADI term for the class as well.....eyebrow

That S & P stuff you quote is the simple stuff that everyone teaches ... monitor your gauge, signal pressure upon request, and surface with 500 psi.

That's not what I mean when I talk about gas management ... there's more to driving than learning how to turn the steering wheel.

I teach my AOW students the concepts behind surface air consumption, how it applies in the context of depth (Boyle's Law and all that rot), how to convert between psi and volume (cubic feet), how to determine turn pressure relative to your dive profile, how to determine rock bottom pressure, how to calculate the amount of gas you'll need for a given dive plan, techniques for good gas management habits, and tips for better gas consumption. Prior to the deep dive we measure gas consumption at depth, convert it to SAC and RMV, and use those figures to calculate gas consumption for the deep dive based on a written dive plan.

I don't train "vacation divers" ... up here there are no DM's to follow around ... not even on the charter boats. Once you're certified, you're pretty much on your own. I want my students to be able to dive responsibly ... and that means knowing how to NOT run low on gas at depth.

AOW is, to me, a generic term ... I use it here because it's generally understood by divers of all agencies.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[vkalia]

The metric equivalent is "thumb the dive at 50 bar" - even if a diver has a whopping SAC of 30l/min, that means that he is able to come up from 30m to the surface and do a safety stop. I agree that "surface with 500 bar" is a bit more vague, as it doesnt make it very clear on what the thumb pressure should be.

"Battlefield calculations"? For reef dives? Is it just me or does that seem to be a bit of overkill? I have had students who struggle with basic math - I can just see them sitting there, running out of air while trying to do these calculations.

A more complex answer is not always the better one. And "everything tech" isnt always needed for recreational diving.

That being said, I agree that gas planning is completely ignored and need to be covered in a little bit more details (I generally cover it in the Deep Dive of the AOW course). I find it particularly ironic that the OW videos devote more time to the merits of dive bags than to gas planning.

Vandit

 

[lamont]

BTW, Lamont, you quoted something I said about safety and then make the observation that a lot of accidents/incidents result from the bad planning or bad implementation. You are, of course, correct. No matter what people are taught, people WILL do what they shouldn't.

As a teaching method, though, I think that "be back on the boat with 500 psi" doesn't give people the tools that they really need, while "if you're at 100 fsw with 1300 psi left, you need to *leave*, and *leave* the DM if you have to" does. If all someone has been told is the 500 psi on the boat rule, then I can't exactly fault them for getting down that low at depth while blindly following and trusting a DM.