When should a Rescue course be taken

[MXGratefulDiver]

I agree - sounds like a great class - but it doesn't sound like any PADI AOW course that I've ever seen. Actually it sounds much more like part of my IANTD Overhead Environment course. It's probably true for you to comment that a lot of my opinion came from my own experience with my instructor/course - it did. As far as I could tell though it followed the PADI AOW manual to the letter.
Another point - if that's your AOW course - I'd love to see your Rescue! And I'd also be very interested if you think that all of the above skills + your Rescue stuff should be rolled into one with OW and taught to a new diver?
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Kim.

I'm a NAUI instructor ... so I cannot comment on the PADI curriculum.

I will say, however, that I know some excellent PADI instructors, and some of them have contributed not only to my own education but also to my concept of what constitutes a good scuba instructor.

It's been said many times ... the instructor makes the course, not the agency. All agencies define a curriculum that comprises the minimum requirement. To my knowledge, none prevent the instructor from teaching above that level. It's the instructor's choice.

I haven't developed a Rescue curriculum yet. I'm only recently certified as an instructor. But no, I wouldn't like to see Rescue and AOW curriculum taught to a new diver. I think that would be overload. I would prefer to teach an AOW and Rescue curriculum separately, in a way that exceeds minimum standards, and have the time to tailor that curriculum to the needs of each class I teach. That means giving the student time to digest the knowledge, work on the skills, and gain insights on what they need to improve on before going to the next level.

I also feel that new divers need to take it slow and easy, and work on developing skills and gaining in-water comfort between each class.

I think that for OW, I would like to see more focus on basic buoyancy skills. I would like to put more emphasis on explaining the "why" of the diving skills, rather than simply the "how". It blows me away how many newly certified divers I've worked with who haven't even a fundamental concept of Boyle's Law ... and that's about as basic to diving as you can get. If you can understand the concept behind what you're doing, you can then better use your own intelligence to help you gain skills and confidence ... rather than simply doing everything by rote. I want to be able to see them at least trying to perform skills without first having to get on their knees ... even if they need to touch fin-tips to the bottom to gain a reference, at least they're getting a clue as to how it's supposed to be done, and what they need to work toward. I will encourage them to continue practicing until they can perform all the skills mid-water. I want to set goals, and establish a mindset that the OW card is just the beginning of the journey. Even if you go no further with your certifications, your real education should continue each and every time you go diving.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[aquaoren]

IMHO it would make very little sense teaching Rescue together with OW the way the OW couses are being run nowdays.
Most OW divers after being certified(4-6 dives?) don't have the basic skills of buoyancy and are unable to help anyone. Lets face it, they are barely able to take care of themselves. I think it is smart to require from such diver to gather some experience before they think about rescuing someone and possibly make things worse.
If you want to teach rescue skills with the OW, than the system of certification should be reevaluated, standards raised and changes made in the way that OW classes will become more demanding and it will become more difficult to become certified.
Whether someone learned a lot during the AOW, will depend on the instructor they had. I had a very experienced instructor in my AOWD course and learned a lot because my OW instruction was the easy going kind you'll find nowdays.
The OW instructor was a young girl that looked very cute and was a good instructor but not very thorough because it is not required nowdays.
It would maybe be a good idea to combine AOW and rescue but the certifing agencies would have something against it because they'll be loosing a payed course. This in part the reason why many divers are pushed to take the AOW immediatly after the OW -> Money and not concern about their diving skills. Otherwise if their skills weren't sufficient, they shouldn't have been certified in the first place.
Out of my experience: I dove once with a Padi Rescue diver, that was very proud about his recent certification but a very nice guy otherwise . We were buddied on a dive boat in the Red Sea, so I didn't know him before. He introduced himself as a rescue diver and assured me that I'll be safe with him. It was a very nice, easy, shallow(10-12meters), sunny dive. This dude was continously crashing into the corals or I had to hold him down so he'll not bolt to the surface because of bad buoyancy. After the dive I wanted to know more about his dive experience. He told me that he had 37 dives logged and his instructor complimented him that he came so far in such a short time.
I'll be honest, If I should get into trouble, I'd prefer that such a rescue diver would stay away because after solving my own problems, I'll have to rescue him if he'll not kill me before.

 

[Kim]

NWGratefulDiver - As far as the thread topic is concerned we seem to be in agreement then:

But no, I wouldn't like to see Rescue and AOW curriculum taught to a new diver. I think that would be overload.

That is more or less what I said in my first post. It doesn't seem like a good idea to me to task load someone who is still working on their own very basic skills.
As to my comment about the PADI AOW - I think that paying around $300 for a quick lesson on what a compass looks like - and another quick lesson about an U/W torch - is really a joke. They were the only two new 'skills' that I can remember being taught! I would much rather have taken my course from you. Wether PADI instructors are allowed to deviate too far from the agency syllabus I don't know. I suspect not very far - or you'd have different courses, at different levels everywhere you go. I also thought that instructors could be left out in the cold by PADI if something goes wrong and they were teaching outside the syllabus. In any event PADI AOW is a 'do it and get it' course, with no exams or tests (unless you count the problem solving during the deep dive to demostrate narcosis - but you don't even have to get that right!!)

All of that said, I also agree to a certain extent with the posters who say that if a new diver knows nothing about rescue there's nothing they can do - except guess. I know that if my instructor had been knocked unconcious or had a heart attack during my OW I would have tried to do something. I already knew the diving theory behind ascents etc so who knows - maybe I could have winged it and got him/her safely to the surface. Unfortunately maybe I could have got myself killed trying as well.

As things stand I don't see how Rescue and OW could be combined. If there was a total re-evalution of what a OW student should be able to do to get a C-card then maybe. We'd probably get far less new divers - but maybe they'd be safer and better ones right out of the blocks. I can't see many agencys liking this idea - as Aquaoren pointed out - they'd lose a lot of money.

IMO - combining AOW and Rescue would make the most sense. Let new divers learn their basic skills in OW - and practice them a bit. Then let them do the next step when they are comfortable with what they have already learned.

 

[ninjamuzo]

From what I rememeber of my OW course and my experience in teaching Rescue the average OW student hardly remembers anythig of their OW course in terms of anything that happens outside their immediate focus.

It takes the average person about 20 dives to get their bouyancy working automatically and if you are still worried about your bouyancy then rescuing someone is hardly sensible after 4 dives.

The AOW issue has been argued to death but it does at least add 5 dives to your count towards the required minumim.

The rescue course also involves some knowledge of the environment, conditions and experience is important here I think. From what I remember again it over 20 dives before I was comfortable enought to really start paying attention to the people around me.

I made sure that I was diving with experienced people for my first 50 dives or so to learn from what they were doing.

You could argue that there are some people who could do rescue in their OW course the majority IMHO however could not.

 

[goodknight411]

I believe a full Rescue course should be taught in conjunction with the basic open water course. .... divers that are fresh off a course are more prone to do bad judgment call

Exactly, divers fresh off a course are more prone to make bad calls. Rescue divers have to be able to make the right call, and not put themselves or others at risk. Most new divers are still at the stage of learning to take care of themselves.
I think the reasoning behind requiring an advanced rating is that these divers will probably be more comfortable diving and better able to make a good decision when a rescue situation comes up.

 

[HammerNoMore]

Exactly, divers fresh off a course are more prone to make bad calls. Rescue divers have to be able to make the right call, and not put themselves or others at risk. Most new divers are still at the stage of learning to take care of themselves.
I think the reasoning behind requiring an advanced rating is that these divers will probably be more comfortable diving and better able to make a good decision when a rescue situation comes up.

Any BSAC divers want to chime in here? My understanding is you have to have rescue to gain the equalivent of an Open Water cert. How many new BSAC "Sports Divers" are unable to perform a rescue without putting themselves or others at risk?


James

 

[Gary D.]

Yes that is my question and I will give you my view about this first I think that 4 or 5 dives and you are certified is wrong. In June there was a death in Canada and this is why I am upset about when the Rescue course should be given. I believe a full Rescue course should be taught in conjunction with the basic open water course. Reason why most diver who complete a course will go diving with his new found diving buddy that just completed the same course and divers that are fresh off a course are more prone to do bad judgment call and like the accident that took place ( I don't know all the details) but I am told that they had just completed their basic course when the accident took place. Maybe proper Rescue training could of change the outcome. And by giving the rescue course it would give the diver more diving opportunity before they venture on their own. Right now in order to be able to attend the Rescue course you need you advance course. My wife has no intention to take an advance course because her goal is not to become a divemaster or instructor and she is happy with shallow dives. Some people will wait years before advancing but AN ACCIDENT CAN HAPPEN AT ANYTIME UNDERWATER this is why I think that the Rescue course should be done at the same time as the basic .

This can be determined in just a few simple words. "BEFORE YOU NEED IT!"

Years ago a basic OW course was what OW, AOW, Rescue and some others combined are today.

I don’t know for sure why it got broken up but IMHO it had to do with a high fail rate and the almighty $$$$.

Gary D.

 

[aquaoren]

Any BSAC divers want to chime in here? My understanding is you have to have rescue to gain the equalivent of an Open Water cert. How many new BSAC "Sports Divers" are unable to perform a rescue without putting themselves or others at risk?


James

Doesn't CMAS require those skills as well?

 

[Kim]

I believe that they both do. European agencies seem to have far higher standards than the larger American counterparts before they allow anyone to dive on their own. CMAS also teaches deco right from the beginning - down to 60 meters (BSAC - I don't know). That, however, is a point I made earlier. How many PADI/SSI/NAUI divers are there compared to BSAC/CMAS divers? I think that the answer is quite clear - and it's hard to claim it has nothing to do with money! In fairness to the American agencies though, I think it's fair to say that both BSAC and CMAS are training cold water divers - I've never seen either at a tropical warm water center. I personally think that if you want to dive cold/low vis/high current conditions you need a different training to warm water. I'd be the first to admit that although I have a reasonable level of warm water training - there's no way that I'm going to dive the North Sea for instance - without at least a checkout or twenty from a North Sea instructor! I've never used a dry suit for a start!!

 

[HammerNoMore]

Doesn't CMAS require those skills as well?

That seems doutfull to me. Here in the US the YMCA is affiliated with CMAS. If you get your OW with YMCA you can get a CMAS card by simply paying a fee. YMCA does not require rescue as part of the OW cirriculum.

James