OneBrightGator:
Waivers only hold up so far, they don't hold up in cases where it is obvious that the person signing the waiver did not have the skill to complete the dive or use the gas and in a court I am sure years of experience would be overlooked if the victim lacked the appropriate card.
Waivers are also there because we can teach safe diving til we're blue in the face, it doesn't mean students will practice it, but regardless we're held responsible.
You're not a diving professional, all this talk is coming out of somewhere, but it ain't both sides of your mouth.
Ben
False Ben.
Murley's next-of-kin tried this gambit when he bought it.
They lost. The waiver was ruled enforceable, despite their attempt to forum shop and claim that maritime law applied (rather than the law and venue
he agreed to when he signed the waiver.)
You are simply not being truthful here Ben, and you know it. This is particularly true in Florida, where dive waivers have been repeatedly held
fully enforceable. Indeed, case law makes them essentially bombproof in this state.
You want to argue you have some form of responsibility? Then take that responsibility. Until you do, you're simply not telling the truth. Paper talks and BS out of one's mouth walks.
You're not alone, of course. All the agencies take this position, and they and their insurance arms (which they negotiated the terms of the policies with - nothing like getting it written exactly how you want to suit your own desires) are delighted with this. They take essentially zero risk, you pay, the diver pays, everyone makes money and the diver gets his pocket picked and freedom incrementally restricted.
BTW, as for Ginnie, no you can't come in by the river and do what you want Mike.
Cave diving from publicically owned lands, which would include navigable waterways, is illegal within that county - banned by specific ordinance. The ordinance was carefully crafted to specifically except Ginnie. You can bet that Ginnie wasn't exactly unhappy with this state of affairs. As for Jackson county, there is noise being made about copying the Gilchrist county ordinance. Think it won't/can't happen? Oh yes it can, and all those agencies that some of you claim to love so much
are the reason it will!
This kind of "creeping regulation", as I have repeatedly pointed out, doesn't happen all at once. It happens slowly over the course of many years. Those who are "in the bizness" love it, as it means that they have the ability to sell yet another card and impose yet anothe requirement.
Not all that long ago, you needed nothing to dive. No card, no anything. Then the marketing folks got involved along with their unholy alliance with the insurance carriers and suddenly you needed a card to buy fills. People who had been diving for 20 years were forced to buy an OW class in order to keep getting their gas. I know several people who went through this; some resisted with varying degrees of success for varying periods of time, but by now essentially all have knuckled under.
But that wasn't enough. Then some fine folks down in Florida got the bright idea that they could force 4 classes - at $200-400 each or more - down the throats of those who wanted to dive in caves. And suddenly, places like Ginne, instead of seeing you as a $25 admission fee, saw 'ya as a $1600 paycheck. Not bad, and it works even better if you can get the county to ban diving
by law in the other, publically-owned springheads around the area so you can actually
enforce your pocket-picking!
Lately, the AOW craze has caught on. Of course there aren't all that many cave divers compared to OW divers, but boy, those OW divers are fairly plentiful. Now suddenly the agencies have created this "60' limit" for OW cards, which of course puts a lot of dive sites "off limits" - unless you buy their offered $195
diving license to exceed that 60' limit.
My relatively-recent calls around to shops running trips to the SG this winter proved this out. Every one of them insisted on an AOW card. They were unwilling to accept a logbook, even one from a dive computer (which is damn hard to forge), showing dives to depths well beyond the sand at the SG. No AOW, no dive. Period. Of course if you don't have the AOW, they were
all willing to sell me one - for $195 - and THEN take me to the SG - if I had the time.
(No, I didn't tell them that I had the requisite card - I told them I had a log with several dozen dives exceeding 100', and asked if that was good enough. To an individual shop, they said "no".)
Good thing I can drag my little boat down there and give them all the finger, eh? At least for now I can. How long before that "medallion" becomes mandatory, and to get it, you must flash that "AOW" card - or something even more that PADI and the rest dream up?
As for the claim that this is all about a few people cacking themselves, that's a lie too. How many people fall over dead from a MI on the golf course every year? Ever hear about someone trying to ban golf, or require you to have a physical before you can play? No? Why not?
I'll tell you why not - there isn't a golf-course-owners-association that has an MD on staff at every course where they could make $150 per golfer getting his "golf medical."
But after each of these fatalities, the apologists from the various agencies show up, crowing that
if only he {had a card|had followed the card's rules} that diver would be alive.
Advocacy? You bet - advocacy that results in YOU becoming part of their money-making scheme.
Either be part of the solution or you're part of the problem.
