Your favorite certification agency ...

[mmadiver]

I did some diving with an ex SEAL in the Philippines. He was trained to go down and disarm nukes that had gone down on a ship or plane etc. He was definitely comfortable in the water but by Scubaboard standards of perfect trim, low air consumption, not touching anything etc....he sucked....of course, I probably do too. Great guy though.

BTW, your buddy's claim is complete BS.

 

[WhiteSands]

My vote goes to GUE as well. High training standards, people can and do fail courses, non profit, sound decisions that benefits divers instead of bottom line, high quality control of instructors, conferences for info sharing and learning, thought leaders.

Also, openess, published training standards, high ethics.

 

[nimoh]

Perhaps a better caption: my student here couldn't get neutral. Maybe it's a gear problem?

Lighten up, gang!

he fits a lot of the criteria for a good SB scuba diver:

no split fins,
no mask on forehead,
no jacket BC,
no air2,
and diving with a buddy

 

[Akimbo]

To be fair to my ex SEAL buddy, he had diving skills. He just wasn't too alarmed at being vertical under the water, or putting his finger on a rock for stability, and he did suck a tank down fast. But he was a good buddy. I know he had my back. He wasn't a coral cruncher by any means.

For sure, sensitivity isn't in their DNA. However buoyancy skills are. Combat swimmers follow a compass mid-water for more miles than you can imagine. They nail neutral buoyancy by necessity. I have known several US and Brit navy combat swimmers who mentioned that never touched the bottom unless entering or exiting the water. Low SAC rates on an Oxygen rebreather also has little value. Definitely different skill sets.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

Talk to this dude about buoyancy and trim.

View attachment 173696

Then tell him he doesn't know how to dive.

Certification agency? Anyone?

NASA ... he was part of the B-9 program ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[TMHeimer]

he fits a lot of the criteria for a good SB scuba diver:

no split fins,
no mask on forehead,
no jacket BC,
no air2,
and diving with a buddy

Only one I do is the no air2. I'm not a good SB diver at all.

 

[Peter Guy]

S.D.SideM wrote

It just doesn't seem like good educational practice to switch instructors (or countries!) for each portion of a diver's initial training. I feel strongly about continuity when teaching foundational skills, and that's hard to reinforce when the deck keeps getting shuffled.

Well, to go back to why I like PADI as a certification agency and the modularity of the Open Water class. I don't see the problem here that you seem to identify. There are three parts to the Open Water Class within PADI (and the others really) -- "Book Work" -- done online, in person or self-study -- all three with evaluations (i.e. testing) which is "objective." There really isn't any particular reason why that needs to be done by the same person who teaches the physical skills, is there?

Confined Water module which is where the "foundational skills" are taught (at least in theory). Here I do pretty much agree with you that having the same instructor teach the foundational skills may be beneficial -- or at the very least all the instructor corps should be on the same page. It can be somewhat of a cluster to have really different types doing the foundational teaching.

Evaluation -- Open Water -- In many ways, it actually might make more sense for the evaluation module to be done by someone other than the "teaching" instructor.

In any event, as I wrote, I like, and appreciate, how PADI has structured its program to allow for the flexibility for the student.

 

[Hank49]

BTW, your buddy's claim is complete BS.

That very well could be true. I didn't have any way to verify his claim.

He was in the service in the 60s and 70s. The only proof of anything military he showed me was being on a ship that picked up one of the Apollo missions after splashing down. He had pictures of the capsule but honestly, I couldn't even verify if it was a Gemini or what.

 

[mmadiver]

That very well could be true. I didn't have any way to verify his claim.

He was in the service in the 60s and 70s. The only proof of anything military he showed me was being on a ship that picked up one of the Apollo missions after splashing down. He had pictures of the capsule but honestly, I couldn't even verify if it was a Gemmeni or what.

The "disarming" and recovery of nukes underwater would be a Navy EOD mission not Seals. You'd be surprised how often you run into posers on dive boats, especially on the coasts around the large Navy bases. It's always fascinating to listen in as they elaborately describe their operational days and outlandish service achievements when they were an operator. What's even funner is to subtlety let them know you're on to their BS and that it's time to sit down and be quiet. I guess it never occurs to to them that there might be somebody on board that walks the walk - how humiliating for those miserable wretches.

 

[Doppler]

For sure, sensitivity isn't in their DNA. However buoyancy skills are. Combat swimmers follow a compass mid-water for more miles than you can imagine. They nail neutral buoyancy by necessity. I have known several US and Brit navy combat swimmers who mentioned that never touched the bottom unless entering or exiting the water. Low SAC rates on an Oxygen rebreather also has little value. Definitely different skill sets.

A buddy, now long gone unfortunately, once explained to me that a Royal Navy clearance diver would be perfectly capable of getting himself to the back of "any cave in Florida" and out again... just like a Monte Carlo Rally Driver could drive an ice-cream truck. "You might end up with a few Eskimo bars and Fudgsicles on the floor, but he'd get the job done."

I have a whole lot of respect for anyone who served his or her country regardless of whether they carried a rifle or a ****ing frying pan, but man, when you talk about big balls, those dudes take the friggin' cake.