AOW Class Max Depth 65 ft. ?????

[MXGratefulDiver]

I WANT a mask strap that sticks to my hair.

... so do I (sigh) ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[doctormike]

Isn't that what a scuba instructor is paid to do? To take newbies (i.e. AOW students) into situations that they have not yet been trained for and train them

I think that's a dramatic over-simplification and I think you're confused about the AOW deep specialty dive.

Sorry, not sure I understand why you think that this is an oversimplification. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you seemed to be saying that an AOW instructor shouldn't take his students to 100 feet in a quarry because it would be beyond their skill set. My point was that the whole idea of training was to bring divers into situations beyond their skill sets (and of course, within the bounds of safety) under the supervision of a qualified instructor.

It is not about getting to feel narc'd or going deeper than you've ever gone before. The deep dive is about dive planning, gas management, 1/3 gas rule, surface air consumption rates, and decompression theory. You can do all these things at 65 feet without sacrificing quality.

Yes. And you can do all these things at 25 feet as well. The only difference is that PADI has deemed 65 feet to be deep enough to qualify as a deep dive, so by agency standards, if fits the course requirements. But the OPs question was not "does a 65 foot dive fulfilled the PADI AOW requirements?". The question was what we thought about the handling of the class by the LDS. Clearly, both the student and the OP thought that 65 feet was less than they expected, so there is at least some controversy on this point.

@doctormike: Have you ever been to a quarry and have you ever done a deep dive there?

Yes, I have been diving at Dutch Springs and in the Northeast since around 1998.

Believe me... its not easy diving 'under the right set of circumstances'

Of course it's not easy. That's why it's an Advanced Open Water course.

and they can be far more challenging than anything a Caribbean reef dive will throw at you.

Yeah, I heard that.

 

[*dave*]

I believe the adrenalin release triggered by the apprehension and excitement of a deep checkout may mitigate narcosis to some extent. At least that's how I rationalized the fact that most students performed certain tasks better at depth than on the surface.

Narcosis manifests in ways that aren't necessarily perceptible. Recall, perception, focus, ability to follow a plan, fixation and time warp are all casualties of narcosis having real impact and potential consequences for deep divers. How often are these issues measured or even addressed during a debrief for deep checkouts?

 

[Colliam7]

At 30m the narcosis tests were simply ineffective - its not deep enough for proper impairment and the simply fact that the human brain adapts quickly to a task masked the effect. They do something on the surface, then underwater. So underwater is the 2nd time they've done a similar task in a short space of town so the increase in speed due to that adaptation often covered potential narcosis effects. . . Its still in the deep spec but it can be done deeper where there IS a much more pronounced narcotic effect.

OK, I better understand the point you were making. I wasn't questioning whether it was effective or not as much as commenting on the reason it was moved from Dive 1 to Dive 3. I agree with you - when you have people descend to 100 ft, do a task, and then ascend again within a matter of minutes, it is unlikely that narcosis will be particularly evident. At greater depth, and a longer/greater exposure to nitrogen, results may differ.

I usually have students do the Dive #3 timed task u/w first, then repeat it on the surface afterward. This is true with Dive #1 color recognition as well.

Either way its been removed from the adventure dive so should not be taught on that dive.

Agreed.

 

[Jim Lapenta]

It's one of the reasons that the combination lock, math problems, write their name backwards did not get included in my AOW when I wrote it. I decided that a task load at depth should have SOMETHING to do with diving. So we descend to the 90 ft platform after dropping stages at 50, and do a quick reaction check. Finger math problem. If they look ok I tie a reel off and we swim approx 30 yds to the ridge at 100. This is in a dark, silty bottom lake. I then hand them the reel to bring us back to the platform. Hopefully with out plowing into the bottom. This means they need to manage the reel and their light. Once back at the platform they untie the reel and hand it to me. We then head for the ascent line. Somewhere between the reel hand off and the actual beginning of the ascent I pull an out of air drill. We then ascend horizontally sharing air to the 50. Once there we retrieve and deploy the stage bottles. Best test I could come up with and not have to go into actual deco. Even though it is simulated on the way up using the stages.

 

[Bubbletrubble]

It's one of the reasons that the combination lock, math problems, write their name backwards did not get included in my AOW when I wrote it. I decided that a task load at depth should have SOMETHING to do with diving. So we descend to the 90 ft platform after dropping stages at 50, and do a quick reaction check. Finger math problem. If they look ok I tie a reel off and we swim approx 30 yds to the ridge at 100. This is in a dark, silty bottom lake. I then hand them the reel to bring us back to the platform. Hopefully with out plowing into the bottom. This means they need to manage the reel and their light. Once back at the platform they untie the reel and hand it to me. We then head for the ascent line. Somewhere between the reel hand off and the actual beginning of the ascent I pull an out of air drill. We then ascend horizontally sharing air to the 50. Once there we retrieve and deploy the stage bottles. Best test I could come up with and not have to go into actual deco. Even though it is simulated on the way up using the stages.

@Jim Lapenta: You are certainly task-loading your AOW students at depth, but how do you prove to the students that their suboptimal performances juggling all of those tasks at depth of 100 ffw are attributed to the cognitive deficits associated with narcosis? Later on, do you repeat the same or similar version of the series of tasks at a shallower depth? If so, how do you demonstrate that the student's improved performance at shallower depth isn't due to repetition/learning? You could do a series of tasks at shallower depths prior to the "deep" test, since one would expect repetition/learning to improve performance on the later trial. Poorer performance at depth would then be pretty persuasive.

 

[oldogre]

For my PADI AOW Deep dive (2-1), we did timed problem, before dive at 30m. (100ft.) & after dive. During ascent we both did simulated OOA with Instructor. Safety stop & final ascent was done on stage bottle which had been slung below the boat. This does not appear to be usual PADI!

 

[eponym]

Narcosis manifests in ways that aren't necessarily perceptible. Recall, perception, focus, ability to follow a plan, fixation and time warp are all casualties of narcosis having real impact and potential consequences for deep divers. How often are these issues measured or even addressed during a debrief for deep checkouts?

One of my approaches to testing these factors is to change positions (left/right, fast/slow, hiding above, etc.) to assess a student's awareness. I only do this one-on-one. Fixation and time warp are biggies, I agree. See below.

You are certainly task-loading your AOW students at depth, but how do you prove to the students that their suboptimal performances juggling all of those tasks at depth of 100 ffw are attributed to the cognitive deficits associated with narcosis? Later on, do you repeat the same or similar version of the series of tasks at a shallower depth? If so, how do you demonstrate that the student's improved performance at shallower depth isn't due to repetition/learning? You could do a series of tasks at shallower depths prior to the "deep" test, since one would expect repetition/learning to improve performance on the later trial. Poorer performance at depth would then be pretty persuasive.

One of my approaches is to charge students with logging on their slates the current run time, depth, and backgas pressure every three minutes. Do a slow trial run shallow (thirty feet). Give feedback.

Now swap out slates. Do a deep dive, with a slow meandering drop down a moderate bank. Take ten minutes to get deep. If they're not logging, remind them (using whatever signal you've devised for this task).

Once you're back on shore, compare results. Legibility is almost certain to vary wildly, in my experience.

I do other tasks deep but these two are major indicators for me.