Discover scuba safety ratios of student to instructor

[Yarbrough]

free of any inherent dangers...

you mean like water to breathe right?

At the end of the day, all we can do is attempt to mitigate risks. There is no possible way to remove risk from SCUBA, and as was pointed out earlier, bad things can happen even when you are close enough to touch, or even touching your diver. The discussion on reducing ratios is a difficult one due to the amount of money made conducting these classes.

For example, an open water class lasts 3 days, takes classroom space, access to a pool and travel to open water sites. One set of gear and one instructors time is taken for the duration of the class. Say approximately 30 hours are put into the program, and the class was 500.00, that is 16.00 per hour. Now, a typical DSD program is 3 to 4 hours, and around 100.00, that is 25.00 per hour or better. When you get into other expenses, the difference is even more obvious. It is hard to get a shop owner, who is looking at the bottom line to want to reduce ratios because that cuts in to profit.

In perfect conditions, with the best students you can imagine, is 4 divers unrealistic? Nope, and the training agencies, and common sense dictates that if warranted, reduce ratios. Is it the fault of the agency if this suggestion is ignored by the instructor? Sadly, no... Personally, I conducted DSDs for years, and held to the 2 to 1 ratio in open water, and conducted most of my programs in confined open spaces with assistants just to protect myself. We need to focus more on teaching Instructors how to assert their personal standards into the classes they are conducting, and not just rely on the mandates from our training agencies to do our thinking for us.

 

[KDAD]

Feel bad for the parents...

I have done two discover dives. The first was a two tank dive to 30 ft. after ~two hours in the classroom and 30 minutes in confined water. One instructor to two DSD and three OW 'vacation' divers. Enjoyed the freedom to dive but looking back can see the risks that were taken.

The other had no classroom, brief pool work, but one DM to each discover diver, with the DMs practically tethered to the DSDs holding onto their jackets as they dove, and a fourth DM for the two OW 'vacation' divers. My DM stayed close by and let me dive freely as I seemed to know what I was doing and was very comfortable underwater. Three dives (15 ft., 15 ft., and 30 ft.). Although I looked at the other DSDs and felt bad for them tethered, I guess I can appreciate the attention that they were getting and the minimizing of risk.

Although more skills were probably learned in the first scenario, the second with the tethered divers was most likely safer.

 

[eelnoraa]

DSD in anywhere other than a completely controlled environment (like a pool) is just nut

 

[beanojones]

So, as the person probably who has done more of these than most (1500 DSDs actually registered with PADI, roughly ten times that done as intro dives not PADI DSD dives and thus not registered.), I can pass judgment on DSD accidents without knwoing any of the particulars.

There are a couple of things at play in the industry in general.

One is that there is not really a strong distinction made by many instructors doing these intro dive between DSD and Open Water divers in training. I see instructors free swimming their intros, and kneeling their OW students. And my mind, she is blown.

A second is that those doing the job awhile have been working on the safety much harder than any agency has.

some stuff experienced people learned:

The guys doing this the longest time (thus counting on the law of averages to shake out those doing funky stuff) have been developing and following community standards, and not any agency standards. Lawsuits are not even going to concern themselves with whatever nonsense PADI (or any other agency for that matter) has to say about things, they are going to go straight to community standards.

Smart intro dive leaders switched to four to one long before PADI, or any other agency, did. The smart ones who expect to be doing this awhile always have a float in the water, and always have their divers on the float line.

I only worked very shortly one place where I had the luxury of a pool then ocean, so that has not been something I have ever had much experience with. To be honest, I do not want the pool anyway because I seen my job as exposing divers to the ocean while ensuring their safety.

One hard and fast rule is always "no means no". Any diver who wants out should be given the easy option of checking something on the health form to avoid having to be peer-pressured into doing this. Especially in the Japanese market, rookie instructors seem to forget that some people can't say directly they don't want to do it, and are looking for an out, and checking anything on the health form is supposed to be an out so they check some box. And then the stupid Japanese rookie instrcutor starts talking about their supposedly confidential health issues with them. "No means no".

 

[dberry]

I've never done a DSD or "try dive", but before I starting reading SB I assumed it would be similar to the novice skydives promoted to tourists. The ones where a birthday-boy with a midlife crisis is bolted piggy-backed to a instructor for the jump. This may be a common misconception about DSD among tourists. I now understand why DSD is potentially MUCH more dangerous than jumping from a plane; dive shops offering DSD should work hard to dispel that impression when promoting a try dive.

 

[demed]

So, as the person probably who has done more of these than most (1500 DSDs actually registered with PADI, roughly ten times that done as intro dives not PADI DSD dives and thus not registered.), I can pass judgment on DSD accidents without knwoing any of the particulars.

...
Smart intro dive leaders switched to four to one long before PADI, or any other agency, did. ...

16500 DSDs, 1:1 ratio, 4 hours a day (8 students for 30mins.) == 2,000 days or 5.5 yrs doing DSDs every day, 7 days a week, Xmas included (for a regular person doing DSDs an avg of 4 days a week it would mean about 9.2 years)....

---------- Post added March 25th, 2015 at 08:18 AM ----------

I've never done a DSD or "try dive", but before I starting reading SB I assumed it would be similar to the novice skydives promoted to tourists. The ones where a birthday-boy with a midlife crisis is bolted piggy-backed to a instructor for the jump. This may be a common misconception about DSD among tourists. I now understand why DSD is potentially MUCH more dangerous than jumping from a plane; dive shops offering DSD should work hard to dispel that impression when promoting a try dive.

i think you have drawn the wrong conclusions.

 

[divezonescuba]

Twenty five years ago, my first dive was a DSD in the ocean off of Aruba. Believe it or not, our group actually penetrated a shallow wreck. While the last person in the group, I went positive while swimming through a cargo hold. No matter how hard I swam down, I could not reach the bulkhead door. I ended up being pinned to the top of the hold. Fortunately, I remembered from my one hour / 4 language class that if you pushed this one button, air would come out, and you would descend. I doubt I would have been found in time had I not made it out.

I think about that dive almost every time I instruct a class. I am surprised that there are not more accidents on DSDs. We only do DS in the shallow end of the pool.

 

[beanojones]

16500 DSDs, 1:1 ratio, 4 hours a day (8 students for 30mins.) == 2,000 days or 5.5 yrs doing DSDs every day, 7 days a week, Xmas included (for a regular person doing DSDs an avg of 4 days a week it would mean about 9.2 years)....

Actually it's more like 4 at a time, 4-12 a day now. The time I shoot for with intros is gear up to gear off in under 1.5 hours. So three hours in the morning for 8, and then another 1.5 hrs in afternoon for 4 more. I have worked recently at operations where we ran kids from a big school throughout the day and I would dive 30-40 in day, with high hitting 46. In general though the market has slowed down considerably from the peak.

20 years of teaching all levels intro to tech, but you got the "no Xmas off" right. There was a stretch in the 90's before the Asian economic crisis hit hard where I did five straight years with no days off. 1000 OW/AOW/ Some Rescue/Some DM a year for two years, then I took over an intro dive operation and did 8-20 intros a day for three straight years.

No days off means just that 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year.

The 16500 is probably be on the low side.

Japan got no holidays to match ours, so Xmas, Thanksgiving, and SuperBowl Sunday (or Super Bowl Monday in Palau) are all work days unless they are not. They used to always be. Now random days off appear out of nowhere.

I think people who don't know about the Japanese market in general, and the intro dive market in specific, have no idea about the scale of it. Even now with the falling Japanese birth rate seriously affecting their economy, there are still many days of several hundred intro divers at the beach spread over 4-5 companies, and for the OW market, several times a year I am part of teams teaching 150-300 person OW courses over two or three days.

And there are people I work with who did groups in Okinawa of 500-600 intros all employes of a single company on a company vacation, in a single day, with the classroom being done in an auditorium seating the whole group at once. They used basically all of the boats and instructor in the area.

The max I processed through the operation I managed was 120 a day with 6 instructors.

(I have posted about running an intro operation in the I2I forum before if you have access there and you want to read it, but I am not allowed in I2I anymore, so I cannot give you the link.)

 

[DandyDon]

I did Discover three times over the years...

First was as a teenager in a local pool, and the Instructor did not get in the pool with us if my 50 year memory is correct. I think she said I'd still have to do the regular course when I got older to get my full cert so I lost interest, but my memory is questionable.

Did it on Saba I think it was while on a tall ship cruise stop about 20 years ago. I think there was a class, pool time with no Inst, then was to dive a reef with another student as a buddy. She panicked, I encouraged her to follow me, so someone on the boat told me to go away. I dived alone, Inst in sight but not close, and survived in spite of actions.

A few years later, I did another tall ship cruise stop at Nevis, a very short on boat class, then 3 dives over 2 days with an Inst as my buddy. That was probably the safest of the times, altho we did get to 100 feet down once.

I wouldn't want any of my family to do any of the dives I got away with now.

We only do DS in the shallow end of the pool.

How does that even work...??

 

[eelnoraa]

I have done DSD a few times in my life. The first time was before I was a certified OW diver in Mexico, twice in a LDS pool, once in catalina Avalon dive park and once in Hawaii. All except the first time was for moral support for friends.

If I were to recall, the first experience in mexico was down right dangerous. It was 1:4 ratio. There wasn't much site or equipment briefing at all. All we were told was to follow the instructors, and the what the bottons does on a BC. And the worst was there is no briefing on how bad it is if we hold our breath. We were told "just keep breathing". The site was OW water on the pacific coast. Everything went well. I had lots of fun. But I didn't know what I didn't know.

The 2 times in LDS pool were conducted properly IMO. With a lot of video instruction, equipment overview, clearing mask .... Almost like the initial part of OW class. So I felt confident about DSD again.

Then the catalina and Hawaii, OMG. In Avalon, we were the only two doing DSD with one instructor. So ratio is good. But I think because there were only two of us, the shop/instructor was making enough profit, so the instructor rushed. Minimal predive instruction. My friend couldn't descent and clear ears. After a few attend, the instructor "tried to help" by deflating her BC and pull her down. I was like "****", hell no. I thumbed and aborted the dive. We paid $90 each, and of course didn't get refund. But I was like better be safe than sorry.

In Hawaii one was on Monokini boat. Nothing really went wrong. They were brief and extensively on equipments. I keep emphasizing to my group (6) that keep breathing is important, or "you will die". In water, there must be like 20 DSD and 2-3 staff (one of them is a photographers). I was like OMG. It was my most stressful 20 minutes 30ft dive ever.

So from now on, no more DSD in OW on my watch.