If you are a new diver, please read this

[Gombessa]

To say you should be getting all of your training in the first course is the same as saying you should be taught your entire four year degree in college in the first year.

We're talking about utterly basic concepts that are required to conduct a safe dive. It's more like saying, "This is how to walk across a street. Now you try. Good! Come back in three months and we'll teach you how to look both ways first."

 

[bill-da-ho]

We're talking about utterly basic concepts that are required to conduct a safe dive. It's more like saying, "This is how to walk across a street. Now you try. Good! Come back in three months and we'll teach you how to look both ways first."

you mean utterly basic, like what they teach you in padi ow,, 1/3's. Yea, I got that. Now lets expand on it,,, Padi could even put these concepts on their web site,, or they could be posted here even with a sticky,,, the point isnt to just keep complaining about what is wrong with the system, its what people have to do to either change it, or find the info elsewhere. I"m guessing by the way this post is going,, Padi isnt going to all of a sudden start alotting more time for this, so lets find anotehr way to do it that works for everyone. Personally, as far as this original post was concerned,, what I took from it first is that this person didnt dump their weight, and also didnt inflate their bc orally. These are also basic skills, not practiced enough. that doesnt mean that it has to be practiced 500 times in OW,, these and other skills should be practiced on each dive. This is my game plan anyhow.

 

[RonFrank]

This entire discussion is based on the premise that agencies do NOT teach gas management. After reviewing the text (and I already knew mine DID), they do, or at least PADI does.

How can ANY agency NOT teach gas management even if it is at a basic level?

There were also other factors at work here, including that this was NOT a brand new just certified diver. This was a diver at 100' feet who I'm *GUESSING* had been there before?

Let's not turn this into an agency bashing thread. I for one, would like a LOT more information on exactly how things went wrong. If that is not forthcoming, then everything else becomes just speculation.

 

[BubblesUp]

Is there anything in the standards that say you can't teach something about gas management after they've been certified?

Nope.

My husband and I do that when we teach OW. Student divers are told to expect to do five OW dives during their certification weekend. The first four dives (assuming all standards are met) get them certified. Then we hit a topic we've touched on all weekend: "Tables and computers let you plan how long nitrogen levels will let you safely stay at a given depth. SAC rates and gas planning tell you how long the cylinder on your back should last at at that depth. The two don't always match, and we think it's important for you to understand both pieces of the planning puzzle."

We then give a more in depth lesson on gas planning: how to calculate individual SAC rates, how to use that number to determine how long a cylinder will last at a given depth, etc. Preparing for the fifth dive we say, "Okay. You're certified divers now, and we want you to plan the dive. Tell us your planned and contingency time and depth and then prove the dive is doable given NDL and your own SAC rate." Sneaky instructors that we are, activities on the last dive are all about practicing buoyancy.

A few divers choose to leave after dive four. Most who stay appreciate the added knowledge and experience. My personal belief is that even new divers should walk away from their OW cert dives knowing more than just when to turn around or ascend; they should go into the water knowing about how long the dive should last at the planned depth. The approach we take when teaching helps bridge the gap between minimum requirements and what I believe they deserve to be exposed to.

 

[Thalassamania]

This entire discussion is based on the premise that agencies do NOT teach gas management. After reviewing the text (and I already knew mine DID), they do, or at least PADI does.

How can ANY agency NOT teach gas management even if it is at a basic level?

There were also other factors at work here, including that this was NOT a brand new just certified diver. This was a diver at 100' feet who I'm *GUESSING* had been there before?

Let's not turn this into an agency bashing thread. I for one, would like a LOT more information on exactly how things went wrong. If that is not forthcoming, then everything else becomes just speculation.

How do you square what you are saying with post from earlier in this thead that I guess you missed:

Husband writing -- I am NOT into Agency Bashing -- in no small part because I've been trained by 5 (?) different agencies (maybe 6 or 7 depending on how you count A.G.!).

During my IDC (Instructor Development Course) I have heard many good things said which would indicate that this particular Instructor REALLY is trying to raise the bar and encourage a significantly higher standard of training within his (my) agency. Good Stuff!

It is true that I was told NOT to teach "Gas Management" at the Open Water Level --- and I described the conversation in another thread (in the Instructor Forum, a closed forum). What Lynne (my wife) left OUT of her statement was that I was encouraged to teach, hell, TOLD to teach OW students how depth affects (increases) gas usage. In fact, it is both graphically and verbally described in the text that your "available gas" decreases (dramatically) with depth. (Here I'm using "available gas" as a shorthand to say that you are breathing "X" times as many molecules at "Y" depth as you are on the surface -- thus shortening the amount of time you may spend at "Y" depth.)

As far as I can tell, what I'm NOT supposed to say is that this is "Gas Management" nor am I supposed to say "You, as a new diver, will probably breathe about 1 ft3/minute at the surface and thus will have 72 minutes of air with this tank at the surface but only 36 minutes of air at 33 feet." But I can say, "IF it took you 72 minutes to breathe this tank at the surface, it would take you 36 minutes at 33 feet -- BUT we really don't know HOW long it will take so PAY STRICT ATTENTION to your computer/SPG!" This, is NOT, gas management -- but I think I can live with something pretty close to it!

And no one has said anything about NOT providing some "Rules of Thumb" such as "Don't Dive Below the Size of Your Tank!"

For those of you who don't know, Lynne is pretty raw on this whole subject at the moment and this death has hit her pretty hard.

 

[jeckyll]

I don't think there is anything wrong with new divers understanding the calculations required to gauge what it takes to be able to get them and a buddy to the surface if the smelly stuff hits the spinning blades.

I didn't have a clear understanding of it coming out of my OW course. I was lucky (and I searched for more information early on) and found Lamont's post on Rock bottom. The whole thing seemed pretty damn important to me. So I actually wrote the rock bottom pressures on my light (based on AL80's, all I dove at the time).

Not everyone will pursue that path and seek the information. Just like many (most?) divers rarely practice any emergency skills away from their training.

If the agencies make new divers believe that they are ready to go diving and gathering experience they should provide the necessary info. And yes, I _know_ that you can go and argue just what's necessary. And you can argue that it wasn't gas management that killed this diver. It was this skill or that skill.

I doubt her friends and family care which specific skill it was that caused her to die.

It's really unfortunate that these threads always degrade into arguments that take away from I think is the main point. Which is that those "basic" skills need to be practiced and perfected. Whether it's mask clearing in frigid waters, dropping weight in an emergency or calculating how much gas you actually need. And that just because you are an OW diver, that doesn't mean that you know enough for more advanced dives.

 

[TSandM]

Peter asked me to post on this thread and revise my original statements. He CAN teach gas management. He CAN teach that a tank lasts half as long at 30 feet as it does at the surface. What he can't do is SAC rate calculations, and planning how long a tank will last for that individual diver.

There were several components to this fatal accident, and it only started with running low, and eventually out of gas. I do not know what agency trained this diver, so I certainly can't blame anybody specific for poor training. But I can certainly believe that, had they not run low on gas, none of the other issues would have been a problem, and the dive would have ended uneventfully.

 

[Thalassamania]

Sac rate caculations are the heart of gas management, I'd have no problem describing a course that lacked SAC rate as an integral part of gas management as dangerous.

 

[BHB ScubaTroll]

Sunday, a diver died at a local site, because she and her buddy ran short of gas at depth, and she ran out on ascent, panicked, couldn't get positive at the surface, sank and drowned.

My husband is taking his instructor course right now, and has been told in no uncertain terms that he may NOT teach gas management at the OW level.

I am not aware of any organization training that does not include gas management in their curriculum. Please enlighten me as to what organization is currently discouraging/not teaching gas management at the OW level...

Thanks...

 

[Thalassamania]

I am not aware of any organization training that does not include gas management in their curriculum. Please enlighten me as to what organization is currently discouraging/not teaching gas management at the OW level...

Thanks...

PADI, you are not permitted to teach SAC calculations, the heart and soul of gas management.