Newbie's - Are we Prepared?

[nagel]

Goatfish Face, I'm the original poster. I didn't mean to offend you or anybody else from Australia about the comments in the original post - I really don't think you took it that way, but thought I should clear it up a little. I'd love to go to Australia, but as you can see I do have respect for what is in the ocean and being very naive from the States, we (or atleast I) often hear about the crocs, sharks, rays, and other creatures living in the water off the coast of Australia. This became center stage with the recent death of Steve Irwin. (Not sure if this even really happened in Australia, but he was highly reconginized as a "Daredevil Australian" and thus the association). Obviously, dangers are in the waters throughout the world also. The only point I was trying to make is that somebody with a couple hours of classroom training and 4 controlled dives under their belt, are they really prepared to tackle the conditions that they could face in an environment such as Australia or anyplace for that matter?

Again, if I offended you or anybody else from Australia, it certainly was not my intent. Very true, there are many other risks everywhere, sharp shells, drivers, falling rocks from the sky, etc.

S. Nagel

 

[in_cavediver]

This thread dances on several topics that have been argued vehemently on other threads. cavdiver, I don't know if that's the target of BOW, certainly wasn't for me, but I think it equates well to what one learns. That's about all I really felt confident in doing so I immediatley took AOW. A previous poster brought up AOW. If and when to take AOW has been argued many times in various threads. IMHO, people get more hung up on the title than the content (I've stated that several times). Given the brevity of BOW, doesn't it make sense to get more dives with an instructor doing more bouyancy skills, navigation, low viz and depth?

You say based on DM'ing you'd make several changes, I'd be interested to know what they are.

JR

I use to DM for Mike Ferrara. He has posted his thoughts/methods many times in the past. A search will yield much (MikeFerrara is his username) Again, the gist of it is requiring students to have some aspects such as buoyancy somewhat under control prior to leaving the pool. He also taught the skills horizontally and worked on trim throughout the course. Lastly, his graduation dive was basically two students planning a dive as if they were certified and doing it on their own. (with an instructor or DM tagging along). He made these changes slowly and unfortuneately, he was bitter and burned out from teaching just when he was turning out good BOW divers. I won't say I agreed with everything he did but 95%-99% was spot on.

 

[joe rock]

I use to DM for Mike Ferrara. He has posted his thoughts/methods many times in the past. A search will yield much (MikeFerrara is his username) Again, the gist of it is requiring students to have some aspects such as buoyancy somewhat under control prior to leaving the pool. He also taught the skills horizontally and worked on trim throughout the course. Lastly, his graduation dive was basically two students planning a dive as if they were certified and doing it on their own. (with an instructor or DM tagging along). He made these changes slowly and unfortuneately, he was bitter and burned out from teaching just when he was turning out good BOW divers. I won't say I agreed with everything he did but 95%-99% was spot on.

Thanks.

JR