PADI OW Final Exam Questions that are either wrong or just bad

[gamon]

PADI thinks every OOA situation is an emergency, does it not?
What is the difference between using your buddys air to ascend normally, and a controlled emergency ascent? Aren't they the same???

for you.

I have always been under the impression that a controlled emergency ascent is not the same as a normal ascent, for a variety of reasons, a quick search indicates that a diver continuously exhales during the ascent to avoid a lung over expansion injury. If the diver is breathing off the buddy's octo, this is completely unnecessary.

Does PADI think every OOA situation is an emergency? I don't know but if so it would seem they're are making a not so serious issue into a potentially dangerous situation by encouraging emergency procedures when none are actually necessary.

 

[Zef]

I have always been under the impression that a controlled emergency ascent is not the same as a normal ascent, for a variety of reasons, a quick search indicates that a diver continuously exhales during the ascent to avoid a lung over expansion injury. If the diver is breathing off the buddy's octo, this is completely unnecessary.

Does PADI think every OOA situation is an emergency? I don't know but if so it would seem they're are making a not so serious issue into a potentially dangerous situation by encouraging emergency procedures when none are actually necessary.

For the PADI Open Water Diver course, yes PADI thinks every OOA situation is an emergency.

Frankly, in 27 years of diving, I have yet to do a dive with anyone where running out of air was planned. The fact that running out of air can be mitigated by another person with enough air in their tank to get both divers to the surface, does not change the fact that running out of air is an exigent circumstance requiring one to deviate from normal procedure even if that deviation is for the diver(s) to start thinking about the exigent circumstance and that they should be ending the dive not in line with how they planned.

Again, in 27 years of diving, I have never briefed or been briefed that a dive will end normally with a buddy pair sharing an air source (outside a training environment)...running out of air is not the same as being low on air, and although it is best practice to discuss procedures, during a the dive brief/buddy check, for if a diver runs out of air, that does not make it a normal occurrence, and the planned or unplanned response to the OOA situation in part is recognition that exigent/urgent circumstances have arisen and one is taking action to mitigate those circumstances. In the context of the PADI Open Water Diver course, the procedure they teach, and what they expect someone within the context of the course to do is to treat it as an emergency ascent.

As has been explained, repeatedly, what you would do in the context of how you dive has no bearing on the objectives of the PADI course, or the exam, nor is PADI expecting anyone to answer the exam questions with any information outside of the course material they have provided.

-Z

 

[Subcooled]

I have always been under the impression that a controlled emergency ascent is not the same as a normal ascent, for a variety of reasons, a quick search indicates that a diver continuously exhales during the ascent to avoid a lung over expansion injury.

A controlled emergency ascent is without much breathing air. We can easily ascend from 60 or even 90 feet staying calm and exhaling as required. Plus a few breaths will become available at shallow depths. Sharing air is a though situation but not quite the emergency.

Obviously, there's an uncontrolled emergency ascent, too.
Whatever works for you.

If the diver is breathing off the buddy's octo, this is completely unnecessary.

True! It is simpler. Exhaling is still a must but it's much easier.

Does PADI think every OOA situation is an emergency?

I do not know, but if so it would seem they're are making a not so serious issue into a potentially dangerous situation by encouraging emergency procedures where none are actually necessary.

 

[gamon]

Frankly, in 27 years of diving, I have yet to do a dive with anyone where running out of air was planned.

Imagine that.

 

[BoltSnap]

but the question really wouldn't have made sense to me UNLESS I had read the course material and surmised that that is what the question was referring to--what you do when you find yourself in one of those "some cases" in which "the sticker or tag may already be partially completed."

The question and the whole test is testing you based on what you should have studied and learned in PADI's course material and the standards it sets not according what @Lorenzoid does in his own time

 

[Wibble]

The question and the whole test is testing you based on what you should have studied and learned in PADI's course material and the standards it sets not according what @Lorenzoid does in his own time

As long as you know nothing nor bring in any real-world experience then the PADI course assessment questions are fine and dandy.

However, if you treat the presence of someone else’s "sticker" as meaning the gas HAS NOT been analysed, tear that tape off and analyse the contents yourself writing your own sticker with gas contents to one decimal place, the date, and optionally MOD then you will probably fail the test.

Not least because the gas contents could have changed as the gasses homogenise if the cylinder has been left for a while.

 

[boulderjohn]

What is the difference between using your buddys air to ascend normally, and a controlled emergency ascent? Aren't they the same???

No, they are very different, and I have never heard or seen anyone anywhere else use the terms the way you are in this thread. These terms are really very standard in the scuba industry.

A controlled emergency ascent is without much breathing air. We can easily ascend from 60 or even 90 feet staying calm and exhaling as required. Plus a few breaths will become available at shallow depths. Sharing air is a though situation but not quite the emergency.

If you ascend without too much breathable air and go to the surface while breathing reasonably normally (and, yes, that will work), you are doing what is termed in the OW course as a normal ascent.

Obviously, there's an uncontrolled emergency ascent, too.

1. The first choice is a normal ascent.
2. The second is to share air with someone else.
3. The third choice is a controlled emergency ascent, in which the diver ascends while exhaling the whole way and while maintaining a normal, controlled ascent rate. This would include dumping air from the BCD to prevent a runaway ascent.
4. The fourth choice is a buoyant ascent, in which weights are dropped to allow for a more rapid ascent. This is normally done from deeper depths when the diver is unsure of making it in a controlled ascent.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

Wrong.
If it rains, the terrain will have an effect. Runoff...
If there are lots of tannis in the water (again the terrain...) then visibility is affected.
I have suffered the effects of both.

There is nothing, and I mean nothing, that affects viz worse than overweighted open water students taught in a silty location.

 

[Lorenzoid]

However, if you treat the presence of someone else’s "sticker" as meaning the gas HAS NOT been analysed, tear that tape off and analyse the contents yourself writing your own sticker with gas contents to one decimal place, the date, and optionally MOD then you will probably fail the test.

No, you will not fail the test. Your score will get dinged by one question--you may even miss more than one of these poorly crafted questions--and you will not be fazed because you still passed the test, and you will go diving with your new cert, and you will continue your education.

 

[Sevenrider860]

I have spoken to a number of folks who had their primaries ripped out of their mouths by an OOG diver who ran out of air/gas. They didn't signal anything.

I have been diving since 1983. In my lifetime I have personally seen 3 out of air divers where I was in a position to donate.

Not a single diver grabbed the regulator out of my mouth.

One diver was swimming towards me signaling OOA and I had the regulator out and in their hand when they arrived. I was diving with an Air2 at the time, so who knows if they would have grabbed that same regulator out of my mouth had I not been prepared.

The second time a diver approached me from the side. By the time I saw him it was obvious to me from his gaze, attention, and how he reached out as he approached that he was going for my alternate. Our hands touched as I pulled it free and he took it from there.

The third was on a mooring line on the Spiegel Grove on my safety stop. I was alerted to the **** show below me because two divers were coming up the line pretty quickly. I saw the OOA give the signal to his buddy and then he headed up the line immediately after the signal. I had my alternate out and waiting to give the guy as he swam up the line. He swam right by, ignoring the offered regulator and surfaced 13 feet above me.

Never once was the regulator ripped from my mouth. I am not saying it doesn’t happen, and I agree my sampling is pretty small, but I personally don’t think it happens as often as urban legends suggest it does.