Question for old timers - NAUI OW class, early 1970s

[kensuf]

As University of Alabama student did indeed die doing the exercise perhaps 7-8 years ago. The instructor was SSI. The exercise was not then (and is not now) part of the SSI curriculum, so the instructor added it on her own. She was not physically supervising the incident when it happened. I never heard the results of the lawsuit, but I imagine the insurance company settled very high and very fast.

A couple decades ago a landmark study of student incidents during training revealed that breath holding on ascent, leading to embolism, was the number one cause of student injuries and fatalities. The prime culprit was the CESA. As a result, PADI and most other agencies adopted extremely strict rules on how the CESA must be done, with the instructor very much in control of the situation at all times and ready to intervene if the student is detected holding the breath. I do not know for sure, but I suspect that is when the doff and don left most instructional practices. The student does not have to hold the breath long during an ascent to cause a problem.

I certainly don't know the rules of all agencies, but for most of the mainstream ones, if the instructor is doing the doff and don, it is in addition to the curriculum and against the wishes of the agency. If there were to be an accident, the instructor would have a tough time defending it in court.

Doff and don? That should be standard. Scuba ditch? Not on your life.

BTW -- Doff and don is still part of the WRSTC standards. Item #16, page 10. http://wrstc.com/downloads/03 - Open Water Diver.pdf

 

[boulderjohn]

Doff and don? That should be standard. Scuba ditch? Not on your life.

BTW -- Doff and don is still part of the WRSTC standards. Item #16, page 10. http://wrstc.com/downloads/03 - Open Water Diver.pdf

We are obviously using the phrase differently. In my experience, the exercise being discussed in this thread was called doff and don.

 

[rhwestfall]

1988 - YMCA - yep!

We did a whole bunch of things that were basically to show you were comfortable in & below the water. They weren't "day 1" skills, but worked into over a much longer time than currently utilized training program. I can see that in the fast paced way of instruction now, this is "dangerous" to the students...

 

[USdiver1]

1977 PADI (using The New Science of Skin and Scuba Diving text) D&D was one of the required skills in the Basic Scuba Diver class. Our first pool session consisted of a timed distance swim (no mask fins or snorkels allowed). Of 22 who entered the water, only 14 were judged proficient enough to continue with the class following that pool session.

Buddy breathing, D&D, Blackout swim along a submerged line performing different skills at the different stations, u/w harassment (i.e. Divemasters removing your mask, shutting off your tank valve, removing your mouthpiece/2nd stage) were all part of earning your C-card back in the day. And that doesn't even cover the in-class portions of underwater physiology and physics.

Who remembers this mnemonic, better ventilated drawers pamper people's hind sides and chill tushies?

Better = Boyle
Ventilated = Volume
Drawers = Dalton
Pamper = Partial
People's = Pressure
Hind = Henry
Sides = Solubility
Chill = Charles
Tushies = Temperature

Say what you will about the equipment, but the classes back in the 50s, 60s, and 70s produced damn good scuba divers.

 

[boulderjohn]

Buddy breathing, D&D, Blackout swim along a submerged line performing different skills at the different stations, u/w harassment (i.e. Divemasters removing your mask, shutting off your tank valve, removing your mouthpiece/2nd stage) were all part of earning your C-card back in the day. And that doesn't even cover the in-class portions of underwater physiology and physics.

Not all of these skills were part of every class because not all of them were part of the standards. If you are a student, it can be hard to know what is part of the class because of agency standards and what is part of the class because your instructor chose to do it. Now, I don't know exactly what was required in class then, but my study of historical documents tells me that much of this was implemented by individual instructors rather than agency policy. I know that the commonly done harassment described above was done by some but not all instructors. A NAUI history written in part by Al Tillman (NAUI Instructor #1) makes it clear that when they first saw it happening by instructors in the gathering of instructors that eventually led to the founding of NAUI, the leaders were surprised and did not approve. It had not been part of the training on scuba instruction they had learned at the Scripps Institute and made the standards of practice when they created the Los Angeles County system.

There are people who do this sort of thing today, but they do so without agency approval and will have a difficult time explaining it in court of they have an accident. I know of a case in a technical diving class in which two students were almost killed in an incident of shutting off of air supplies.

 

[rhwestfall]

ah yes, the swimming test...

 

[Jim Lapenta]

I was teaching this exercise as part of the SEI OW class as recently as 2013. It was the first demonstration skill for students I had to learn in 2007 as a YMCA/NAUI DM.

At DEMA in 2013 the UA incident was brought up and we were told that we could no longer do this as part of the OW class. Really sucked since it was, and is, a great confidence builder and gear familiarity exercise. It also taught good problem solving skills. It is still in the DM/AI/Instructor courses.

There was some heated discussion over this since it had been a YMCA skill for decades.

We were advised to substitute other drills to accomplish this in the OW class.
Station breathing, where everyone removes their BC and swims to another persons and dons that unit.
We can also use gear switching while sharing air or buddy breathing.

At least we still get to do the bailout. This is where you sit on the edge of the pool with all gear in your lap. Weight belt bandoleer style over the shoulder, air on and reg in the mouth. You fall in and as you are descending you start donning your gear. The DM version is everything is in your hands, reg in, air off, you jump into the water, turn the air on, and start donning gear.

 

[g8orjet]

I remember a variation of this drill while certifying in 1980... the whole class had their equipment thrown to the bottom of the pool, we all went at the same time, first step was to grab any mask and BC/tank/reg you could find (don't worry about weights, fins and such until later, figure it out as you go) and then begin the process of trading out with the others underwater until everyone had their own stuff. I was a bit nervous about this drill but it all worked out, taught us (or at least me) the power of staying calm in a hectic situation... a valuable drill imo.

 

[frndrfoe]

My least favorite was when they lined our masks with aluminum foil and played mean tricks on us like knocking the regulator out of mouths, turning off air, and flooding masks. That was the pool final exam.

 

[Kevrumbo]

Not sure if this is the correct forum or not.

A friend in her 60s got certified through NAUI in the early 1970s. She said the following was part of the class:

You went down to the deep end of the pool, took all your scuba gear off, and swam back to the surface. You then swam back down, put all your gear back on, and then back to the surface.

She was surprised that wasn't part of the SDI OW class I'm in the midst of (check out dives in about three weeks). I asked my instructors about it today. They said it's not done anymore as students died while doing it. Any clue when that skill was dropped? I was just curious. The thought scared the heck out of me!

I did that as part of my NAUI Basic Open Water course back in and as late as 1997 (the last couple of years Sport Chalet was NAUI and then subsequently switched over to PADI). It was called the "Ditch n' D'on" drill. . .