Terrible Advanced open water experience

[havnmonkey]

31 #'s!?!?! Are you sure that is not too heavy? Sounds like strapping an anchor to your chest!

The only reason why so many people dive is because they like it and have found the type of diving they enjoy... keep at it; but be smart and assertive.

 

[RV]

snip....

Any words of advice for me I’m just really turned off of diving right now. And have no desire to to it again anytime soon.

get your money back..

Go on vacation to .. say.. Cozumel,, and take you AOW there

 

[MasterGoa]

Snip the horror story.

I think the guys here call that a cattle boat.

Well, my freind, it is up to you, but
this is what I did and I am having the time of my life.

I have been Snorkling for a long time and decided
I was ready to see that next to final frontier. (The final one being
Space.)

I went all over the net to find reviews, site like this one, opinions, etc.
I chose Tusa products. (Tabata)

I actually bought my diving kit before I had even dove.
But I know I would dive and I knew I liked the brand.
Note that I have been using Tabata products for over 15 years.

I finally went to Dive Sports and bought their Delux kit.
This is just me, but I knew I WAS going to dive and all the
equipment in that kit had very good or great reviews.

No regrets.

Now, school.

This is how I went.
But again, this is just me.

I asked aroung for the hardest school.
Yes, the most challenging shool I could find.
And I went there.

And you know what? I love it!
Because they have a rep for being hard, they are not as popular
as the cattle ranches downtown. They teach you stuff you NEED
to know, like hydrodynamics and how a 63CF AL will have more
dive time than an 80CF AL. And yes, I have experienced this myself.
They teach you about psychology of diving and simple but
practical stuff like using almond oil in your ears makes equalizing
so much easier.

It is sad that you experienced this, but I went in knowing I would
have to learn harder than most, but the rewards are amasing.

For example, I went on 3 dives this week-end and today
was fantastic! The lake where I was is getting a little cold
and people were not as many, so vis was around 20ft!
Sunny, etc.

So please, do NOT dispair!
Scuba diving is great and nothing like it compairs!

There are good schools! Then there are HARD schools that go
over and beyond! But they are hard and most people are like
little children, so they hear hard and run as fast as they
can in the opposite direction! So more instructor time for you!

This is what I would do:

Find a good school! Ask around, post in the Canadian section in your area.
Remember that the most money spent on flashy graphics means
less money spent elsewhere.

Take your course. While taking your course, ask to try lots of different stuff.
Fins, masks, etc.

Then go to all scuba shops in your area!
And I mean all! Real basket case divers that try everything
and take time to build a selection have no time for publicity.
Which is unfortunate.

If you cannot find a good scuba shop near you, find one here from the
States and have them UPS to your nearest US UPS location.
Or Fed-Ex directly to you cause UPS brokrage fees are
just stooooopid.

Then find buddies! Talk to every one you know about
Scuba! Scuba fans and certified people will come out
of the wood work! I know 6 people who rarely dive because they
have no buddies. Now they all have one!

So I hope this helps, and if not, I have some eye candy:

http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/0603/MasterGoa/Quebec-Underwater/

Good luck!

 

[spankey]

get a new instructor, DM & LDS this is how people are killed and stop diving. These types of instructors need to be reported, I cant belive the DM wanted u to falsify your log book. I am willing to put money on this that it was a PADI AOW.

 

[Scuba_Steve]

Your AOW dive sounds, in many ways like one of mine last year. I was fresh out of OW the month before. Because I had no equipment, I had not dove since my OW course. Our class's first dive for AOW was to be the deep dive (my OW class was in a very shallow 35', warm 87 degrees quarry). This was the first time I had also worn a wet suit (let alone a 2pc. 7mm). I was also using the dive shop's rental gear (same as I used in OW). We went over weighting guides (I was a 5'6" female at 185#). Using the guide I weighted myself for 18# (not taking into account that the suit was a 2 pc.'er & should have used about 24#'s). This quarry goes to 120' (we planned for 75-80') and the temperatures were: 83 at the surface down to 43 below 60'. We swam out to a descent line and everyone started down, except me. I couldn't get down. I then hand over hand started to pull myself down & finally started to become negatively buoyant at about 20'. I had to exert a lot of energy pulling myself down & my breathing became very rapid. I continued down to the platform at 75'. On the platform I started having issues with my weight belt trying to fall off & dealing with the cold temperatures that I wasn't at all prepared for (I like to call it refreshingly cool, now). The suit had really compressed & the belt, while uncomfortably tight on the surface had lossened & I found I had no more take up on it. I worked through a math problem at depth & did OK. The group then left the platform for a slow ascending swim towards the surface. At that point I lost my right fin (the buckle had unknowingly come loose). I had to use my 1 good fin to fetch the other. I found out real quick that I am no where as flexible in a thick wet suit. I started doing doughnuts trying to put the finn back on. I got totally disoriented and stressed. The attending dive master saw what was going on & came over to assist me. My breathing was really getting bad at that point. I'm not sure what happened to cause this, but I started taking in water as I inhaled. I basically freaked at that point ( I was frightened, but didn't know what to do) & the dive master saw what was happening and grabbed my BC and we started to ascend slowly. I didn't try to bolt & helped him to kick our way up. We made our way up to the safety stop and my breathing quickly returned to normal & I calmed down. We finished the safety stop & went on to the surface. At the surface the dive master made sure I was OK & positively buoyant. He left me floating on the surface & returned to the group down below. After 10 min. the entire group surfaced & joined me. After swimming back to the entry & getting out of our gear the instructor & dive master talked to me about what had happened. They were very kind and assured me that I wasn't the first one to have problems & freak out at depth. For me it turned out to be a very good learning lesson. I have since purchased my own equipment & become familiar with it. I have dove deep in this quarry & another without to much trouble since. Although I'm not crazy about it, the cold doesn't bother me like it used to and I can tolerate these dives for 15- 20 min. at a time. I just want you to know that you're not alone when it comes to having bad dives. Like the others have suggested, if you're not happy with the instructor, find one that suits your needs. Every dive can be a learning experience, even the bad ones, if you let them. Good luck to you & your endevours.

lol, glad you're OK.

How's that for your typical AOW class, if not very smart, at least how you got to that dive was by the numbers as far as Padi would be concerned..but then again there's that "Educational Validity" course outline working for you again..........

Anyone who thinks padi's course outlines (objectives) and fast paced training schemes at all levels has any sort of real training value with an eye for safety is just plain not thinking straight.

I wonder how many more "My AOW class this weekend went real bad" threads have to be started every week on scubaboard before enough people realize that this is in fact, by design, how a huge majority of AOW classes go, and it's damn dangerous to the student. Here's two more in this thread alone.

I don't really care how well of a job the odd instructor does because if it's not imortant enough for Padi to put it in writing, then they feel it must not be enough to worry about despite the continung nonsense that goes on weekly. And they know more than you, as I am so often told....uhhmm OK.

The facts are this type of CF will continue to happen because the aagency by not having and enforcing stricter course guidelines and a mind for safety allow this stuff to happen far too often without having it punished. But why would they? The onus is on the Instructor to basically do the impossible with most people so the agency is pretty free and clear here, even though by design they set it up to fail when it comes to training.

Go ahead and blame the shop and Instructors, but the root of this nonsense is a totally bogus and unworkable training outline, from skill requirements to face-paced courses.

Not that the shop and instructor are not somewhat to blame, because we all can say 'No', and we should more often.

I truly believe any shop that opens their door and does only quality training which goes far and beyond rec agency standards, and had to charge appropriately for their instruction, wouldn't make the first lease payment.

Stay tuned for another episode of 'how my training went'........see you in 7 more days, it's a given.


As for the OP, of course there's no excuse for falsifying a training record. That alone is all you really need to complain about since you came out of the dive itself alive. The rest is still wrong as well, but at least it's the typical nonsense we could have told you about without you having to experience it yourself. Be glad at least now you know you have a community here to get some decent info from and maybe make you a little more street smart when it comes to dealing with your training in the future. But don't kid yourself, I'd bet you a lot of boat fees nothing's going to happen that has any lasting change in the industry. What happened to you, more or less is pretty much SOP from the reports I see and hear about.

Good luck with your future training.

regards

 

[MikeFerrara]

A couple of weeks ago, I had an interesting conversation with a new instructor. She told me about an AOW deep dive where one of the students came up missing and she found him on the surface. I don't really remember if she had seem the student leave or not but that's not the point of the story.

She explained to me that she knew that the student would have problems because of his poor skills and she warned him. I had to ask, why she took the student on a deep dive in the first place. I also asked what sense there was in taking a diver deep if they aren't any good shallow. I got that deer in the headlights look. In her defense though, she was pretty much oporating as she was taught. From her descriptions of the students skill issues I don't think she would have ever even saw them as a potential problem except that she has recently completed some more advanced training herself that no doubt showed her what things should look like.

What a concept...get good shallow before going deep! You'd think we were speaking a different language or something. LOL

 

[trigfunctions]

Instead of taking another AOW class, I would recommend doing more dives jsut for fun. That will make you more comfortable with the equipement and everything.

Until you get used to a wetsuit it can definitely cause anxiety because of they are so confining. Once you get to depth they compress and become a little looser.

 

[*Floater*]

I will just say that many dive operators recommend AOW right after OW. They expect the student to be an unrefined diver and the point largely is for them to gain experience while diving with an instructor that's there to help out and give tips. I know other places do not teach it like that, but let's not jump the gun here and say the person isn't ready.

Also, the instructor probably recorded the dive as 40ft instead of 20ft, because otherwise (depending on time limits) it might not even have qualified as a dive, let alone counted towards the AOW cert. Not saying it' wa right, but some people would have wanted it that since they paid good money for it.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

I decided to try my advanced open water this weekend and oh boy what an experience.
To boot it was my first time in a wetsuit.

I went diving in my first lake and it was like tea. Not used to such dirty water.

1. Had a hard time to adjust my mask, inflator etc with the gloves on.

2. The rental regs wouldn’t fit the adapter on my bcd so had to borrow one from another student .The dive shop also forgot to send out gloves and the top part of the wetsuit.

3. I had a hard time to descend with the 31 lb belt they supplied. It was nothing like at the pool when I deflate. I would just descend nicely. I had to actually work hard to swim to the bottom. the instructor actually pushed me down. he grabbed the back of my tank and and pushed not telling me and not giving me a chance to pop my ears.

4. The wetsuit was so tight I found it very difficult to move.

5. My anxiety levels where nothing like I had ever experienced. everything was so rushed and with all this new equipment on I didn’t feel comfortable at all.

6. The instructor was in such a bad mood because he had so many students before hand and hadn’t had a break after 5 dives and was mad because he hadn’t had lunch etc.He ended up canceling my first dive and whole weekend trip withen 5 minutes in the water.??said I wasn’t ready.Then told me to right down in my log book that we went down to 40 feet when we actually only 20 feet max??

Keeping in mind it was the dive master who I was working with the instuctor was no where to be found.

Any words of advice for me I’m just really turned off of diving right now. And have no desire to to it again anytime soon.

Sounds to me like your instructor wasn't ready for AOW either ...

My advice ...

First off, forget about more classes right now. Find someone you can dive with and do some shallow, easy dives to get comfortable with what you learned in OW class. When you can start to feel relaxed on easy, shallow dives, then it's time to move on to the next class. Most people take AOW too soon after their OW class and end up struggling so much they don't get anything out of it (except the c-card, which is basically worthless if you don't have the skills and knowledge it's supposed to represent).

Second off, after you've logged some bottom time and feel like you're ready to expand your skills, definitely get a different instructor. No instructor should "push a student down" to get them to descend. If you can't get down on your own, your instructor should work on that problem before continuing. What he did endangered you ... and no class is worth that kind of risk.

Third, even if you're using rental gear, try to find a shop that will rent you the same or similar gear every time you dive. Struggling with a different gear configuration all the time only makes learning how to dive more difficult. Also remember that it is your responsibility (not your instructor's) to go through your gear before the class and make sure everything you need is there, and it all works properly.

I would also suggest that you forward what you wrote in the OP to this instructor's certifying agency. Besides being a poor instructor, I suspect there are some standards violations that need to be addressed (there are if he's a NAUI instructor, at the least).

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[jbd]

...but let's not jump the gun here and say the person isn't ready.

Take another look at the original post. 2nd sentence. Look at his talking points #1, #3, #4, and #5. He was not ready for this and as NW GratefulDiver notes neither was the instructor.

The whole experience this guy had is why I disagree with taking an AOW course right after OW cert. Most OW divers are not ready yet. They need more experience with the use of equipment and especially if they are going to be in cold dark water more time in that environment before taking the AOW course.

Also, the instructor probably recorded the dive as 40ft instead of 20ft, because otherwise (depending on time limits) it might not even have qualified as a dive, let alone counted towards the AOW cert. Not saying it' wa right, but some people would have wanted it that since they paid good money for it.

As far as I'm aware a dive to 20 feet for 15 to 20 minutes meets the requirements of being logged as a training dive. No need to log it as 40 ft dive.