why are there very few young divers?

[al248005]

I got certified when I was 21. Only reason I was able to get certified that young/afford it was I took it as a class in college. I think I paid somewhere around 150 for the class and had to buy mask, fins, snorkel. It was a 9 or 10 week class- 2 or 3 hrs in the classroom every week and a 2 hr pool session every week.

 

[flots am]

ive been reading alot of scubaboards and have noticed that most divers seem to be in there late 30s and up. i also read some other threads regarding diver fatalities and most people involved seem to be 50+ and up. one diver in the socal forums was 67 and had to have his son pull out the body. there was another guy in my class who was probably the same age who didnt complete the course as he got rolled the first time entering a beach dive. the second dive he tried it he was successful but he was breathing heavily before even getting in the water due to the weight of the gear.
where are the younger divers? im talking late 20s and under. my guess is due to the high initial cost of certification+gear most people cant afford it.

No time + no money = no diving.

Don't feel bad for the 67 year old guy who died diving. They die in hospital beds all the time too. If I had my choice of where to die, a hospital wouldn't be it.

I teach college SCUBA classes, and while the students get certified, it's actually pretty rare to see any of them do any local dives. It's usually just on vacation with their family.

 

[al248005]

I teach college SCUBA classes, and while the students get certified, it's actually pretty rare to see any of them do any local dives. It's usually just on vacation with their family.

Ya I got certified my junior year i think in college. Didn't do any more dives for two more years until I got out and had some money to spend. Most of my extra money that I had in school went to the college "experience" after classes were done for the day.

 

[MrsBBC]

Money, transport, time.

I was lucky enough to learn to dive with my dad aged 15, but not having a disposable income, or a car, meant that I only racked up 20-25 dives by the time I was 19.

Worked 7 days a week for 6 months, made some poorly advised gear choices, dived for 2-3 months before university.
Could afford very little diving at university, even though I joined the sports club. I usually ended up on the summer trip, but not diving cold water during the year as I could not afford a drysuit. etc etc

Now I'm 27, have a disposable income, and a bit more time. Sitting at 300 dives ish
But the inevitable, saving for a mortgage etc also gets in the way.
... and I still can't drive.

Nic

 

[kelemvor]

initial cert costs are not that high.

Either it's cheaper where you live, or your idea of not that high is different than mine. $350 for OW class is the going rate around here. Now, dive instructors might say that's cheap but I NEVER would have considered it in my 20's just because of cost. I still balked now that I'm older and more financially stable.

That doesn't even include gear or the OW dives around here. Diving is expensive, getting certified is expensive, gear is expensive. True there are more expensive hobbies but I bet that it's out of reach for most younger people on the grounds of cost alone.

 

[oreocookie]

I'm 25, got certified at 20. The friend I got certified with has been sitting at 60-something dives for the last year and a half and can't afford to rent gear and go for a couple of dives with me, meanwhile I'm contemplating where I'm going for my next dive trip.

 

[gcarter]

I certified my son @ 16, he is now 18 and nearing the end of his 3rd season with >100 dives total, we expect to hit 40 for the year tomorrow.

He has contributed about $800 (BPW, computer) to his kit from his savings, the rest has come from me - tanks, regs, wetsuits, lights, etc.etc. On top of that you can add the training - OW, AOW, Deep, Nitrox - the dive trips - Tobermory, Victoria, Cape Ann, Cuba - the boat dives (how many ?) - the fills, the gas to the dive sites (St Lawrence is an hour away) or the quarry (1/2 hour + $10/PP), THE GRUB! (growing teenage boy LOL)....

I am not being a martyr, it is what it is, but this can be an expensive hobby to get going in when you are paying your own freight - which he does not have the resources to do, like most young people. He just started university so it will be a while before he is flush enough to do much diving on his own nickel. Of course, the good news is that we now have all of our own gear (everything we NEED, dry suits would be nice LOL) so it has now dropped to fills, gas, and grub for local diving.

So long as he is a good dive buddy I`ll keep him on the payroll

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I'm around a lot of young people on a regular basis.
Scuba isn't a sport that really charges their motors, not like dirt bikes, snow boarding, surfing, wake boarding, or even mountain biking.
I ask many young people what they think of diving and their answer is they are either scared of sharks, scared of the ocean, it doesn't seem fun, or they never thought about it.
The small minority of younger people I do see out at the ocean are either surfing or an even smaller percentage of those are freediving and hunting.
Freediving to them is cheaper and more skill oriented than scuba and they all usually hunt. In my neck of the woods it's abalone and some spearing, and in Southern California it's all spearing and some for bugs.
Most of the members of the freediving clubs around here are in their 20's and 30's.
They love to camp out and dive their asses off all day then drink beer and and have a great time around a fire with their girlfriends.
They seem to be the northern bohemian surfer ocean types not the city types.

Young guys like action, and there has to be chicks involved. Chicks like to hang around cool guys doing cool things. Scuba is what old farts do.
I don't know if it's even really so much about the money because there are ways around that, gear can be had cheap if you know where to look. I just think scuba is boring to them, at least the way it's presented these days.
Now if it was Sea Hunt style like from back in the 50's and 60's then it would be different.

 

[Max Speed]

It's not the money. Go to any motorcycle roadrace and the sport is dominated by folks in their twenties spending tens of thousands of dollars on equipment and a couple of thousand per weekend on expenses.

And that is also the answer, the younger folks have the physical skills to participate in a wide range of exciting sports. When you're old, stiff and wheezy a sport where all you have to do is fall into the water and sink looks pretty good...

Sent from my GT-P3113 using Tapatalk 2

 

[AfterDark]

Ithings don't work underwater.