Would you stay away from a dive shop that had an accident?

[boulderjohn]

but I'll bet you that 9 out of 10 new divers will keep their mouth firmly shut during real oh **** moment.

I would bet the percentage is very high. In fact, a joint PADI/DAN study a decade ago indicated that the most common incident-related cause of death in scuba was an embolism following a rapid ascent to the surface. These were frequently preceded by an OOA incident. In other words, a poorly done CESA.

PADI responded by changing the OW course to put greater emphasis on the buddy system and awareness of remaining gas pressure. They did not change the method of teaching CESA. I have said frequently that the way we teach CESA violates basic instructional theory and contributes to a diver's belief that they will not succeed doing a CESA for real from depth. I have also argued this with PADI headquarters, but to no avail.

 

[admikar]

Yes. CESA is a last ditch effort. By that point primal instincts are pretty much in driver's seat. Primal instinct is to keep your mouth shut underwater.

 

[CT-Rich]

And what do you think those stats would be if we take pilots with as much training and actual capability of an average driver (with your general attitude toward checks/maintenance) and put them in charge of large aircraft?
CESA sounds great, but I'll bet you that 9 out of 10 new divers will keep their mouth firmly shut during real oh **** moment. Training and technology makes it safe, but diving is higher risk than walking in your back yard.

To the OP, as you already had to figure out by now, it depends. What, when, how? Those are questions that needs to be answered before you will get your answer.

I never said diving is without risk. I do object to the characterization of it being an extreme sport, akin to skydiving or motor cross. It is a sport that extremely safe when practiced within recreational limits and with proper training. You are out in the wild, you are in open water and sh*t can happen. But, for most divers it is pretty damn safe. It does not relie on physical stamina, speed or coordination. It relies on a planning, training, experience and appropriate and well maintained equipment.

I don't like the "your gonna die" mentality whether you are talking about split fins or a jacket BCD. There are bad operators out their. I've met a couple of them. I have had a couple of oh-sh*t moments, too. I have had more of them biking than diving. Diving is not particularly dangerous for the conscientious diver, but if your f*** around you will find out.

 

[VikingDives]

I have said frequently that the way we teach CESA violates basic instructional theory and contributes to a diver's belief that they will not succeed doing a CESA for real from depth.

How would you suggest that CESA be taught?

 

[boulderjohn]

How would you suggest that CESA be taught?

I have written this many times.

The key to all instruction in physical performance is to make the practice as much like the real thing as possible. In coaching athletics, the idea is to make it "gamelike." Instructional practices that are not "gamelike" can teach and ingrain bad habits. When teaching this, I used to show how the common soccer coacing practice of having two players pass a ball back and forth to each other teaches a host pf poor skills, and I showed how a simple game of keep away is much more gamelike and teaches gamelike passing skills.

The big problem with the CESA is the horizontal CESA, where students are supposed to swim 30 feet at a normal ascent rate while exhaling the entire time. If "normal" is 60 FPM, that is darn tough. If "normal" is 30 FPM, it is close to impossible. This is not gamelike, because in a real CESA, the vertical ascent brings expanding air in the lungs, and an ascent of 30 feet while exhaling is relatively easy. Instructors typically teach students how to exhale as little air as possible so they can succeed. They teach them to come as close as possible to holding their breath without actually holding their breath. It is still tough, and the overriding message to the students is that they likely cannot do it in a real situation, especially if it is deeper than 30 feet.

Students are also supposed to fail the exercise if they inhale at any time during the ascent. That, too, is not gamelike. In a real OOA ascent, the regulator will be able to deliver air at the shallower depths. Students who have gone OOA at depth should begin a CESA confident that they will get a breath or two of air during the ascent if they need it. If anything, they should be asked to demonstrate that confidence by taking a breath near the end. At least in the PADI system, that information is not even mentioned in the course. I added it and emphasized it myself.

An important part of the CESA is the "C"--controlled. Students should vent expanding air from the BCD during the ascent to maintain a controlled ascent rate. In a horizontal CESA, that does not happen. When I did my IE, we all had to demonstrate a horizontal CESA. We all started in water about 4.5 feet deep, and our 30 foot swim ended in water about 3 feet deep. After 30 seconds of exhaling, we all lost enough buoyancy that our knees scraped the bottom, costing us all a point on our score. How gamelike is that?

 

[boulderjohn]

Revisit and of the countless ScubaBoard threads on the CESA over the past 15 years. Look for the following:

1. How many times people question their ability to get to the surface safely from depths greater than, say, 20 feet.
2. How many times people are concerned that they wil suddenly go out of air after exhaling and thus have no air left to complete the CESA. (The US Navy trains divers to exhale fully before beginning an emergency swimming ascent for a submarine escape.)
3. How many times people tell them that they can estimate the depth from which they can do a CESA based on how deeply they can do a breath-hold dive.
4. How many times people tell them to practice free diving (or just holding their breath) to improve the depth from which they can CESA.

 

[VikingDives]

The big problem with the CESA is the horizontal CESA, where students are supposed to swim 30 feet at a normal ascent rate while exhaling the entire time.

I concur with everything you said... I will say that when I went through the PADI IDC, I was taught to do a diagonal CESA with an ascent to the surface. It isn't great, but it's better than horizontal to be certain...

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

While teaching open water, the best method for getting students to keep track of their cylinder pressure was to give them the assignment of informing their buddy and then me, when their cylinder pressure dropped to 2000, 1500, and 1000 psi. Telling them to monitor as I may ask at any time and they needed to be within 300 psi raaaaaarely worked. I don't know if other instructors had better success than me with that.

 

[TMHeimer]

I probably wouldn't stay away from the shop. I went on a charter once and found out later there was a lawsuit (I think) regarding a death that occurred with that dive op. They seemed to know what they were doing. Also years ago there was an instructor death at our shop here. This shop has a stellar reputation.

 

[rmssetc]

If diving was high risk, there would be many more accidents.

It seems to me that this "discussion" of risk could be clarified by distinguishing between:

1. high probability of incident
2. high consequence of risk
   

To me, diving certainly is an activity with a high consequence of risk -- if something notable [beyond sunburn, a dermatological reaction comparable to a bee sting] goes wrong, then it's likely a serious incident.

As an industry, there's a very good track record of managing the multiple components in the risk chain, from equipment manufacture, gas quality, boat operations, etc. leading to a relatively low rate of incidents.

A personal assessment of risk must include considerations of both consequence and probability.

To get back to the OP's question about whether I'd dive with an operator that had an accident... "it depends". If, for example, the operator runs 8 ~ 10 dives/day on 4~5 boats with 15~30 divers each, (hello, Rainbow Reef), then I wouldn't find it unusual if there was a higher number of accidents than an operator that runs 2 dives/day with one boat and 6 divers (your choice of Cozumel single-boat operators). The rate of (incidents/yearly dives) would be a measurement, as would the type of accident operator at fault (ie., bad gas fill or boat captain error) vs diver error (OOG) or unknown cause, in determining whether to use a given operator.