I just recently got my PADI Rescue Diver certification. I took the course because I felt that if I was participating in an activity like SCUBA, I felt it was my responsibility to get all the training to be able to help myself and others. I knew I had an upcoming holiday in Phuket, Thailand, but I wanted to make sure I approached the course seriously and had enough time to really learn. So I opted to do all the initial coursework and confined water work at my own pace where I live in Shanghai, and just do the open water part on referral on holiday. I did this because I didn't do that when I did my open water and I found that it was very rushed in holiday resort places and they didn't take it so seriously.
For the study part, I thought it was well worth it. And I enjoyed the training I did in Shanghai. I really felt I could learn a lot from the course and I was excited for the open water training and rescue scenarios. I was under the impression that it would be a 2 day open water course, where the first day would be training and demonstrating all the rescue skills I had practiced in a pool so the instructore could be sure I could also do them well enough in open water. And I understood that day 2 would be just me diving on a boat with other divers and at some random times throughout the day there would be some pretend rescue scenarios and I would need to react to them.
However, this is not how it happened. For the open water portion, most of the scenarios were done all day the first day when I thought I was supposed to be training. From the moment I entered the boat on Day 1 I was told, "You are the rescue diver on the boat today. No one else will respond to any emergencies. It's all on you. Be prepared." That was my introduction and the first thing I had in working with this new instructor since I was doing the open water portion on referral.
That first day, there were 2 different diver overboard emergencies - one who really did his best to drown me since he had refused to accept the line/buoy I threw to him from the boat. And several times in each dive which I was told I could just relax and dive for a while before we did some training, my instructor suddenly had her regulator out and was "out of air" and rushing for mine. This was very unexpected as I thought I was just supposed to demonstrate skills the first day and the second day would be all the mock emergency scenarios.
Finally on the 3rd dive the first day I was told I was the divemaster for a group of new students (3 instructors pretending) and they all had emergencies. One man in particular had about 15 emergencies in the 50 minute dive including losing a fin, 2 emergency assents, 1 emergency descent, going the wrong way from the group as fast as he could in low viz (4m) multiple times, out of air multiple times, randomly coming up to me and pulling my regulator out. I felt that it was a bit overdone and really made the course stressful and not in the least bit enjoyable or rewarding.
On Day 2 there were no rescue scenarious but because of how they acted on Day 1, I was expecting them and constantly watching everyone, I didn't want to take off my wetsuit because on day 1 they had waited each time I took of my gear to have an emergency... so I was stressed all day waiting for something to happen which never did. But the asked me to again demonstrate an unconscious diver at the surface (I had already done this a few times on day 1) and of course this time they picked a 300 lb man. No issues with that but the current was sooooo strong that it was impossible to tow him to the boat. In fact it would have been impossible to swim on my own. I was then criticized for accepting the tow line that was thrown to me when I called for help [though I feel it was the right thing to do].
All in all I feel that there should be some challenge of course, but I would preferred more focus on training the first day as the course is described and then maybe only a few rescue scenarios the second day which are more reasonable. At a certain point when the emergencies are coming in constantly the rescue diver is unrealistically on guard and in addition to the stress being high the whole day and diminishing any potential enjoyment from the course, it also is not mimicking the sudden onsent of an emergency situation in real life.
I am sure everyone's experience is very different depending on which dive shop and which instructor they have, but from my personal experience I would never recommend this course to anyone who is not trying to become an instructor. The course I took was hell. It was not enjoyable. It was stressful beyond what it needed to be and seemed to have more of a focus on "hazing" me rather than training me. If that's the case, really the only people that need to be hazed up through the ranks are future instructors.
I am glad its over... I can't really be objective yet about whether or not / how much if may have benefited me... but maybe the next time I dive, I may feel something different and maybe with time I may realize some value from it. I hope others have a better experience/feeling from their rescue course than I did.
For the study part, I thought it was well worth it. And I enjoyed the training I did in Shanghai. I really felt I could learn a lot from the course and I was excited for the open water training and rescue scenarios. I was under the impression that it would be a 2 day open water course, where the first day would be training and demonstrating all the rescue skills I had practiced in a pool so the instructore could be sure I could also do them well enough in open water. And I understood that day 2 would be just me diving on a boat with other divers and at some random times throughout the day there would be some pretend rescue scenarios and I would need to react to them.
However, this is not how it happened. For the open water portion, most of the scenarios were done all day the first day when I thought I was supposed to be training. From the moment I entered the boat on Day 1 I was told, "You are the rescue diver on the boat today. No one else will respond to any emergencies. It's all on you. Be prepared." That was my introduction and the first thing I had in working with this new instructor since I was doing the open water portion on referral.
That first day, there were 2 different diver overboard emergencies - one who really did his best to drown me since he had refused to accept the line/buoy I threw to him from the boat. And several times in each dive which I was told I could just relax and dive for a while before we did some training, my instructor suddenly had her regulator out and was "out of air" and rushing for mine. This was very unexpected as I thought I was just supposed to demonstrate skills the first day and the second day would be all the mock emergency scenarios.
Finally on the 3rd dive the first day I was told I was the divemaster for a group of new students (3 instructors pretending) and they all had emergencies. One man in particular had about 15 emergencies in the 50 minute dive including losing a fin, 2 emergency assents, 1 emergency descent, going the wrong way from the group as fast as he could in low viz (4m) multiple times, out of air multiple times, randomly coming up to me and pulling my regulator out. I felt that it was a bit overdone and really made the course stressful and not in the least bit enjoyable or rewarding.
On Day 2 there were no rescue scenarious but because of how they acted on Day 1, I was expecting them and constantly watching everyone, I didn't want to take off my wetsuit because on day 1 they had waited each time I took of my gear to have an emergency... so I was stressed all day waiting for something to happen which never did. But the asked me to again demonstrate an unconscious diver at the surface (I had already done this a few times on day 1) and of course this time they picked a 300 lb man. No issues with that but the current was sooooo strong that it was impossible to tow him to the boat. In fact it would have been impossible to swim on my own. I was then criticized for accepting the tow line that was thrown to me when I called for help [though I feel it was the right thing to do].
All in all I feel that there should be some challenge of course, but I would preferred more focus on training the first day as the course is described and then maybe only a few rescue scenarios the second day which are more reasonable. At a certain point when the emergencies are coming in constantly the rescue diver is unrealistically on guard and in addition to the stress being high the whole day and diminishing any potential enjoyment from the course, it also is not mimicking the sudden onsent of an emergency situation in real life.
I am sure everyone's experience is very different depending on which dive shop and which instructor they have, but from my personal experience I would never recommend this course to anyone who is not trying to become an instructor. The course I took was hell. It was not enjoyable. It was stressful beyond what it needed to be and seemed to have more of a focus on "hazing" me rather than training me. If that's the case, really the only people that need to be hazed up through the ranks are future instructors.
I am glad its over... I can't really be objective yet about whether or not / how much if may have benefited me... but maybe the next time I dive, I may feel something different and maybe with time I may realize some value from it. I hope others have a better experience/feeling from their rescue course than I did.
