Running with Scissors

[Cave Bum]

All of that is taught in PADI OW to one degree or another. Basic OW students are not taught "all conceived emergencies," but are taught how to avoid those we aren't talking about by not engaging in diving behaviors that lead to those emergencies.

There we differ in our opinions. I’m a PADI instructor and I know what the minimums covered in the standards are. The standards in no way require, or even encourage, the instructor to teach any of what’s listed above, but of those items the most important is problem solving. The standards have the instructor showing the student how to run away from the problem not how to address it.

Problem solving is not a natural human mental process. It's nurture as opposed to nature and since most people don’t do problem solving very well, what is passed down during our formidable years is usually inaccurate and missing steps.

“Let’s stumble through the dark until we run into the answer by brail”.

One thing this discussion has convinced me of is the need, my need at any rate, to paraphrase parts of the document in AndyNZ’s post so I can pass it out to my students. Since that document has items specific to deciding whether or not to solo dive, I don’t want to give that whole document to students, but I do want to give them something written, that they can refer to later, covering self-reliance, situational awareness and formalized problem solving.

I want to introduce the ideas to them in a written document that they can keep and reference in the future. I’m not trying to have them master the skills, just be aware of how to implement them so they can self-learn as they go through their diving careers. Maybe do one or two quick problem solving exercises in class to show them how it works. Maybe do some ‘what-if’s’ out at the dive site between dives to show them how to do that with their dive buddies.

That, IMHO, would give my students the tools to make themselves better divers.

That’s my opinion and that’s what I’m going to do in my classes.

 

[Kevin Carlisle]

That is not true. When you do deep tech dives you are solo. Doesnt matter how many other divers are in the water. If you have a major issue a buddy helping you could mean 2 divers injured or worse. And in cave diving some passages are better traveled by one diver instead of a team. Diver congestion can be a bad thing. So ANY dive is not safer with a buddy.

"Some dives are safer done solo"?????

I'd say if that's the case the fault doesn't lie in the buddy system itself, but in the person implementing it. ANY dive is safer with a buddy..... but only the right buddy.
I think if you believe that to be true you don't have access or don't know how to develop a good buddy. I'd further contend that if you don't understand how to develop or employ a good buddy that you yourself are most probably lacking in that area and that is why you have such luck.

IMO the buddy system is a perfect idea who's problems lay in those that try and use it.

 

[Cave Bum]

"Some dives are safer done solo"?????

I'd say if that's the case the fault doesn't lie in the buddy system itself, but in the person implementing it. ANY dive is safer with a buddy..... but only the right buddy.

That may be true for the types of diving you're doing. Exploring a cave whose entrance is a 600' foot, mud floored body tube, with no turn-around is definately (IMHO) a solo dive!

Any dive where I have to blow out the vis to get in or where there are very limited options for turning around, IMHO, is a candidate for solo.

But again, this thread isn't about solo diving, its about teaching self-reliance to new divers.

 

[Cave Bum]

Specific, isolated skills are taught, but there is little or no discussion of the types of situations that might call for those skills, or how to avoid the necessity of using them.

To use your extraordinary intellect to avoid situations that would require your extraordinary skill.

 

[Yellowmask]

The main thing I noticed from Yellowmask’s post is the depth of her wisdom. She's gonna go far.

::blushes:: thanks! That means a great deal coming from a very experienced diver.

I wasn't thinking of 'Pass/Fail' criteria, I was thinking of exposing new divers to the concept.

I think what I was trying to get at is that the current Open Water criteria would seem to be fairly open-and-shut in terms of whether you pass them or fail, in the sense that it’s easy to see if someone can take off their mask then replace and clear it, CESA, share air, remove and replace a BCD, etc. These are all skills which it’s relatively easy to measure, and I have no doubt that any instructor worth their salt would fail someone who couldn’t do them, whereas measuring someone’s capacity to problem-solve would seem to be considerably harder to do and would take a lot more time. It would also, I think, involve a shift from the current marketing of the course, and people’s subsequent expectations, which are “plunk down cash, pass five written tests, do five pool dives, do four open water dives, get certified”.

So now you are a few fin stokes away from reaching your buddy in a single breath. Every diver has done that. Would some discussion of self-sufficiency and situational awareness have helped given you to tools to think 'what if...'? Or did you already have too much on your plate? I assume from your answer you were trained PADI, what if they had eliminated the 'take a PADI site tour with a PADI professional' or 'take an advanced course' in section five?

The “too much on plate” is an important issue. I think as an introduction to basic scuba skills, Open Water is pretty good. There is a limit to the number of new skills a person can master at any one time, particularly when they all have to be performed at once. There might be a risk that talk of self-sufficiency and problem-solving immediately would put off many people who might become perfectly competent divers once they have got over their initial nervousness over breathing underwater / running out of air / sinking to the bottom. I think that once maintaining good buoyancy control, monitoring your air and depth gauges, equalising your ears, clearing your mask if it leaks, using good finning technique to move to where you want to be, sticking to within a safe distance of your buddy and ascending at a safe rate have started to become second nature, then a person might have the self-confidence (and brain space) to start proactively thinking about situational awareness and problem avoidance.

Sidenote: how about eliminating that part of section five just on the grounds of being too irksome for words? I’m all for making new divers aware of the need to get a local orientation, and give people an idea of where to go next with their diving, but it’s such a blatant sales pitch that its main function would seem to be providing a bonding moment between student and instructor, as both roll their eyes in annoyance at the notion of having to answer written test questions on any of this stuff.

From my perspective as a very recent Open Water graduate, the problem would seem, as others here have said, to be more with the notion that, having completed Open Water, you can plan, log and conduct independent no-stop open water dives up to 18m deep “in conditions similar to those which you were trained in”, with a buddy (I’m paraphrasing a bit here).

I seem to remember thinking at the time, “Yeah, right, if the buddy is someone like a divemaster or a diver with far more experience than me”.

The day after I got my Open Water, we went for a fun dive before going home. Halfway through, one pair of divers ascended unexpectedly (though under control – it turned out to be a problem with a leaking mask that was easy to resolve on the surface). The divemaster I was buddying with signalled “Ascend”. As we ascended together, I remember thinking something like “Hmm. I have no computer and no compass. I have never, in fact, done a vertical ascent before [all my previous Open Water dives were shore dives, ascending by swimming slowly and diagonally upwards towards the shoreline], nor any dive without someone else there to guide me around. I am, in fact, entirely relying on the more experienced diver I’m with to get me up to the surface safely, and to guide me around, because I have no clue where I am”.

I now own a computer and intend to do a navigation course soon, but I don’t think I could make anything like an equal contribution to planning a safe dive without much more training and experience, and I didn’t sleepwalk through my course. The thought of two divers with my level of training and experience trying to do this… I have my doubts.

As a cold water diver myself, what gets said here is "if you learn to dive in cold water, you have an advantage".

And perhaps this is something else that needs a little more emphasis, since one cause of diving accidents in the UK is people learning abroad in tropical waters, coming home, and not appreciating the differences:

In too deep: expert warns that scuba crash courses are putting lives at risk | UK news | The Guardian

Scuba diving death toll soars | UK news | The Guardian

I fully intend to write up a formal proposal for PADI, based on the conclusions of this discussion. I'm just as sure I’ll get shot down, but I am going to try…

Look forward to seeing it.

 

[wjknobles]

Is PADI warning new divers of things as basic as “Don’t run with scissors”?

In a recent thread, who’s title contained that dreaded and obscene (well, by PADI standards anyway) 4 letter word starting with “S”, the issue of PADI’s view on the buddy system was brought up. Since typing the “S” word here would immediately have this thread condemned to the bowels of a special forum for anti-social miscreants (like myself), I’ll have to spell the word with hyphens in between…

S-O-L-O

Now this thread isn’t about s-o-l-o diving, it’s about the harm PADI is doing by making this a taboo subject and going on and on and on about the dangers of being unattended by a buddy. Let’s face it; many buddies are “inattentive” to begin with so you are unattended anyway at times whether you planned it that way or not.

Many of us feel that PADI’s stance on s-o-l-o diving is really a PADI argument for the buddy system, or more accurately, for the PADI version of the buddy system –ie- “never mention a diver can be safe alone, insist that you are only safe with another diver, no matter how newly minted, just out of the box he or she is”.

A little history:
Back in the day, one of the first scuba certifying agencies was the YMCA and when they started teaching scuba they brought their complete swimming program over to their scuba syllabus. They had a rule in their swimming program, ‘Never swim alone; always swim with a buddy’ and that became ‘Never dive alone; always dive with a buddy.”

This rule wasn’t the result of countless hours of research backed up by reams of paper with statistical calculations filling both sides. It was just ‘that sounds like it applies’…” by whoever was converting the one course to the other.

My Views:
I think we, as instructors, should move the focus of the training to self-reliance, self-rescue and solving underwater problems underwater and making it a last resort to either run to a buddy or pop to the surface in an emergency. We should do this right from the start, from open water training, so the concept is instilled in newly minted open water divers.

Okay, now to the question! I’d like to hear from both open water divers and instructors what your opinion is.



Should we be teaching more self-reliance?

or

Is the current PADI version of the buddy system the correct approach?

To jump back directly to the OP's question ...

Self-reliance, self-rescue, and underwater problem solving should ALWAYS be taught. The buddy system should not be a system that abandons this ... as it unfortunately appears to be in the recreational scuba world. The ideal buddy system is two self-reliant divers diving together to achieve a common goal. Their buddy system exists so that there is an extra pair of eyes and in the event that you do encounter a problem that you are unable to solve on your own ... they can assist. Frankly, IMHO the reason the buddy system is stressed so much is due to OOA scenarios. It has been my experience that your average diver does not do a good job managing their gas consumption (indeed many have no clue what a SAC rate is or how to apply it). Management of gas should be a priority in scuba classes, unfortunately it is not.

 

[AndyNZ]

To be honest, I haven't read the whole thread (yet).... just got back from diving today and have been invited to comment. Maybe after a brief post tonight, with a post-dive beer in hand, I'll read through the earlier posts tomorrow.

First off, whilst I can't "officially" comment on PADI's stance it appears quite simple - PADI aren't opposed to solo diving, they just consider it outside of the remit of recreational diving. As a recreational agency, they will therefore never teach it. It's a strategy decision more than any judgemental one.

PADI instructors are free to teach self-reliance as they see fit, in line with PADI standards. There is a lot of scope to do this with in PADI standards from OW through to Rescue. All it needs is a bit of thought about what the intent of the relevant standards is and how they may be acheived by a student.

Or, if this seems too "grey", a PADI instructor can write their own distinctive specialty. Here's a brief overview of my PADI self-reliant diver course:

PADI Self Reliant Diver Course


Bottom line, in terms of PADI at least, they have made a perfectly defensible position to not teach solo diving. PADI standards allow for an instructor to teach self-reliance (with a bit of thought). PADI have sanctioned at least one course in self-reliant diving, probably more. There's no "fault" that can be attributed to the agency here..... just it's instructors. There are many PADI instructors who are either ill-prepared for teaching this stuff, or who are just too plain lazy to think of ways of incorporating it into their course offerings.

 

[AndyNZ]

What Cave bum is alluding too, and what I experienced myself, is that PADI places a strong emphasis on the buddy system for solving problems - instead of self reliance.

Not true.

Wha t you may have experienced is one, or several.... or indeed many PADI instructors who teach this way. That doesn't mean that it's the official party line.

There seems to be a lot of confusion, even amongst PADI instructors, as to what the PADI system is and how to teach it. There are a few comments in this thread, things like (paraphrased) "PADI doesn't let you exceed standards" that reinforce this.

PADI standards rarely specifcy how somthing is done, just what must be acheived. So for example, from CW1 a standard is:

In shallow water, breathe underwater for at least 30 seconds from an alternate air source supplied by another diver.

Yes, the intent of this standard is to build up to doing a full alternate air source skill. Yes, 99% of the time it will be taught as using someone else's octi. But it doesn't have to be. There is nothing that stops this being taught as another person handing over a pony bottle for the OOG diver to use.

There is an emphasis on the buddy system in PADI education, as there should be. But that doesn't mean you can't teach with it, as opposed to against it. The above interpretation of the standard teaches both the buddy (team!) system, but also the basic skills for self-resolution of problems.

PADI also have no problems with an instructor teaching beyond the syllabus. The only stipulation is that you cannot withhold certification if the student doesn't master the extra skills/knowledge. What stops instructors teaching beyond the syllabus is either the fear of litagation, or the simple fact that they don't have the time. But, as Boulderjohn has pointed out, PADI don't specify a time for a course - that's up to the individual instrctor or facility to decide.

So SSI do anything different? Or SDI? Or NAUI, for that matter..... I'm not talking about individual instructors, but the agencies? In essence, no. NAUI encourages instructors to exceed the minimum standard, as PADI actively requires instructors to eleaborate on the minimum.

So the agency-specific aspect of this thread is a red-herring.

A more general question is "should there be more emphasis on teaching self-reliance in ENTRY LEVEL TRAINING"?

Maybe the answer is yes - though personally I certainly would prefer to see more emphasis placed on problem avoidance, rather than problem resolution. But either way, why isn't it?

I suspect that one issue is the time allocated to a course by a facility, there just isn't enough time to do it. But that has got nothing to do with the agency, it's a business decision by the particular facility.

 

[D_B]

Thanks Andy for your thoughts

The time needed to teach the OW course ... the instructor can hold out for more time from the facility to teach it ... as mine did by getting another pool session added (to a total of 3, approx 4hr each)
Or, the instructor can just spend more time with a student as needed for them to be a safe diver (as I've seen mine do)

I'm still a believer in that what and how the instructor teaches, is more important than who he teaches for

 

[Jacky Boy]

Hi, I learned the open water course nearly ten years ago, but as im making arangements to get back into diving ive bought an open water crew pack and read it (I would say re-read it, but I think last time i just watched the videos). As Yellowmask said the 5th section is cringeworthy, blatent, shameless self promotion, but as she, and AndyNZ point to, the open water course is very basic. After 4 dives under supervision of an instructer or dive master there is no way you ready to go out diving with a buddy of similar experience, nevermind alone. Self reliance I'd immagine is something gained through experience and padi dont have diving police stopping you diving solo. I think not encouraging solo diving yet at the same time not stoping it is a sencible position for a large organisation to take, and giving intructors relative autonomy is a great thing. Also I cant talk for any further padi courses, but as I recall all emergency situations were coupled with "And heres what to do if your buddys too far away to help..." And yes they were pretty much all how to surface (except tangles in kelp/fishing nets etc) but should a very unskilled, inexperienced diver really be thinkning about trying to reconnect a disloged regulator underwater or something like that?