Letting non-certified kids use scuba gear in a pool

[Sam Miller III]

@Scuba Lawyer
I was just getting ready to shut down for the day and walk my dog Lucky when I noticed your post.
Thank you for the complement it is appreciated and is reciprocal - you are definitely one of the greats.

My son Dr. Sam IV amd I still discuss that night a month ago when we sat around at the Quarter deck eating fish and sharing our many adventures .. And what adventures we had

SAM III

 

[jlcnuke]

I think it would be massively irresponsible to allow just anyone who wasn't aware of the potential issues associated with holding their breath, regardless of age, breathe off a regulator at depth. Personally, I think that a "certified" 12 year old, and a "un-certified but warned what to do and not do with with regard to holding their breath" 12 year old are probably equally as "safe" breathing on a regulator in a pool. I don't think I spent more than a few minutes on the concept when getting my OW cert through PADI. Air embolism = bad, expansion of air as depth gets shallower = air in lungs expand as you go up = holding breath is dangerous. It's really not that difficult a concept and explaining it to kids more in-detail, and with more emphasis, than my PADI class had can be done very quickly to ensure they are aware of the danger.

Whether you believe a kid is mature/smart/responsible enough to take that information in and apply it so that they follow the rule is a different matter, though. Some kids I've known I would be very confident that they would be just as safe (regarding this concept) as most adults, while others are a very different story.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

I have two old Heros
@Scuba Lawyer , NAUI Instructor SSI 5000 diver and my Scuba Lawyer
@Lake Hickory Scuba ,As of 2019 a new SSI Pro 5000 diver

I just discovered several new heroes
@wetb4igetinthewater
@Ana
@caruso
@Saniflush
@homerdoc
@Charles Graves
@DEEPCBOSS
(Spontaneous Pneumothorax- Air trapped in the intercostal space IDed via "crackling" sound
Air Embolism- over expansion - air in blood stream - RX recompression )

All of you That a boy ! Keep up the informative posting - certainly appreciated

Sam Miller, 111

I'm going to print out this post and frame it!

 

[Neilwood]

@Fat Daddy I have to wholeheartedly agree with your sentiment in this thread.

Giving kids (of whatever age) a scuba tank and a pool and letting them "play" with it smacks of negligence and, to me is highly dangerous.

That said, kids come in all shapes, sizes and levels of maturity. There are some kids (and a lot of adults) I wouldn't trust with the TV remote control whereas there are others I would trust to follow my instruction to the letter without a second thought. That will always have to be a judgement call though.

If parents are comfortable that their kids will do what they are told/shown and the parents have enough knowledge to teach them the facts and dangers that they need to know , then experiencing scuba can be a wonderful thing.

 

[TMHeimer]

@Fat Daddy I have to wholeheartedly agree with your sentiment in this thread.

Giving kids (of whatever age) a scuba tank and a pool and letting them "play" with it smacks of negligence and, to me is highly dangerous.

That said, kids come in all shapes, sizes and levels of maturity. There are some kids (and a lot of adults) I wouldn't trust with the TV remote control whereas there are others I would trust to follow my instruction to the letter without a second thought. That will always have to be a judgement call though.

If parents are comfortable that their kids will do what they are told/shown and the parents have enough knowledge to teach them the facts and dangers that they need to know , then experiencing scuba can be a wonderful thing.

I agree with all you say. As mentioned, my only concern is young kids dealing with true emergencies. Learning the dangers of scuba is no big deal.

 

[Lake Hickory Scuba]

I have two old Heros
@Scuba Lawyer , NAUI Instructor SSI 5000 diver and my Scuba Lawyer
@Lake Hickory Scuba ,As of 2019 a new SSI Pro 5000 diver

I just discovered several new heroes
@wetb4igetinthewater
@Ana
@caruso
@Saniflush
@homerdoc
@Charles Graves
@DEEPCBOSS
(Spontaneous Pneumothorax- Air trapped in the intercostal space IDed via "crackling" sound
Air Embolism- over expansion - air in blood stream - RX recompression )

All of you That a boy ! Keep up the informative posting - certainly appreciated

Sam Miller, 111

@Sam Miller III Thank you. Its always an honor to be recognized by a legend.

 

[BlueTrin]

Thanks Darrell. This will be our first trip there and everyone's very excited. We're staying 12 days.

It's lung expansion injuries that are the concern. If you take a full breath at 6 ft hold it and surface you can get seriously hurt or die.

Jason

I didn’t realise it was possible to die only from 6ft.

 

[BoltSnap]

I didn’t realise it was possible to die only from 6ft.

1.2 meter per DAN is possible. I have the article somewhere but not now unfortunately.

 

[Snorkeling For Treasure]

Agree, but......

When my dad was teaching me to dive in the 60's (mind you he was not a dive instructor - just a guy who learned the "proper" way to dive from a pamphlet that came with his scuba tank more than a decade earlier), he would toss a tank and reg in the deep end of the pool and have me swim down, take a few breaths then make an emergency "blow and go" swimming ascent. Time after time, rinse and repeat. My 7 year old self must have done that drill 50 times. I thought it fun. Now I know I likely dodged a bullet, but at least I was taught the reason for exhaling on ascent and was very comfortable doing it. .

Fast forward a bunch of decades and I take my then 7-year old son to a birthday pool party. The birthday boy's father (who I had never met before) has an Aluminum 80 on the bottom with an adapter and 4 second stages coming off the 1st stage. Twelve little kids with ZERO instruction are doing the dive down, breathe and surface game. Some of the other moms and dads there thought it looked like fun and were encouraging their little darlings to participate. I read that dad the riot act and told him that it was dangerous and why it was dangerous (including a short lesson in gas expansion laws, barotrauma, etc...) and advised his financial liability for the death of one of the children would be astronomical. That father told me in a very loud authoritative voice so that all the other parents could hear that I had no clue what I was talking about, that I was just plain stupid, and he told me to leave his house as "ignorant" people were not permitted on his property. My son wasn't very happy but we left. An hour later (apparently after he changed the tank out for a fresh one) a little 8 year old girl surfaced spitting up blood and was taken to the hospital. Thankfully she survived but the civil verdict against the father far exceeded the amount of his homeowner's liability insurance coverage. Plus the punitive damages against the father for "conscious disregard" of the safety of the children was not dischargeable in bankruptcy and he ended up losing his house. I guess stupid people weren't permitted on his property either.

I have no problem with having a young child breathe off a tank in a pool as long as you are right there with them and they are at least old enough to understand not to ever hold their breath. My rant is over. M

I am a Non-Certified Diver.
I would let my kids do it if they asked but I am not going to pressure them into it.
I know their limitations and reactions only because they are my children.
I lost a 10 year old boy at a day camp due to a drowning at a High school pool. My assigned area was the deep end. And he died in the shallow end.....None-the-less, I was the one to clear the pool and dive into the shallow end to retreive him and start CPR to no avail. So I personally have experienced a drowning and would still let "my Children" learn Scuba through me. Great question by the way

 

[Scuba Lawyer]

I was the one to dive into the shallow end to retreive him and start CPR to no avail. So I personally have experienced a drowning and would still let "my Children" learn Scuba through me

I am truly sorry for your experience. Respectfully, I would be less worried about a properly supervised kid on scuba drowning in a pool, and much more worried about the same kid suffering a barotrauma. No amount of supervision is going to prevent that, only knowledge and training. My 2 psi.