OSHA and rebreather instructor (employee) rules

[Leadking]

How many dive stores are aware of OSHA rules regarding their rebreather instructors?
https://www.osha.gov/pls/oshaweb/owadisp.show_document?p_table=STANDARDS&p_id=12956

 

[Superlyte27]

Every single instructor I know is an Independent Contractor. So, no employee, no problem.

So, store XYZ hires Contractor 123 to teach a class... It's up to the contractor to make sure he's following the rules. OSHA does not care about Store XYZ in this scenario.

 

[Wookie]

It's pretty amazing how many states are disallowing the subcontractor status for dive instructors. We may get away with it in Florida for a while more, but in Washington State they are auditing dive shops.

 

[RJP]

Every single instructor I know is an Independent Contractor. So, no employee, no problem.

Including the instructors who are shop owners?

 

[Superlyte27]

A shop owner might not be an employee. Depends on how the business is structured. It is possible to be a contractor for the shop you have shares in. At the end of the year, did you get a W2, 1099 or K1

 

[akdeepdiver]

If dive shops ignore or are ignorant of many other OSHA requirements, why do you think they will follow this one?

 

[Wookie]

Including the instructors who are shop owners?

The business owner is not subject to OSHA.

 

[sea_ledford]

How many dive stores are aware of OSHA rules regarding their rebreather instructors?
https://www.osha.gov/pls/oshaweb/owadisp.show_document?p_table=STANDARDS&p_id=12956

How many OSHA authors know they are requiring something that doesn't exist?

"(d) The employer must ensure that each rebreather has a continuously functioning moisture sensor, and that:

(i) The moisture sensor connects to a visual (e.g., digital, graphic, analog) or auditory (e.g., voice, pure tone) alarm that is readily detectable by the diver under the diving conditions in which the diver operates, and warns the diver of moisture in the breathing loop in sufficient time to terminate the dive and return safely to the surface; and

(ii) Each diver uses the moisture sensor according to the rebreather manufacturer's instructions."

Or is gurgling considered a moisture alarm?

"(e) The employer must ensure that each rebreather contains a continuously functioning CO2 sensor in the breathing loop, and that:
(a) The employer must ensure that each closed-circuit rebreather uses supply-pressure sensors for the O2 and diluent (i.e., air or nitrogen) gases and continuously functioning sensors for detecting temperature in the inhalation side of the gas-loop and the ambient water."


Or what they are for?

5. Use of No-Decompression Limits

(a) For diving conducted while using nitrox breathing-gas mixtures, the employer must ensure that each diver remains within the no-decompression limits specified for single and repetitive air diving and published in the 2001 NOAA Diving Manual or the report entitled "Development and Validation of No-Stop Decompression Procedures for Recreational Diving: The DSAT Recreational Dive Planner," published in 1994 by Hamilton Research Ltd. (known commonly as the "1994 DSAT No-Decompression Tables").

(b) An employer may permit a diver to use a dive-decompression computer designed to regulate decompression when the dive- decompression computer uses the no-decompression limits specified in paragraph 5(a) of this appendix, and provides output that reliably represents those limits."

Sorry about the bold, can't seem to do anything about it... Scubaboard must not meet OSHA requirements for formatting.

-Chris