Solo Diving: Coming Out of the Closet (Mark Powell presents LIDS 2012)

[TMHeimer]

DevonD, Thanks. Good video. I've been posting a lot of anti-statistics stuff lately. But I liked his main point that it's really only buddy diving if your buddy is competent--can rescue you and won't get you killed. I guess this ties into the other debate about rescue skills in the OW class but enough of that.

 

[DaleC]

I agree with your points Andy.

For me, the greatest need for a solo oriented course was right out of the gate. At the time there was a 100 dive prerequisite. By then I had probably done 50+ solo dives and had figured most of the stuff out on my own from non-formal sources. I know some would argue the numbers but I suspect there has always been a sub group of solo divers who have known they were going to do so early on, whether some external group sanctioned it or not.

I also really really like Marks emphasis on poor buddy teams being more dangerous than intentional solo diving (by capable individuals). It would be an excellent idea for shops to run concurrent courses either for self reliance or team building... or better yet both and then challenge their clientele to pick one or the other.

I do have a criticism from what I've seen of some agency approaches to solo diving instruction though and it probably has to do with your point about instructors/DM's with little experience teaching something that requires a fair degree of insight. That is; the boiling down of risk mitigation strategies into general "rules" instead of the harder approach of teaching evaluation and adaptability. Usually this pertains to gas management or redundancy issues.

I think there are still things that can be learned by a good instructor but I have a strong aversion to being taught something by someone who knows less about the subject than I do or being taught strategies that really don't make sense in the real world.

 

[Searcaigh]

Thanks for reposting this video Andy.

From what I notice, it's always the smaller agencies that adopt change quicker. The relative size of those agencies doesn't cause much of a ripple. PADI sit back and observe. If it works, PADI embrace it, wrap it up...and sell it to the globe. Then it becomes 'mainstream'.

Same in any large corporation, the bureaucracy slows everything down, in the company I work for it is close to killing it!

I've been humming and ha'ing about whether to offer the 'Self-Sufficient Diver' course myself. There are two reasons for that; firstly, self-reliance and team diving already feature highly on the courses I already offer...and secondly, I am unsure of demand for the course.

I also don't like the confusion between 'solo' and 'self-reliant' on the PADI course. I'd want to train divers at an early stage in self-reliant diving... but the solo element demands a considerable amount of prerequisite experience (100 dives). That's weird... 100 dives to be self-reliant... only 60 dives to be a Divemaster?!? That'd mean that many newly qualified divemasters wouldn't have sufficient experience to train for 'self-reliance'... Ironic?

I am sure you will have a demand from underwater photographers

I have yet to meet a decent DM who passed with the minimum number of dives, hell I have yet to meet a decent instructor with the minimum number of dives.

IMHO a DM should have around 100 minimum dives and an instructor twice that

 

[beanojones]

Pretty much the whole industry flip-flopped in regards to Nitrox.

As much as PADI people were stupid about Nitrox, PADI itself was not. They were waiting for OSHA to back off the stance that any Nitrox fill station (or at least PP fill stations) would have to have OSHA inspections.

OSHA backed off this stance, and PADI embraced Nitrox.

 

[shoredivr]

For some reason I can't "like" dale c's post. Consider it Liked.
*edit*

oh, so *now* it shows up.

 

[chrpai]

Just because someone has perfect flat trim and can do a perfect frog kick does not mean they are not a Muppet.

Classic quote.

 

[NAM001]

I love the video. It is spot on. I cant count the times i have said that i dive solo with others and have been trashed for saying it. I am a firm believer that diving with an other is no more buddy diving than diving with a bp/w makes you a tech diver. I have often thought that solo certification should be made a prereq for master diver as rescue is. I also understand that a buddy is more than a proximity issue. If they cant help they are not a buddy. I believe that unless you are trained to be a buddy, specifically perhaps a team diver, then you do not have a buddy. You only have someone to tell the recovery divers your last know situation and location. And a good recovery team does not even need that. Unless you know how your "BUDDY" is going to react to your needs, through experience, then whoever you are with is not a buddy, The name Instabuddy should be renamed to instapair or assigned waterspace occupier. I would love to have the opportunity to have a legitimate regular dive BUDDY or BUDDETTE that i can say that this is my functional buddy. Reality is that probably less than 20% can claim that status. Unfortunately OW or AOW does not have the time to teach the team concept skills to make a proper buddy out of someone and keep the training competivly priced.

 

[AfterDark]

Here in NE we dive mostly same day same ocean buddy diving. We learn early on to be self-reliant or quit diving. There are a lot of diving dropouts in NE because of the lack of vis and the cold mostly. I've yet to meet anyone in NE with a solo/self-reliant cert, yet there are lone divers everywhere, that is people starting off with a buddy(s) and ending up alone almost as soon as the dive starts. IMO areas like New England with normally low vis, some type of self relience course should be taught in conjunction the OW class. I say OW because here, once someonecompletes OW they are turned loose and are diving from the many sites we are lucky enough to have here. Diving with a DM in RI on a guided dive is at least to me unheard of.

 

[ozzydamo]

This was already posted in the solo section, quite a while back.

Good you put up for a broader audience- especially for those that think having a buddy makes them extra safe, statistically they aren't- but bsac and the other certifiers are good at twisting the truth, saying when a fatality occurs and buddies split- the death was a solo diver death- not a failure of buddy system, also interesting how most rec dive fatalities are either people in the first 20 dives or with a medical issue(like heart attacks). Seems solo-ers have been arse-holed for way too long good that mark has investigated the white lies involved. So back to the future.......

 

[NAM001]

I remember in the 60's when looking at auto ins rates adn women got a 10% or better discount because of gender. out of 100 accidents men had 60 and women had 40. explained teh rate difference till you looked at the miles driven men had 60 accidents in a million miles driven and women had 40 in 100 thousand miles driven. in those days women only drove to do house hold chores when men were not there to drive. percentage wise women had more accidents than men even if the anual count was lower. girls did not have cars guys did. if girls were to cruise the main it was done from the passenger side fo the car. so statistics mean nothing when it comes to justifying a position. drink the cool aid and then push it or you are an enemy of the cause. its a lot like dont walk the streets at night cause the boogie man will get you. probably kept a lot of us in at night till one figures out the truth and then the end resuslt is broad mistrust in all you were told. that last time the necessity of a buddy made sence to me was in the pre bcd days when we had j valves on our tanks.