The State of Diving

[*dave*]

It must be nice to be an experienced diver, perfect in all respects, so as one can criticize and belittle those divers who are just coming on line or only have a few dives under their belt. It must be a really big ego boost for those who are inclined to do so. And: "C-cards are given to people with the bare minimum dive skills"? I guess so, since they are newbies who have only had two days of open water. Get a life.

Please.... There has been no criticism or belittling, other than from you.

 

[ScubaSam]

I put this video together from clips from the DVD we bought after a two tank Cancun dive. I'll be using it in my OW class to demonstrate poor trim, buoyancy control, situational awareness, dangling gear, hand sculling and finning technique.

I don't dive with many groups I'm not familiar with, so I was a bit surprised to find the level of skill displayed in the video to be so common on the dives I did in Mexico. I thought I'd get your input on how the skills displayed in the video compare to your real world experiences with divers you aren't familiar with.

Is this representative of today's state of diving?

Yes, your video is very representative of the divers I see when I'm on vacation and at our local quarry.

 

[Jax]

I put this video together from clips from the DVD we bought after a two tank Cancun dive. I'll be using it in my OW class to demonstrate poor trim, buoyancy control, situational awareness, dangling gear, hand sculling and finning technique.

I don't dive with many groups I'm not familiar with, so I was a bit surprised to find the level of skill displayed in the video to be so common on the dives I did in Mexico. I thought I'd get your input on how the skills displayed in the video compare to your real world experiences with divers you aren't familiar with.

Is this representative of today's state of diving?

Yes - from the places I've dived, which are tourist areas.

On the other hand, you see the same thing on the ski slopes or in young MC riders. The fact is that most people do not think about bettering their skills. Skills take classwork and practice, and most people find classwork and practice 'boring'.

 

[B Lo]

... I wonder if the clueless girl handling the scorpionfish has any idea how lucky she is?

I'm glad I wasn't the only one staring at that part of the video. That was insane!

 

[TSandM]

That's quite typical of what I have seen in areas like Hawaii and Cozumel, or our South Pacific trip. Although I suspect the woman who is holding hands with her buddy is very, very new, and I can see Cozumel currents discombobulating someone straight out of OW.

But sometimes it isn't poor education or ignorance. We have a dear friend who doesn't dive a lot, and he dives like the folks in the video. We've been utterly unable to convince him to change anything he owns or anything he does. His attitude is that he doesn't have any problems in the water, so he doesn't need to "work" at his diving. Interestingly, he is an instructor in another sport, at which he works quite hard. I think diving is something where he doesn't perceive a need for skill, per se, and sadly it's also something where he doesn't hanker after elegance.

My experience in diving with newer divers is that some are just happy for the tour, and it is a rare one whose eyes light up and who says, "How did you learn to dive like that?"

 

[ONESPEED]

She had no idea what the DM handed her till she was back on the boat.

Holy crap, the DM handed her a scorpionfish? That's spectacularly irresponsible on so many levels.

 

[ScubaSteve]

......and it is a rare one whose eyes light up and who says, "How did you learn to dive like that?"

I like to think that I was always willing and wanting to improve/learn but one such moment for me was watching a diver in a pool hover inches from the bottom for minutes without moving. At that point, I knew that my skills could be refined A LOT (and at that point I really did have good trim and buoyancy IMO but not in comparison)

 

[ONESPEED]

It must be nice to be an experienced diver, perfect in all respects, so as one can criticize and belittle those divers who are just coming on line or only have a few dives under their belt. It must be a really big ego boost for those who are inclined to do so. And: "C-cards are given to people with the bare minimum dive skills"? I guess so, since they are newbies who have only had two days of open water. Get a life.

I know plenty of responsible instructors who would never give divers that sloppy in the water a C-card. As for getting a life, I'm doing just fine but thanks for your concern.

 

[Hank49]

The divers lack skill, but they DO look like they're having a blast. Waving arms around and kicking....and thinking, "HOLY S**T !!! this is GREAT" !!

 

[Trace Malinowski]

It must be nice to be an experienced diver, perfect in all respects, so as one can criticize and belittle those divers who are just coming on line or only have a few dives under their belt. It must be a really big ego boost for those who are inclined to do so. And: "C-cards are given to people with the bare minimum dive skills"? I guess so, since they are newbies who have only had two days of open water. Get a life.

After 30 years of diving, I'm still practicing and not perfect. I just spent 2 weeks filming training videos with one of the best skilled divers on the planet and neither one of us was "perfect" nor did we do every skill drill we were shooting correctly every take.

Some of us were initially certified at a time when C-cards were truly earned, coveted and respected. I still remember magazine articles suggesting divers take certification courses. If those earlier divers followed that advice today, they would walk away laughing. The open water standard today is less than the standard that was required to be a resort diver years ago who had to dive under the supervision of a pro.

It seems in every thread about training someone claims that the divers who are disenchanted with "training smarter not harder" are posting to stroke their own egos. I'm posting to call attention to lurkers and SB members that if they are diving like this that they should be aware that such diving is very poor - even for an OW diver fresh out of the class. There are many fixes to this problem.

My life, for the last 20 years, has been quality diver training - or giving back to others entering the sport what I received from my instructors. It was a hard course even for those of us who were "water babies" and the "feel good" aspect was getting that C-card after the hard work and knowing how far you came in skills and knowledge and feeling like you could go out and accomplish anything.