[daz]

Originally Posted by [b

Quote[/b] (Steve W @ Aug. 08 2003,14:24)]Ah.... it depends on how standards are deployed, for instance in my old club new divers , the old Club Diver which is equivalent of Ocean Diver (yes, BSAC have chopped and changed titles a bit over the past few years) was most definately NOT allowed to dive without supervision and had to be buddied with a dive Leader. Only as Sport Diver level were they ok'ed to dive with equivalent or higher grade divers, even then it would depend on the site, depth & experience.
IMO & IME (no rucks please) the typical OW is no where near as capable as a CD/OD, AOW is more like it, I think OW is really only a "resort" grade, which is very useful but very limited

Steve

Don't know to be honest Steve,  just because I have not had experience of diving with CD or OD...  But I don't doubt it for one moment.  

One of the problems is that the OW divers do not have experience of diving for divings sake (If you know where I am coming from on this)...  AOW does give them the opportunity to do extra dives that are if you like proper dives while still under supervision to some degree.

I think that many newly qualified OW and even AOW divers could benefit from getting at least an addition dozen OW dives in with another experienced diver.

But we must not lose sight of the fact that the OW qual trains people to dive in conditions similar to those experienced on their OW course....

The car driving test analogy is a very good example IMHO.

Daz