Cautionary tale from Anglesey

[Fiona]

Oh almost forgot, we recommended his next kit purchase was a pony

[Lou]

Yes, I think that is the problem with shop clubs. Remember that PADI don't actually have clubs, and shop club are really under the auspices of no-one, even if they are a PADI school.
It generally appears to me (although not all shops are the same) that the trips run are simply profit-making extensions. If no-one is teaching then they have no responsibility over anyone who dives with them, even though people who might have been students with their school may feel it to be a "safe" way of diving.
Another way of looking at it is that the shop=staff get subsidised diving for a weekend and will be keen to do sites that they want to do....
Divers either have to take their progression into their own hands and be sensible about it (which is what Caroline and I did) or join a club that tells them what they are ready to do.

You can't fall in between like this guy seems to do...

[Adrian Kelland]

There's ALWAYS duty of care Lou.

If he was diving with the company he trained with, they would have a hard time explaining why he died on a dive they knew he was not qualified/trained/experienced in.

Proprietors clubs always have someone who is responsible for the club's actions, even if it does not seem like it.

Adrian

[Lou]

But it may not have been a shop he trained with.

I understand what you are saying, Adrian, but it really isn't a club, as you wuld call a BSAC branch a club. It is only a boat-booking service or similar - sort of a UK travel agency for diving?

[Mark Davies]

Originally Posted by Lou

It is only a boat-booking service or similar - sort of a UK travel agency for diving?

Pretty much like YD. NOT a club.

I can't really fault the guy - he just didn't know enough to realise what a mess he'd put us in. I guess he just felt a bit shy to mention to us that he was running short of air until he hit red and didn't realise that by then it was already too late. Just a lack of experience and we've all been there.

But couldn't believe someone had taken him on a 40m dive. Again, he didn't think anything of that. He went along with them and thought it must be okay. He simply had not got to the point where he was taking personal responsibility for his diving. That's where PADI fails and BSAC does so much better - it really looks after divers until they are properly ready to look after themselves.

But I did PADI and I'm still here, so sometimes they must get it right.

[NJT]

The point were the brown stuff hits the fan and the training takes over.
Green incoming.

You were lucky as Elfyn certainly knows were to get out of the weather and still dive.
We were at Dotty and the convoy from the coast arrived about 11am.

My buddy had a free flow at the hut. However we both had a pony, and she continued to breathe from it until it finnally stopped at 17m. As soon as she gave the signal the dive was aborted and came up as fast as was safe.

I wonder if my fin ever turned up, lost just to the north of the Dakota

Regards
Nick

[Lou]

Originally Posted by Mark Davies

But I did PADI and I'm still here, so sometimes they must get it right.

Precisely.

As I said, you either take repsonsibility for yourself and think about these things, or you find an place where someone else will do it for you until you are ready.

Well done, guys, anyway.

[jamesp]

We had a diver turn up at our BSAC branch one evening, wanted to do "more adventurous diving". chatting, we tend to be a rather tame branch on the whole, it transpired that he was AOW with 10 dives to his name.None were in the sea and he had allready been past 40m in dorrie. Strangely i've never seen him again.

As has been indicated, some people just do not realise they need to be responsible from themselves.

Having dived with rather ropey buddies who turned out to be instructors, i can sympathise with your predicement.At least you were diving this weekend.

[hogen-deifar]

Excellent and interesting read, Mark. I tried to blob you, but as with Odin I need to spread my green around first! I also gave a blob to Fiona on behalf of both of you, because you worked so well as a team.

As a new diver, like *Simon* it helps to read threads like this because it hi-lights the dangers as well as the highs of diving. Experienced people know the techie aspect but us newees we can only go on what we hear in the class room and though forums like this. I have a million questions to ask now about the situation, but this forum isn't really the place, however, I will now read up on it more and talk to my *buddy* more about it. He'll have read the thread so he can explain further for me and also help me with the questions I have racing in my mind!

What struck me, when reading the original post, was the apparent calmness of both Mark and Fiona. I hope *Simon* was grateful to you afterwards in the boat, and I hope it made him think twice about his knowledge. Being an AOW doesn't make you an experienced diver. When I qualified in April, I did so with 2 others. One of them struggled with the initial swim in the pool. I lapped him 3 times and he basically skulled his way through the swim competancy. Then all through the course all he kept asking was *How deep can I go" etc. He qualified, just, and did his AOW a month later with no additional diving in between. I've loved the water for as long as I can remember, but I totally respect it more than anything. Learning to dive has been a dream come true, but it's also been an eye opener, like this thread has been.

Without wanting to sound patronising, I just wanted to say "well done" to you both for your cool heads and I only hope that if I ever do something as daft as he did that I've got divers like you 2 around me to help out!

[Paul Beal]

Originally Posted by Mark Davies

Going around I was wondering how Simon was getting on with his air. But he was carrying a 15 litre like myself so I wasn't too worried. I would have gone to look, but we had the age old problem of threesomes; in only 3m viz as soon as I turned to check Simon we were sure to lose Fiona. Coming up to 30 minutes and I still had half my tank and Simon hadn't indicated 100 bar so I presumed we were fine. Then I did get a signal from Simon - a clenched fist!

'He must have got that wrong?' I thought. I looked at his guage - 50 bar. I looked at my computer - 28.2m and 3 minutes of deco obligation. We were both on air, so if I had deco, so did he. I looked at Simon and thought, 'You're fucked!'.

Okay, so what was the good news? Well, I still had 115 bar. 'We ought to make that', I thought. Bent, maybe? But not dead. I sent up my blob, and not for the first time was I grateful for my self-inflating SMB. None of my now precious air was wasted on the bag.

To my relief, Fiona had seen what was going on and had joined us. I signalled to go up and she sent up her own bag. We started heading up, but Simon was so slow! Didn't he realise the trouble he was in? I had to beckon him urgently to come up. I got us up a few metres and saw he was down to 30 bar. I passed the reel to him, put my spare into my mouth and passed him my long hose. He took it without much fuss. To be honest, for a man on the brink of his own demise he was handling the situation very well! He really didn't know!

Seeing this Fiona now had an idea of what was going on and we continued to ascend. I watched my air-integrated computer as my available air time began to diminish alarmingly. By the time we reached 10m I had 9 minutes of deco to do and we only had 4 minutes of air left. 'Now we're both fucked!' I thought.

I took a glance at Fiona's computer. Thankfully she'd been on her mix and had no deco to do. I suggested that she take Simon up as far as she could and then let him go. No point in us all getting bent. Fiona deployed her long hose and again Simon took it very calmly. Getting my own regulator back I was relieved to see my available air time climb steadily back up to 18 minutes. I might survive after all!

My computer takes me up slowly, with stops every metre from 9m down. I made my way up and six minutes later was surprised to see Simon and Fiona still hanging off her line. Simon had insisted on his 3 minute stop at 5 metres! Fortunately, he'd done all his air gulping at depth on my tank, so in shallower water Fiona had enough to manage it for them both.

They got to the surface a couple of minutes before me and we all made it back onto the boat without a single bleep from our computers! Anglesey had done it again - scared the shit out of me but let me live to tell the tale!

Well that wasn't that bad!

And it wasn't, once it was over. It was a first for both Fiona and myself (though we don't know about Simon!) and we found it very useful. It was satisfying to have worked together as a team and got the job done, but we did feel rather daft for allowing the situation to arise in the first place. Lessons learnt.

Sounds like a nasty situation well handled! Well done!

I have to say that I am not shy to check someone else's guage periodically throughout a dive whether they are more experienced than me or not. I dived with someone I had only met on the boat a few hours before off Brid on Saturday and if his guage had not been orientated so I could see it whenever he faced me I would have been checking it every so often.

Paul

Edit: Mark, I need to spread the love. Fiona, you have a green!