[MRKYMARK]

In my role as Visitors Licencee for the Coronation, I occasionally take whole boat loads (10+) out for tours etc.
Don't do too many, about one a month.
In order to dive the site, we ask a bit of info as regards name, address and dive qualifications.
This makes interesting reading. Many groups are very mixed, and that is fine. some we have had are well qualified for the dive ahead, i.e Rescue, diver leader etc. some are instructor etc. i generally leave it to the group to buddy up as they see fit, they know thier divers etc, and then just tag along.

What amazes me is how bad some of them are. and i have had some who are rescue qualified and higher approach and say 'this is my first sea dive' or 'i have not dived from a boat before' or 'how do i use the diver lift?' (this is after the skipper brief when it was covered!!)

Earlier in the year i had a rescue qualified diver who had to have thier hand held (literally) the whole hour dive.

Buoyancy is quite often really bad, and viz goes to zero at the base of the shot where divers decend and dont leave the shot until they actually hit the seabed, rather than breaking off about 4-5mtrs up and orientating themselves then.

One group i arranged to meet out there in thier rib had a big argument about where the wreck was (an old timer on board was adamant it was where the Elk is!) so they dropped the divers there, in 30mtrs water, when the divers were expecting 15! when i saw them, saw the boat name, i asked them what they were diving, 'the Coronation' they replied. 'This is the Elk' said I. 'when you are done, come over and i will meet you at the Coronation. you are about two miles out of where you should be!!'
so i motored on over to the coronation with agreement they would meet me there, only to find that when i got there, the skipper and boat was right behind me, he had followed, leaving four divers on a wreck at twice anticipated depth, near a shipping lane, with no top cover! conversation ensued, and he was anxous to shot it right this time, so as he had a spare shot, he would do this while his divers were down. (barking mad!!) 'stick it where my bow is now' i shouted, so he did. and the whole lot went to the bottom as the shot was tangled.

these are but a few of the things i see, and maybe i will write a book.

but it does worry me how hap-hazard some divers are, and how unqualified some qualified divers turn out to be!!

maybe you have simular experiences?


but i do think that maybe 'quarry qualified' is totally different to 'sea qualified' and to be fair to quarry wallers, vice versa. there are many aspects of quarry diving that need different understandngs. Maybe these type incidents, and there must be 100's if not 1000's each year in British Waters are at the root of many incident pits.

Perhaps as well as 'near misses', we should report 'potentially dangerous diver or skipper' situations to allow for better/more training???

 

[sheesh]

I think the issue is not whether they are qualified, but whether they are qualified "for that dive". You could be rescue diver and have only dived in quarries or blue water. The qualie says "in similar conditions to your training", so if that is the case you "should" be building up gradually to that 30m uk sea dive. That means it isn't a problem with the qualification, it's a problem with the diver making assumptions about their abilities in harsh conditions they are not used to.

All my diving has been in the sea (except a few pool sessions), but I wouldn't dream of just dropping into e.g. Dotty without at least some familiarisation. I genuinely think most people don't understand how different uk sea diving can be from other environments, and I suspect that with the task loading of dealing with descending a shot, dealing with chop, and current, and poor vis etc the task loading means that all that expensive training goes.to.shit.

Sent from my GT-I9000 using Tapatalk 2

 

[MRKYMARK]

The Coronation lies in 15mtrs, the incident with a 30mtr dive was one of the mistakes that could of ended badly.
we accept all divers at the Coronation OW and above. youngest we have had on site was an 11yr old girl, and she had better dive skills than some twice her age!

 

[edward]

I'm not sure tickets mean very much. I've dived with some highly qualified instructors who were crap, and with a 2 dive OW who was a pleasure.

Half the problem is people being honest. There is a lot of macho stuff in diving and people tend to be scared to admit any worries/failings/faults.

 

[RonProwse]

tickets mean nothing we was sat on a boat ready to head out of port when the skipper asked everyone if they all had SMBs and reels only for a MI instructor to turn round and say they did not have one nor had they ever had the need to use one, on talking to this guy he had never dived in the UK!

 

[GSK]

I've seen some right states aboard, including one apparently national instructor

 

[MRKYMARK]

I'm not sure tickets mean very much. I've dived with some highly qualified instructors who were crap, and with a 2 dive OW who was a pleasure.

Half the problem is people being honest. There is a lot of macho stuff in diving and people tend to be scared to admit any worries/failings/faults.

i learnt that very early on in diving, when i was just OW, and a AOW diver ended up tank down on the seabed with no mask!

 

[jturner]

In my role as Visitors Licencee for the Coronation, I occasionally take whole boat loads (10+) out for tours etc.
Don't do too many, about one a month.
In order to dive the site, we ask a bit of info as regards name, address and dive qualifications.
This makes interesting reading. Many groups are very mixed, and that is fine. some we have had are well qualified for the dive ahead, i.e Rescue, diver leader etc. some are instructor etc. i generally leave it to the group to buddy up as they see fit, they know thier divers etc, and then just tag along.

What amazes me is how bad some of them are. and i have had some who are rescue qualified and higher approach and say 'this is my first sea dive' or 'i have not dived from a boat before' or 'how do i use the diver lift?' (this is after the skipper brief when it was covered!!)

Earlier in the year i had a rescue qualified diver who had to have thier hand held (literally) the whole hour dive.

Buoyancy is quite often really bad, and viz goes to zero at the base of the shot where divers decend and dont leave the shot until they actually hit the seabed, rather than breaking off about 4-5mtrs up and orientating themselves then.

One group i arranged to meet out there in thier rib had a big argument about where the wreck was (an old timer on board was adamant it was where the Elk is!) so they dropped the divers there, in 30mtrs water, when the divers were expecting 15! when i saw them, saw the boat name, i asked them what they were diving, 'the Coronation' they replied. 'This is the Elk' said I. 'when you are done, come over and i will meet you at the Coronation. you are about two miles out of where you should be!!'
so i motored on over to the coronation with agreement they would meet me there, only to find that when i got there, the skipper and boat was right behind me, he had followed, leaving four divers on a wreck at twice anticipated depth, near a shipping lane, with no top cover! conversation ensued, and he was anxous to shot it right this time, so as he had a spare shot, he would do this while his divers were down. (barking mad!!) 'stick it where my bow is now' i shouted, so he did. and the whole lot went to the bottom as the shot was tangled.

these are but a few of the things i see, and maybe i will write a book.

but it does worry me how hap-hazard some divers are, and how unqualified some qualified divers turn out to be!!

maybe you have simular experiences?


but i do think that maybe 'quarry qualified' is totally different to 'sea qualified' and to be fair to quarry wallers, vice versa. there are many aspects of quarry diving that need different understandngs. Maybe these type incidents, and there must be 100's if not 1000's each year in British Waters are at the root of many incident pits.

Perhaps as well as 'near misses', we should report 'potentially dangerous diver or skipper' situations to allow for better/more training???

It's all down to the annoying fact that 7/10s of the planet is covered by water, the conditions within that water vary hugely and there's more than 1 way to get into it and out of it! Until about 2 years ago I'd never done a sea shore dive. Hundreds of dives logged and a qualified instructor but with no sea shore dives?!! How did I ever qualify?!! Another example would be boat diving - UK hardboat diving with live boats and lifts is different to Egyptian hardboat diving using a large liveaboard and supporting RIBs. I know people who have hundreds of dives logged and are qualified to 50m deco dives but have never dived in the UK (or in temperatures below 25C or thereabouts) and would probably be very uncomfortable in the murk and cold!
Just goes to show that qualification doesn't guaranntee the wider experience!

 

[TerryH]

Think one of the prime candidates is a dive industry that is scrabbling for as much
as it can get from every client in a depressed market. That sees divers being pushed
onto the next course and kit being sold that is way past the level they are at now.

Even sites like this are partly to blame, soon as you buy into the mantra of advice
based on the concept of what's good for the future, you'll inevitably get someone
who wont wait and uses that advice in the present.

 

[12480]

It is all to do with dive frequency, if you get a rescue ticket and don't dive more than 2 or three times a year you can still say you are a rescue diver.

Time out of the water makes a world of difference, I pay no attention at all to peoples quals... they ar eon the whole meaningless without dive frequency to back it up.

It doesn't mean their training was shoddy, corners cut or that instructors are simply signing off bad divers, it means at the time they met the requirements, that doens't mean they still do...

Although, to be fair, the Driver of the RIB should not be allowed keys....

My ol' man had a ticket to drive a car up to his dying day, the fact he had not driven for thirty years made no difference, he could still climb into a car and hit the motorways on any day he so chose to, thankfully he never chose too...

 

[Iain3]

I was on a boat heading out to a 35m wreck last year, a girl on the boat, rescue diver apparently, just before jumping in asked someone to remind her which button on the BCD was for up and which was for down as it had been a while since she last dived.

 

[MRKYMARK]

Macho, over confidence, lots of reasons, embarrassment maybe
A good diver knows when to can a dive, and knows when he is beyond his abilities

 

[sheesh]

Macho, over confidence, lots of reasons, embarrassment maybe
A good diver knows when to can a dive, and knows when he is beyond his abilities

The problem is sometimes it's only when you are on the dive you realise you are beyond your comfort zone.
That's when you need the confidence to call it.

 

[Blu DL]

I always think that qualifications = enthusiasm for scuba. Not necessarily capability! You assess that by watching someone kit up and the first 5mins usually let you know.

 

[witchieblackcat]

My view is that the issues are as follows:

1. Too many people think that experienced means 50-100 dives. That's too few.
2. Too many people are in a rush to be a more qualified diver and bounce from course to course. I've always believed that one does the course and then does 50-100 dives before thinking about the next one so those skills really are nailed.
3. Too many people want to be instructors meaning too many people are instructors meaning too many bad instructors are giving their time for a pittance training the next bunch of poor divers.
4. Too many people come on places like this wanting to buy everything once rather than rebuy their kit failing to realise that it's the learning and experience that makes you want/need other kit and starting with a full tech setup is a fools game.

I'm sure that there are more problems.

 

[MSargeant]

My view is that the issues are as follows:

1. Too many people think that experienced means 50-100 dives. That's too few.
2. Too many people are in a rush to be a more qualified diver and bounce from course to course. I've always believed that one does the course and then does 50-100 dives before thinking about the next one so those skills really are nailed.
3. Too many people want to be instructors meaning too many people are instructors meaning too many bad instructors are giving their time for a pittance training the next bunch of poor divers.
4. Too many people come on places like this wanting to buy everything once rather than rebuy their kit failing to realise that it's the learning and experience that makes you want/need other kit and starting with a full tech setup is a fools game.

I'm sure that there are more problems.

I see those 2 a lot.
My gripe is when people who were really macho/overconfident balls up during a dive (as some would expect) then try to bullsh*t their way out of it.

 

[Mustard Dave]

I was on a train a couple of months back. I was sat at a table reading Mark Powell's 'Deco for Divers'. The lad sat opposite me asked about it, mentioning he was an 'advanced diver'. As I explained what the book was about, he asked me what deco was. As we chatted, I worked out 'advanced diver' meant PADI AOW, as I'd suspected. I appreciate PADI recreational courses do not teach diving outside NDLs, but avoiding the dangers of decompression are a fundamental part of the course syllabi. How the f**k can a diver of any level not know what is meant by decompression?

 

[MRKYMARK]

I reckon the word 'advanced' is poorly chosen by padi, as students think it means they are more qualified than they actually are. its just another rung on the ladder, and the name should reflect that, not give them an over inflated view, which is bad for them as well as others!
and dive centers live on courses often.
they too push for more and more courses, and you hear of Scuba Divers with not so many logged dives etc qualifying as instructors

 

[12480]

Adventure diver would sit better, after all the course manual is/was entitled adventures in diving...

 

[slinky]

I am not getting into whether PADI or BSAC are any better then each other have dived with poor divers from both agencies but a lot of it has to come down to personal responsibility for your training/safety etc I am asked to do more qualifications but why would I? I have no interest or intention of becoming an instructor and am as qualified as I need to be for the diving I want to do. I see it as my responsibility to stay within my comfort zone and dive accordingly and make sure i am a 'good' buddy I am not going ot endanger my life/safety for anyone - having said that I have been relieved of several buddies while on different holidays due to their poor dive skills and ignoring the the dive plan etc all of them have been more 'qualified' than me and most of them with most dives than me