Diver safety following a number of fatalities

"Jim" <foj@grizedale.karoo.co.uk> wrote in message
news:5lydneX658JL9HfdSa8jmw@karoo.co.uk...
>
> <Pete S.> wrote in message news:40ea5c07.3655015@news.clara.net...
> > On Tue, 6 Jul 2004 08:40:05 +0100, "Jim" <foj@grizedale.karoo.co.uk>
> > wrote:
> >
> > >As a concerned diver I really would like to hear my fellow divers
> opinions
> > >on what seems to be an increasing number of fatalities reported in the
> press
> > >and the likely repercussions of such media exposure.
> > >
> > >What is the cause of the increasing number of diving fatalities?
> > >
> > > Is it the thrust of the PADI advanced diving cert? Newly qualified OW
> > >divers are encouraged to take advanced diver as soon as they qualify, and
> > >when they pass, they are anything but advanced. Ten dives does not make a
> > >diver no matter what certificates they hold, but is the confidence of
> having
> > >the Advanced cert pushing them to go beyond their personal diving limits?
> Or
> > >is it simply the increasing number of participants in the sport which is
> > >making the fatalities seem higher?
> > >
> > >Will the increasing number of fatalities encourage the government to
> issue
> > >legislation for divers and set standards for diving charters. If so what
> > >will that mean for the freedom of UK diving.
> > >
> > >I am highlighting PADI not out of some form of malice, I myself am a PADI
> > >cert diver, however I (personally) think that the progressive training
> > >regime offered by such organisations as BSAC is preferable to PADI
> > >financially driven diver training.
> > >
> > >
> >
> > It appears to me that your first paragraph which contains "seems to be
> > an increasing number of fatalities" is the basis for all the following
> > paragraphs. You have gone from "seems to be" to "the increasing number
> > of fatalities" without any reference to any statistics or factual
> > reports, and then used it as the basis for a question about
> > legislation and training standards.
> >
> > You're not a journalist are you?
> >
> > Pete S.
>
> I doesn't matter what the statistical evidence might say, the general public
> or a member of a government agency will not consider numbers and ratios when
> they perceive diving to be a dangerous sport. Increasing media attention
> will highlight the fatalities, but who's there counter that attention when
> we all have our backs to the wall, waiting for some legislative structure to
> be imposed on our sport to make it safer.
>
> Not likely to happen? Look at the two stage Motorcycle licence which is in
> place today, not long ago anyone could jump on any sized bike and ride away.
> Was licensing changed because of the high proportion of riders killed? No
> it wasn't. It was brought in because of public and media attention.
>
<snip>

....and rightly so. Three times around Chesterfield Town Hall followed by an
emergency stop *does not* qualify you to zoom off on an RD250. Jim, the biking
analogy doesn't hold water because back in the 70s the statistics *did* show
alarming increases in motorcycling deaths. The crash-helmet law was a feeble,
poorly thought-out attempt to do something about this, but Compulsory Basic
Training was brought in after in-depth discussions with the BMC and other
interested parties. CBT is a Good Thing. The other area in which the biking
analogy falls down is that back in the 70s you couldn't go out in your $vehicle
without seeing some idiot young sod on an RD250 weaving in and out of the
traffic at ludicrous speeds trying to kill himself and everybody around him.
Diving is not as "in your face" as that: Joe Public just hears about diving
accidents on the BBC. He probably puts them into the same category as
mountaineering and climbing accidents, thinks to himself, "tossers", turns over
to Coronation Street and tucks into his pizza, reflecting to himself what a full
and interesting life he leads.

After your post yesterday, I spent my lunchtime reading through the BSAC
statistics, as suggested by Keith. They seem to me to show that poor and
inadequate training is not a major contributor. No politician in his right mind
is going to legislate based on those statistics, in the face of opposition from
BSAC and PADI.

"Jim" <foj@grizedale.karoo.co.uk> wrote in message
news:5lydneX658JL9HfdSa8jmw@karoo.co.uk...
>
> <Pete S.> wrote in message news:40ea5c07.3655015@news.clara.net...
> > On Tue, 6 Jul 2004 08:40:05 +0100, "Jim" <foj@grizedale.karoo.co.uk>
> > wrote:
> >
> > >As a concerned diver I really would like to hear my fellow divers
> opinions
> > >on what seems to be an increasing number of fatalities reported in the
> press
> > >and the likely repercussions of such media exposure.

> > It appears to me that your first paragraph which contains "seems to be
> > an increasing number of fatalities" is the basis for all the following
> > paragraphs. You have gone from "seems to be" to "the increasing number
> > of fatalities" without any reference to any statistics or factual
> > reports, and then used it as the basis for a question about
> > legislation and training standards.

> I doesn't matter what the statistical evidence might say, the general
public
> or a member of a government agency will not consider numbers and ratios
when
> they perceive diving to be a dangerous sport. Increasing media attention
> will highlight the fatalities, but who's there counter that attention when
> we all have our backs to the wall, waiting for some legislative structure
to
> be imposed on our sport to make it safer.

So you admit you are not interested in statistics Am I to assume you would
rather base your argument on hearsay and invention? As to the general public
and government agencies: the former doesn't give a damn if it doesn't
impinge on them, while the latter care not a jot provided it does not lose
votes or provide an opportunity to impose taxes. Diving is still very much a
minority interest that has absolutely no impact upon public life except when
some hack, deperate to fill a few column-inches in the silly season, invents
or exagerates a story to fill his paper. Sorry Jim, but the problem is not
divers but journalists.

Cliff.

Gareth Ansell <g.ansell@no-spam-please.coventry.ac.uk> writes:

> Surely they both provide progression from one grade to the next.

When people from BSAC talk about progressive training, they are generally
talking about building on the level of individual skills as you gain
more experience, rather than progressing from one qualification to the
next.

For instance you would learn a Controlled Buoyant Lift from 2m in the
pool, progressing to 6m in your Ocean Diver, 10m in sport diver, 15m
in Dive Leader and 20m at Advanced Diver. This is just one example of
the way that you gradually build on skills as you progress through your
training.

The contrast is supposedly with PADI where you would normally not do
much in the way of rescue skills at all until you elect to take a
Rescue Diver course, though not being PADI trained it seems that
this is maybe not so cut and dried as it appears.

> As for quality of training etc, on my Open Water course in 1988 I was
> trained above and beyond the basic PADI syllabus, especially for diving in
> this country, for no extra cost.

I think things may have changed somewhat since 1988 - PADI must have been
in the very early staages of establishing itself in the UK and a lot of
PADIs early instructors were BSAC, ScotSAC or SAA taught.

> before and I will reiterate here, diving is relatively simple and the
> skill needed are common to all training agencies syllabuses. I
> believe that what makes the difference is the quality of the instructor.

I think that's about right. I also seem to recall hearing exactly
these arguments from other trolls back in 1989 when I started
learning to dive with SAA, so none of this is new.

Pete

--
__________________________________________________ __________________
Pete Young pete@antipope.dot.org Remove .dot to reply
"Just another crouton, floating on the bouillabaisse of life"

On Tue, 6 Jul 2004 09:59:13 +0100, "Jim" <foj@grizedale.karoo.co.uk>
wrote:


>
>I doesn't matter what the statistical evidence might say, the general public
>or a member of a government agency will not consider numbers and ratios when
>they perceive diving to be a dangerous sport. Increasing media attention
>will highlight the fatalities, but who's there counter that attention when
>we all have our backs to the wall, waiting for some legislative structure to
>be imposed on our sport to make it safer.
>
>Not likely to happen? Look at the two stage Motorcycle licence which is in
>place today, not long ago anyone could jump on any sized bike and ride away.
>Was licensing changed because of the high proportion of riders killed? No
>it wasn't. It was brought in because of public and media attention.
>
>You could suggest that it was imposed to prevent reckless riders killing
>themselves, are you now going to tell me there are no reckless divers?

I have no doubt there are reckless divers, and that some members of
the public think that diving is dangerous. I just tried to point out
that you are basing an arguement on "seems to be", rather than some
facts. Just like the media do from time to time. If we are going to
base our arguments on shakey data, how are we to defend our selves?

Not long ago on any sized bike? That law changed when I was 15, which
would have been about 1971...... I had to start riding on a CB175
honda.....

Pete S.

Pete S. wrote:

> Not long ago on any sized bike? That law changed when I was 15, which
> would have been about 1971...... I had to start riding on a CB175
> honda.....

Up to 250c on L plates in the late 60s.
I don't know the date it changed too that.

nigelH
Norton 350 twin owner in 1968

On Tue, 06 Jul 2004 15:13:45 GMT in uk.rec.scuba, Nigel Hewitt says:

>Pete S. wrote:
>
>> Not long ago on any sized bike? That law changed when I was 15, which
>> would have been about 1971...... I had to start riding on a CB175
>> honda.....
>
>Up to 250c on L plates in the late 60s.
>I don't know the date it changed too that.

Originally I don't think there was a limit but then the 250cc limit
for learners arrived in 1962. Then in 1979 mopeds lost their pedals
and were limited to 30mph but still the 2-strokes 250s were developing
~100mph by 1981 so that in response to concerns <yeah right> learners
were limited to 125cc and 12hp in 1982. Then came the CBT in ~1993 and
so it goes on.

--
Ian
"Democracy, what we need - Kakistocracy what we've got"

On Tue, 06 Jul 2004 15:13:45 GMT, "Nigel Hewitt"
<news@REMOVETHISnigelhewitt.net> wrote:

>Pete S. wrote:
>
>> Not long ago on any sized bike? That law changed when I was 15, which
>> would have been about 1971...... I had to start riding on a CB175
>> honda.....
>
>Up to 250c on L plates in the late 60s.
>I don't know the date it changed too that.
>
>nigelH
>Norton 350 twin owner in 1968
>
>
Sorry, got the date of helmet legislation and 250cc limit mixed up.

Pete S.

"Nigel Hewitt" <news@REMOVETHISnigelhewitt.net> wrote in message
news:e0966a89e8b943c5b34a020ef4a8c60b@news.teranew s.com...
> Pete S. wrote:
>
> > Not long ago on any sized bike? That law changed when I was 15, which
> > would have been about 1971...... I had to start riding on a CB175
> > honda.....
>
> Up to 250c on L plates in the late 60s.
> I don't know the date it changed too that.
>

Changed to 125cc with 12bhp limit in the late 70s or early 80s I think. Google
shows that CBT was introduced in 1990 but more rigourous testing came in in
around 1984 I believe, and in practice that was difficult to pass if you hadn't
had training. I was one of the last people to do the old test: as I said, three
times around Chesterfield Town Hall and an emergency stop. The last of my bikes
was sold in around 1995 but - hey - you're allowed trailers now so nothing to
stop me taking diving gear on a bike!

"NoJags Neil" <neil264removethisbit@andthisbithotmail.com> wrote in
message news:7cednRlldedvVHfdRVn-hw@nildram.net
>
but - hey - you're allowed trailers now so nothing to
> stop me taking diving gear on a bike!

Paging Nigel...

IIRC you've gone one better than that haven't you?

DaveA



--
Posted via Mailgate.ORG Server - http://www.Mailgate.ORG

NoJags Neil wrote:
> but - hey - you're allowed trailers now so nothing to
> stop me taking diving gear on a bike!

Pah.
Who needs trailers when you have a Fireblade?
http://www.nigelhewitt.co.uk/stuff/bikefill1.jpg

nigelH