Posted by Jason on October 18, 2000 at 17:30:48:
In Reply to: Poor training or lack of experience posted by JRM on October 18, 2000 at 16:15:37:
it's not the new divers being trashed, it's the
lousy instructors and the agencies that do nothing to
fix this.
I disagree that OW cert divers are inexperienced flounders
by definition. A good OW class will prepare them to
go out and dive. Mine certainly did, and I went to the
Farallon Islands with 40some dives of experience. Three
of my nine checkout divers were at Monastery, with
dive 4 being 50 minutes long.
This crap about 80 minutes of UW time for the entire weekend,
all at Breakwater...that's what's being criticized. That
just doesn't get the job done in California. And any
course that mandates AOW for safety should be eliminated.