Posted by MHK on January 16, 2001 at 17:33:54:
In Reply to: Re: DIR on the West Coast posted by seahunt on January 16, 2001 at 16:42:30:
Seahunt,
I've enjoyed our exchanges and it seems to me that at this point we have come to an enpass..
I've attempted to supply sound reasoning behind every recomendation that I have putforth, and I think even the most ardant of DIR critics would agree that there is a reason for everything, it seems to me the debate is wether or not the paticular reason makes since to the other side..
We often times find ourselves in dialogue with diver's that have a collection of poorly strung together philosophies with inadequate support or thought process behind their diving practices.
I respect your right to offer counter arguements and I believe that anyone following are exchanges has gained a heightened awareness of diving safety, and at the end of the day this is what we should all strive for.
We clearly have varying views with respect to DIR and its respective application to west coast diving.. I've attempted to counter every point you made and in my mind it all comes down to a steadfast reluctance to accept the system taken as a whole, but rather a inclination or temptation to piecemeal the system. I'd hope that it would be accepted recognizing that the value is greater in total than the sum of the parts.. I've noticed a tendancy of the DIR opponents ( and I'm not singling you out) to justify some of their diving practices by offering potential solutions to problems.. DIR attempts to solve the problem before you get into the water rather than incur added risk and then hope a diver is skilled or practiced enough to resolve the problem when it happens.. That's why you see me constantly refering to the DIR mentality..
We all recognize that there are risks associated with diving, so the question becomes what's acceptable and what isn't, and of course each diver makes there own analysis.. The focus of DIR is to reduce the risks to the least common denominator which means in a emergency situation there is less to consider when trying to solve a problem.. If I could reduce the analogy to a numerical number I'm trying to illustrate that there are perhaps 15 ( I'm just making up numbers here ) things that could go wrong to a DIR diver.. In the event of an emergency I have the amount if time I can hold my breath to recognize the problem and then implement the fix. Less potential problems is certainly better than more. So to continue with the analogy, from what I see from the overwhelming majority of opposition is that rather than go into the water with 15 potential failure points, I'll go in with 30 but know how to solve the added 15, which simply doesn't make any sense to me when they can be fixed at the surface...
Every one still following this thread, I would ask you to look at your screen and hold your breath for as long as you can, and then ask yourself in that short amount of time ( bearing in mind that you aren't in a paniced situation) but in that short amount of time could you find the problem, fix it and if not safely ascend to the surface?????
By adding additional potential failure points you are shortening the response time to fix a problem in an emergency...
Obviously this medium of diving isn't going to be 100% accepted by the masses and I've long ago reconciled myself to that, but I will strongly defend the system against a wide sweeping statement such as DIR does NOT apply to our diving.. I believe it does, I've shown week in and week out it does and if nothing else we got some divers that may otherwise have fallen into complacent habits to re-think a few things, so in my view the time and effort is worth it..
Later and safe diving to you as well...