Posted by Chris on August 11, 2004 at 12:40:27:
In Reply to: Re: The "incident" on SUNDIVER posted by Tired on August 11, 2004 at 11:53:48:
I agree, regardless of what the diver and his buddies did there was absolutely no excuse for leaving the dive site without him. I believe the primary responsibility for the incident was that of the Ocean Adventures divemaster/master instructor Zacharias Araneta.
The stated source of the story was Dan Carlock and Ocean Adventures owner Steve Ladd. It seems they completely for got to mention the culpability of the DM in the incident. Since the time period of lawsuit liability over this incident has not yet expired I fully understand and support Ray’s choice not to comment.
Captain Ray relied upon the divemaster to give him a accurate accounting of the divers. This is a necessary practice because Captains have many issues on a boat to attend to and cannot do the divemasters job for them. Because the captain is ultimately responsible, and Ray was the only one the Coast Guard has jurisdiction over, he got the short end of the stick.
I am still exceedingly disturbed by PADI’s refusal to take even token disciplinary action against their DM/instructor Mr. Araneta. It seems unacceptable since they have no problem taking disciplinary action against instructors who attempt to teach more than the “basic” curriculum in a beginning SCUBA class. It seems PADI finds that teaching divers life-saving skills is a bigger offense than leaving divers behind at a dive site.
