what do the standards say?

[curtschu]

Wait just a minute. Ok if you can't violate a depth level at intro or cave 1 or whatever pretty please let me cave dive cert you have how do you then take a class that takes you to 130 without violating the standard? You see my point? If you are in the supervision of an instructor for the level of the dive plan IE a full cave instructor takes a AN/DP student that is intro to 130 no violation has occurred.

[Rhino]

Wait just a minute. Ok if you can't violate a depth level at intro or cave 1 or whatever pretty please let me cave dive cert you have how do you then take a class that takes you to 130 without violating the standard? You see my point? If you are in the supervision of an instructor for the level of the dive plan IE a full cave instructor takes a AN/DP student that is intro to 130 no violation has occurred.

By the logic above, Cave/An-DP/DPV Instructor taking newly certified OW diver on a scooter dive in a cave to 140' for an AN-DP course, violates no standard of being a Cave or AN-DP or DPV Instructor, because the OW diver is "in the supervision of an instructor for the level of the dive plan."

Regarding my instructor not doing my AN-DP course in a cave when I was Apprentice Cave certified, one of the things I said was: "... I would have been diving beyond both my cave training certification level (Apprentice) AND my basic diving certification level (Nitrox), and the instructor was only willing to train above one certification level at a time."

[curtschu]

By the logic above, Cave/An-DP/DPV Instructor taking newly certified OW diver on a scooter dive in a cave to 140' for an AN-DP course, violates no standard of being a Cave or AN-DP or DPV Instructor, because the OW diver is "in the supervision of an instructor for the level of the dive plan."

Regarding my instructor not doing my AN-DP course in a cave when I was Apprentice Cave certified, one of the things I said was: "... I would have been diving beyond both my cave training certification level (Apprentice) AND my basic diving certification level (Nitrox), and the instructor was only willing to train above one certification level at a time."

I'm sure you can pile any amount of detritus on the logic to make it invalid, my point is that anytime you train to the next level you are technically violating your current level of certification. But you are doing htis under the supervision of a dive professional, not a trust me dive with an experienced buddy.

[mstueven]

I think I was a bit ethereal in my first rendition, so let me try this with a more concrete example and a couple terms defined for the purposes of discussion. "Standard" is something an instructor must follow while teaching. "Limits" are the rules you are to follow once you are certified.

Is an intro diver with a previous trimix certification perform limited to cave dives shallower than 130'? Does being full cave change the limit, or do I have to have a cave trimix certification?

Can an instructor teaching a full cave course to a trimix certified diver do a training dive deeper than 130' and stay within standards?

In other words, are the limits restrictive (always limit yourself to the least) or cumulative (dive to the limits of your highest level of training)..? What about the standards?

And yes, I deliberately loaded the question, because I see divers and instructors in real life and on the internet doing it whichever way is convenient or best for them. I also deliberately used trimix rather than AN/DP to avoid the AIR/END arguments, which isn't the point. Although we might throw rebreather in where trimix was at and see what people think then?

[curtschu]

I think I was a bit ethereal in my first rendition, so let me try this with a more concrete example and a couple terms defined for the purposes of discussion. "Standard" is something an instructor must follow while teaching. "Limits" are the rules you are to follow once you are certified.

Is an intro diver with a previous trimix certification perform limited to cave dives shallower than 130'? Does being full cave change the limit, or do I have to have a cave trimix certification?

Can an instructor teaching a full cave course to a trimix certified diver do a training dive deeper than 130' and stay within standards?

In other words, are the limits restrictive (always limit yourself to the least) or cumulative (dive to the limits of your highest level of training)..? What about the standards?

And yes, I deliberately loaded the question, because I see divers and instructors in real life and on the internet doing it whichever way is convenient or best for them. I also deliberately used trimix rather than AN/DP to avoid the AIR/END arguments, which isn't the point. Although we might throw rebreather in where trimix was at and see what people think then?

Since I am not an instructor or a board member of any training agency I can't say. But one thing? What is Cave Trimix? I'm Full Cave and TDI Tri-mix I dive Henley's and occasionally parts of Eagles Next. AM I diving beyond my certification limits? I don't believe so. Did I dive below 130 in training in a cave? Yep. Did it violate standards I don't think so. But I'm not to say.

[speleodiver]

The real issue here is not what agency he was teaching for or not teaching for. He was the training director and as such (like many love to claim) is held to a certain standard of actions. After speaking to one of the divers who was intro certified only, he stated he became stuck in the "restriction" and has since quit cave diving. Now based on his statement, and that of a few others recently, it seems this person has a history of violations which have taken some time to catch up. Sure Oliver is going to defending his buddy to his death but you can't ignore the facts. Any instructor this high up who violates ethics and standards time and time again is a ticking time bomb for his students and this community. There will be another agency who will pick him up because it's all about the money. When we decide as a whole that no amount of money is worth a life then perhaps this will change. Just had this conservation last night. I know of only one shop who could care less about the money and more about the environment and lives. If you want to talk standards, let's talk about the standard of money being worth more than everything else. After all, its how this mess started. I can agree, teaching tech classes off a boat is costly and stricken with logistical challenges. But who wants to put their life on the line because the weather may blow the trip or the current is to strong?? The real issue is too many are placing the dollar over safety and this crap needs to stop.

Every agency differs on training in overhead. What does not differ is the safety we all owe our students. It doesn't matter if I am teaching TDI, PADI, PSAI, NSS-CDS, NACD, NAUI, CMAS, SSI or any of the others, a life lost is just as lost with TDI as it is with NACD. This is the price we cannot afford but people like this guy seem to think we can write the check. Or maybe he thinks the check will never be his to write?

Either way, I enjoy my diving without all this BS and I need not venture too far or into the overcrowded what is becoming limited accessible sites most have to go to. I guess that's the nice thing about where I am in my career of cave diving.

[victorzamora]

By the logic above, Cave/An-DP/DPV Instructor taking newly certified OW diver on a scooter dive in a cave to 140' for an AN-DP course, violates no standard of being a Cave or AN-DP or DPV Instructor, because the OW diver is "in the supervision of an instructor for the level of the dive plan."

Regarding my instructor not doing my AN-DP course in a cave when I was Apprentice Cave certified, one of the things I said was: "... I would have been diving beyond both my cave training certification level (Apprentice) AND my basic diving certification level (Nitrox), and the instructor was only willing to train above one certification level at a time."

That's a good point.

I'm sure you can pile any amount of detritus on the logic to make it invalid, my point is that anytime you train to the next level you are technically violating your current level of certification. But you are doing htis under the supervision of a dive professional, not a trust me dive with an experienced buddy.

The rule I've heard is "Dive one level beyond your training." If you're Cavern, you can do an Intro dive with an instructor.

[victorzamora]

Bold/Red is mine:

I think I was a bit ethereal in my first rendition, so let me try this with a more concrete example and a couple terms defined for the purposes of discussion. "Standard" is something an instructor must follow while teaching. "Limits" are the rules you are to follow once you are certified.
I think that cert limits are a good idea to make more available. That way, we wouldn't all be arguing about this. There'd be a clear cut "This card certifies you to dive within the limits of: No deco, no major restrictions, 130ft max depth, with a buddy, on the gold line, to sixths of two tanks"....or whatever. Then, if someone was diving thirds, double-stages, deco on trimix to 160ft through restrictions we'd know, clearly. They could even reference official definitions of each of those. This could open up some ugly cans of worms, though.

Is an intro diver with a previous trimix certification perform limited to cave dives shallower than 130'? Does being full cave change the limit, or do I have to have a cave trimix certification?
My understanding is that yes, being Intro limits you to 130ft, period. My Intro card also clearly states "No Decompression." I was told that that was true, REGARDLESS of other certifications. I've met Full Trimix Instructors that are Intro certified and weren't allowed to do deco dives in the overhead. And yes, Full Cave does change that limit. Full Cave, the way it was explained to me by an instructor, was the "license to do any cave dive you'd like." My instructors told me that them giving me a Full Cave card meant that I was expected to be mentally and physically prepared for much bigger dives than I should be doing at that time. It was made clear to me that, while I was allowed to be as aggressive as I'd like, I should use my best judgement before making a dive and that they were giving me the card under the impression that I was wise enough to not go straight to a 4-stage scooter dive but that I'd expand my limits gradually. Deco and mixed gas were both covered topics (briefly) but they were topics for another course.

Can an instructor teaching a full cave course to a trimix certified diver do a training dive deeper than 130' and stay within standards?
I'm no instructor, but my understanding is that they cannot. Training standards seem to me to indicate a max depth. My cert limit is 130ft END, which would allow mix....but I don't think the training standards phrased it as END.

In other words, are the limits restrictive (always limit yourself to the least) or cumulative (dive to the limits of your highest level of training)..? What about the standards?
I think it'd be foolish to think they were cumulative, or anything other than restrictive. Same goes for standards.

And yes, I deliberately loaded the question, because I see divers and instructors in real life and on the internet doing it whichever way is convenient or best for them. I also deliberately used trimix rather than AN/DP to avoid the AIR/END arguments, which isn't the point. Although we might throw rebreather in where trimix was at and see what people think then?
I think the CCR case is different because it's my understanding that there are separate courses for CCR divers that lack overhead training to go straight to Cave without separate OC Cave training. I know many CCR divers get OC Cave training and then do a crossover, but I think most CCR divers jump straight to Cave. CCR is something I'm fairly ignorant about, though, so please correct me if I'm wrong.

NACD training standards were posted on another forum. I'm going to search through those and see what I can find to back up my statements above. However, like so many other things on this topic (or similar topics), there's a lot of gray area and a lot of assumptions. There are also a lot of complications with there being so many agencies teaching slightly different things.

[BabyDuck]

Agreed. How is this absent from their website?

But, is your question whether the tdi class was violating standards?

Was your TDI instructor (also) an NACD instructor?

my question is 'is this technically a violation? because if so that's silly and needs to be addressed'.

yes, he was/is, and he was my instructor cavern through full as well as an/dp. i'm sure he saw this class as part of the cavern to full continuum, as did i, and not random chunks. perhaps he'd have done things differently if i hadn't been his cavern/intro student with app/full planned in a few more months, i don't know.