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Pelagian DCCCR Rebreather test
By Mark Ellyat on 23 October 2008 -
Lot of Concentration
Rebreathers, particularly Closed Circuit Rebreathers (CCR) take a lot of concentration and unprecedented amounts of attention to detail compared with traditional scuba. Watching CCR divers underwater it’s a wonder what they actually get to see considering that 50% of the dive is spent staring at up to three LCD displays waiting for them to potentially read you your last rites.
Similar to frying bacon with your shirt off – CCR’s can have some disastrous consequences if you don’t keep on top of things and/or if taken to extremes. I’ve taught different types of rebreathers since 1996 and while I appreciate that customers might want the choice between regular scuba and CCR in a vain attempt to emulate an Action Man or simply look ‘cooler’ there should be at least some kind of ‘Stewards Enquiry’ started to try and stem the needless loss of life that complacency or ineptitude with a rebreather tends to reward, lets not even start with ‘ready meal’ all-in-a-weekend training courses and 1 hour crossover instructor specials that plague the scuba business.
Ocean Gladiator Chapter 4
By Mark Ellyat on 21 October 2008 -
Clarity Beckons
I dived deep using air because it is fun, cheap and most importantly, because I can. Also, deep air diving provides a level of peace and tranquillity that only parachutists and astronauts experience. We all share a minute or two of intense action at the beginning, then towards the end, lots of time for reflection and sightseeing.
I suppose Astronauts get another bout of action when they attempt re-entry, which must be similar to the fickleness of decompressing after an extreme dive. However, in contrast to divers, spacemen are not making many life and death decisions, they just ride an automated fair ground ride called a rocket.
Ocean Gladiator Chapter 3
By Mark Ellyat on 19 October 2008 -
A Deeper Interest
Work as diving instructor can be very seasonal. To stay busy you need to travel to other holiday destinations as the tourist seasons rotate. After a year in Barbados, I felt a return to the United Kingdom was on the cards. Arriving back in London gave me itchy feet almost immediately, and I phoned around for work in various holiday destinations around the British south coast even before my tan had faded. In 1995, I’d had my first laptop for over a year already, but the internet still resembled semaphore and websites where just glimmers in a ‘net-nurds’ eye.
Job searches in the diving industry then, and even more so now were best completed in person – by actually visiting various dive shops. I had arrived in London in June when most summer dive jobs were already filled, so the job search went slowly. While away though, I stayed in contact with an instructor buddy, James.
Am I Doing It Right?
By Helen Hadley on 7 October 2008 - comments
Am I Doing it right? So am I doing it wrong at the moment then? Hmmm
DIR is possibly one of the most controversial subjects in diving, with many people having never heard of it, or having significant misconceptions about it. There is, at present, only one agency who teach the DIR approach – GUE (Global Underwater Explorers ) who started out diving the Florida caves which seemed to be claiming many lives. They took a step back from diving and re-evaluated everything we do, all the equipment choices we make and chose the configuration which offers the fewest number of failure points. But DIR isnt about equipment, it is a mental attitude of diving as safely as possible.
I decided to do the course in the spring to hopefully make me a better, safer diver. It has been quite a journey – here is the tale from beginning to end.
The course was run in Capernwray (see Capernwray article ), an inland site in the North of England over a very chilly weekend in January.
D.I.R.F. the training part 2
By Mark Chase on 5 October 2008 - comments
Day 3 The final two dives of the course
Dive one was to be the by now standard Valve drill and S drill but this time the instructor would step in if he spotted an error missed by the buddy and end the drill. You would then be required to re set the drill and start again from the beginning. Personally I felt this was a much safer way of handling drills and avoiding the potential danger of inadvertently shutting both valves.
This was followed by a drill called the Basic Five. This involved reg removal and replacement, swapping from primary to back up reg and back again, mask clearing, mask removal and finally a modified S drill. This was an odd one as it was apparently practice for a full S drill? Instead of donating your primary reg to your buddy to breath from he would just hold it in his hand whilst you went through the donation and re stowing side of the drill.
Getting into silent diving, the BSAC way
By Mark Milburn on 8 September 2008 - comments
BSAC CCR Mod 1
Earlier this year I bought a second hand APD Classic Inspiration Rebreather, it was at the right price and I knew the previous owner.
So there it sat in my lounge for several months, waiting for me, I didn’t even know if it worked. I waited until most of my summer diving was over to decide who I was going to do the course with, I didn’t want it to intefere with any of my ‘deep’ dives. As far as I know all agencies restrict the Module 1 of CCR qualifications to just 40m, much more like my winter diving plans.
I decided to do the BSAC course with John, a local BSAC National Instructor and regional coach. I knew John from bumping into him several times at Seaways Diving in Penryn, he had recently taught an E.R.D. course to some of my friends. He is very thorough, and that’s what I wanted.
Pelagian DCCCR Rebreather review
By Mark Ellyat on 30 August 2008 - comments
Rebreathers, particularly Closed Circuit Rebreathers (CCR) take a lot of concentration and unprecedented amounts of attention to detail compared with traditional scuba. Watching CCR divers underwater it’s a wonder what they actually get to see considering that 50% of the dive is spent staring at up to three LCD displays waiting for them to potentially read you your last rites. Similar to frying bacon with your shirt off – CCR’s can have some disastrous consequences if you don’t keep on top of things and/or if taken to extremes.
DIR – What its not!
By Mark Ellyat on 28 August 2008 - comments [1]
Scientology meets Scuba
A long time ago (early 90’s)…in a galaxy…far… far away a group of divers awash with best intentions created the philosophy of Doing It Right.
DIR was meant to promote better technique for safer Florida Cave diving – it focused on equipment configuration and type, plus general procedures for team based cave exploration.Red Sea Holiday Mayhem
By Kate Hardy on 11 August 2008 - comments
We work hard all year and save up our money to get the things in life that we enjoy. For me one of those things is an annual diving holiday to the Red Sea. It is an escape from life’s stresses and is supposed to be a way to relax. We all hope everything will run smoothly, and for most of us it does. But what happens when it doesn’t?
This time round I really needed my holiday to go well after a particularly tough spell, but it wasn’t to work out that way. So rather than a report about a stunning dive holiday here is my story about when a holiday goes wrong.
Rebreathers: I want that one!
By Mark Chase on 4 August 2008 - comments
The average diver dives for two years in UK conditions then quits and possibly dives every now and again in the clear blue seas of far off shores. Those that stick with diving in the UK often quickly exhaust the love of shallow in shore dives and start to explore in the 30m+ zone where they find better vis and less broken up wreckage. Unfortunately they also find that the gas supply quickly runs low and that air offers a severe penalty in terms of decompression and narcosis. Until recently the choice at this point was Nitrox and accelerated decompression using high percentage oxygen mix to rapidly force out those nasty nitrogen bubbles. Recreational technical diving kicks off at this point and many divers see no need to venture beyond its boundaries. However for some it’s just not enough.
D.I.R.F. the training part 1
By Mark Chase on 21 February 2006 - comments
My instructor for the DIRF course was Richard Walker. By pure luck he turned out to be the ideal man to train someone like me who was not 100% sold on all the standards of DIR. Richards had been diving as long as I had and he had come through a BSAC and TDI background before deciding to follow the path of a DIR diver and instructor. Someone with this background would have experienced the same problems I had and would therefore understand my concerns.
Richard was assisted by David Martin. David was a GUE instructor in training and would be doing the video work and generally helping out. He was 26 and came from a BSAC university club background. The youth and his more limited diving experience set him apart from Richard and in conversation I got the impression that his loyalty to the DIR systems and practices was based more on faith in the work of others rather than personal experience. That said at the level of diving DIRF is preparing you for I have no doubt he could dive rings round me and his presentation skills were very good.
D.I.R.F The Fundamentals
By Mark Chase on 14 February 2006 - comments
On the 27th January I motored on down to Vobster in Somerset to take the DIRF training course. I didn’t need the course; I am already qualified way beyond any DIR training course currently offered in the UK. No I was doing the course for totally different reasons. I was there to see what all the fuss was about and I was there because several of the DIR divers in my acquaintance has impressed me so much with their diving skills that I felt I would like to able to dive with them in the future. This second point was a surprise even to me but to understand why you have to look at my history with DIR.