Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire How many of you are scuba certified?

Certified in two weekends, first Sat and Sunday was books and pool, 2nd weekend was the 4 open water dives,

I love water, but I really struggled that first open water session which required the full mask removal down at 30' in cold murky water, had a little anxiety with that manuever, but it's intended to possibly save your life so it is a valuable lesson,

Junior and I will be in Bonaire in a few weeks, 7 days of nothing but diving,

Cant wait.

PADI Open Water in 1986. Did a fair amount in my Navy travels including a 125 foot deep dive in the Med off Haifa to an Italian U-Boat sunk with shellfire from shore.

Last dives were in Monterrey CA in 95. Kind of lost interest after that but if I were in a place with warm water and some who wanted to go in a less than 30 foot dive I'd go again.

I'm NAUI certified

If you have not, get your nitox cert. when we went to Bonaire we got in 6 dives a day. There is so much shore diving you can dive 24 hrs a day. You won't do that on straight air.

We would do a sunrise dive, eat bfast, do two dives, eat lunch, two dives, eat dinner and then a twilight or night dive.

Friends and I got PADI certified about 30 years ago and never dove again. Mostly due to the $$ required to get somewhere good to dive. Northcentral Pa. isn't high on the list.

We found it to be a pretty easy course but we were 'water junkies', we had earned every aquatics merit badge the Boy Scouts offered and half of us were Red Cross Lifeguards. Clearing a mask was second nature to us. I do remember the first breath underwater, that was pretty cool. There were a couple of folks in the class who had some problems because they weren't as comfortable in the water.

Worst part for us was the 2nd day of open water dives. It was the last weekend in October and the temp. had dropped below freezing overnight. The $%^&* wetsuits had been stored in a trailer outside and were froze stiff!

Dale

I got naui certified. There use to be an old tank sunk out there.
a guy would crawl in and bang a dive knife. Bugs came crawling out to meet a gunny sack.
about 2minutes of so in a microwave, mighty good.
i later did it for the sheriff's department, dead bodies that kind of thing.
wierdest i think was diving on a D9 cat in about 70 feet of water, pitch black.
i found the cat when i bounced my head off it.

PADI certified in, or about '95. IIRC it was a couple nights of classroom, a day (maybe two) in a pool and then a weekend of open water. Hard to keep excited about diving in Wisconsin and I haven't kept it up. Would want to recert if I were to do it again. Diving is an activity that is worth respecting and I'd not half-ass it...which leads into the last time I dove story.

We were in PTO Vallerta on a night dive to poach lobsters out of Los Arcos natnl park. Perhaps in my middle age years I'd not be game for poaching lobsters, a 'dive master' with pot leaf tatted on his bicep OR leaking tanks, but at that age it seemed fine. Plus, poaching lobster in Mexico, you're not always going to get the best quality help.

Well, it is not only lucky as hell no one died that night but that the boat didn't get wrecked on the reef with the changing tide. Also, no lobsters on account of almost dying.

I'd say, even though nothing bad ever happened it would be WELL worth your time to get some knowledge on the subject...I don't think the courses are prohibitively expensive either financially or in time invested...plus then you can get your tanks filled without a 'strawman' purchase

PADI certified in 77, NAUI in the 80's

Scuba Schools International in Subic Bay, late 80's. Anybody ever heard of them

PADI Open Water, Advanced Open Water, Rescue, Nitrox, Deep, Night, EFR, and Oxygen Provider. I am working on my Dive Master now.

Shreck Yes SSI is still around. More so then NAUI is now a days.


Diving without being educated is just plain stupid. A lot of people will say you should get certified by (add your favorite) Just get certified. PADI is the international standard, though I am sure someone will challenge that. BSAC is the toughest and from what I have experienced produces a very knowledgable diver. You'll be surprised how much you will learn! Diving is a lot of fun and in some conditions very safe. But sort of like flying when chit goes wrong, it goes wrong fast!

I have only been diving a year, but in that year I logged 120 dives. From Brunei ship wrecks, Big drifts and serious currents in Labuan Bajo (AKA Komodo) Indonesia, Bali, NUSA Lembongan, Lembeh, Bunaken, Kota Kinabalu Malaysia, to the reefs of Miri Malaysia. Every dive site I learn new things.

Once I finish my Dive Master I'll be focusing heavily on Tech Diving.

PADI Master Diver here. Have been for 20 years or so. In the beginning I would dive in a mud hole if it was deep enough. But I'm 3 hours from any decent location and 6 hours from the coast, so I eventually became a vacation diver. I dove all over the Caribbean, Hawaii, East Coast, West Coast and etc. Wish I had all of that money back! Just about quit now, been 3 years since I've been wet. Was thinking the other day that I need to sell all of my gear.

Was for many years, but after I moved to the interior West, I discovered other things on which to spend my time and money.

Did the NAUI course back in about 77. As I recall, it was mostly safety related. Some coverage of gas laws and dive tables. The equipment has changed a bunch since then, but human physiology hasn't. Generally can't get in too much trouble on a one tank dive, but if you do too many too close together, you can. Don't change depth too fast and never hold your breath while ascending. Learn to clear your ears. (that was the thing that gave me problems) Bouyancy control and clearing your mask takes practice but isn't hard. We probably spent 10 hours in the classroom, a couple hours in the pool, and did one open water dive. I don't know how long it takes these days.

Jerry

Was certified before NAUI/PADI were invented, by a Navy UDT WW2 vet.

2 laps without gear in the olympic size pool, no stopping for air. Classroom study, written test.

Deep water check: 60', ditch the gear and surface, return and don, end of story.

Drained more tanks than I can recall while diving the 1715 fleet wrecks off the east coast of FL. Never cared for scuba for anything other than the salvage stuff.

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Generally can't get in too much trouble on a one tank dive, but if you do too many too close together, you can.

Jerry
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This is not true in any way, shape, or form! One tank or multiple tanks there is always risks in diving.

Entanglement, lost/missing diver, currents, Narcosis and the list goes on doesn't care how many tanks you have dived.

First cert. was NAUI by an ex EOD diver. He was one of the original divers in the "Man in the Sea" program. We had to do a harassment swim where mask was took off, air turned off etc. it really prepared me for some tough dives.

Tomt52

My understanding is that NAUI was a great training program. To bad they didn't market it well. It has really fallen off. I thought about taking their course, my dive instructor who is BSAC, NAUI, SSI, and PADI certified told me at this point I would just be wasting my money. I really wish PADI would incorporate some of the old NAUI ways.

NASDS certified in the mid-'70's. Mainly spearfishing. Still equipped, but haven't dove for years.

SSI here a few years back previous to traveling to Belize.

One LONG night in the pool. Supposed to be a couple/few pool sessions. But I was on a short timeframe so they made it work. Homework previous to that. Then a couple open-water certification dives. Did this in late October-early November in northern Wyoming. My open-water was completed when the ambient temp was at or below freezing. Water temp, I believe, was in the low 50's.

Instructor was a former navy diver. Dove everywhere. Technical diver now. His stories about his deep dives were enough to spook me just a bit. And I don't spook that easy.

He was PADI and SSI certified instructor. Told me he preferred SSI because it gave him latitude to adjust the training based on his judgment. Case in point, when he and I did the open-water, he asked if I had gotten everything done during the pool work as he had another instructor take me through the pool work. I admitted they had not made me do my treading and lap-swim. I told him I had been training and could do it. He looked at me and said he was comfortable with my comfort-level in the water after watching me during the 2 different open-waters. That was good enough for him. In SSI, he had that latitude. Not with PADI.

I was a NAUI instructor back in the mid 80's for retail dive shops. We did not do the harassment stuff back then, and I doubt that you will find any recreational/basic courses that do it today.

Most of my experience was in lakes and quarries around the Midwest. One of my deepest dives was 95 feet in a quarry in Redgranite, Wisconsin. It was dark and cold! Most memorable dive was about the same depth in a crystal clear freshwater spring in Florida at night with a full moon. I have not been underwater for about 15 years.