Training

There is still a lot of confusion around nitrox these days. Simon Pridmore talks about what it does and does not do, the benefits of diving with nitrox, and why a nitrox course is a good idea.

Very often, you will come across examples in scuba education where what is taught does not match up with what divers do in real life. Mark Powell provides insights for new divers and tips for dive instructors.

In Part I of this two-part series (see issue 100), I made a correlation between scuba diving and driving a car, particularly in the context of learning how to anticipate and assess dangerous situations, make well-informed sensible decisions and stay safe—things that motorists tend to group together under the catch-all phrase of defensive driving.

When we learn to scuba dive, we are given a little knowledge and taught some basic skills. We take a theory test and demonstrate that we can perform the skills and that’s it, we get a licence.

Readers of my Scuba books often say how useful they find the stories I tell to illustrate key messages. The stories are all true. I wish I could say I made them up, but I am not that creative. Fortunately, life tends to be able to conjure up real situations that are far more instructive than those I could ever invent.

Human factors is about making it easier to do the right thing and harder to do the wrong thing. Therefore, for divemasters, human factors is about making it easier for them and their divers to do the right thing and harder to do the wrong thing.