A while back I was asked to speak to a large audience about the trials and tribulations that technical divers had endured back when deep and mixed gas diving was considered a foolish and irresponsible activity. I pointed out that many agencies in the recreational dive training industry were reluctant to incorporate risk analysis and acceptance into their programs and would not support Nitrox and technical dive training. Despite solid science and data supporting its merit and validity, efforts to make this technology available to the general diving public was prohibited by well-established organizations within the industry. The group of 'denialists' extended beyond the world's most popular training agency, and included the single greatest influencer within the dive industry. The Diving Equipment and Marketing Association (DEMA) is a globally recognized institution dedicated to promoting growth within the industry and connecting its members. Historically however, they were not so keen on this technical diving stuff and had originally taken an adversarial role regarding the introduction of Nitrox into the world of recreational scuba diving.
Passions are the winds which fill the sails of the vessel; sometimes they sink it; but without them it would be impossible to make way… Everything is dangerous here below, but everything is necessary. ~ Voltaire 1747
In 1991 DEMA boss Robert Gray wrote Dick Rutkowski, founder of the first dedicated Nitrox training agency; “…due to the lack of informational systems and dedicated equipment, the use of nitrox with existing recreational dive equipment may create confusion among many divers and may present a serious, unwarranted safety risk”. Dick and his organization, IAND (now IANTD) were prohibited from exhibiting at the DEMA show in 1992. A few months later the industry was hit with a massive misinformation campaign to deter the use of Nitrox.
These institutions set an embargo against any individual or company attempting to promote Nitrox or technical diving. It is dumbfounding to think that IAND was prohibited from participating in any significant North American dive show because it was feared they were offering some kind of snake oil that was not good for divers. It is interesting how they had allowed themselves to make these decisions for divers inferring that recreational diving was strictly this and very safe and technical diving was specifically that and very risky. A long while back when I was National Director for IANTD attending a conference involving insurance coverage for our members, I overheard the head of another recreational training agency refer to technical diving as 'that dangerous shit'. By implementing maximum depth limits, specific dive equipment and restrictive diver training practices the recreational agencies had determined for their students how much risk was acceptable without saying why. And then in a one fell hypocritical swoop they adopted the very same principals and technologies that began so long ago and have always been the fundamental practices for 'technical divers' (for example; Nitrox).
In the past many training agencies and their advocates did not teach divers the realities of technical diving because they knew nothing about it nor did those realities fit in with their strategical plan or their financial agenda.
Advanced sport diving does require a great deal more training, experience and thought, but it can be just as safe as regular recreational diving activity. Unfortunately the hypocrisy of it all has done its damage and the bandwagon ride has encouraged too many 'armchair tekkies' to go where they have no right to be with arrogant and over confident attitudes giving the technical diving community the undeserved rap of unnecessary high risk.
Let’s put things into perspective; I have been referred to as a cowboy breathing voodoo gas because I chose to dive Rebreathers with Trimix and Nitrox on deep wrecks and in caves. Yet when I do these dives I incorporate extensive dive planning practices, equipment preparation, mental, emotional and physical fitness exercises and draw upon years of training and experience. For me those dives were no more risky than an eighty-foot dive on a wall with a single tank, and what risk that did exist I was clearly aware of. I once heard a statistic that listed scuba diving and bowling somewhere along the same line in the 'risk ' category. Of course that is bullshit. As safe as diving might be there have been far more diving fatalities than bowling.
Truth, where does it lie? It is out there but in many different forms. Let's compare a table of no-stop limits from some of the more reputable organizations in the diving industry. From the table below we can see how very diverse the interpretations of safe diving practices can be. But even at an extreme end of conservatism the table indicates a possible risk as great as 1% or a possible 1 in every 100 are likely to have a problem by spending only 8 minutes at 100 feet.
So which table, dive computer or decompression algorithm do we then use? This should be up to the learning diver after we have given them everything they need to know about decompression and how the tables actually calculate residual nitrogen. The dive tables are an excellent example of how different diving activities can be perceived as both risky and safe. Too often Open Water Scuba Diver Program students are told that exceeding their dive table limits is strictly forbidden however, we do not explain how the tables actually work and what will actually happen when one exceeds the limits and gets bent. The 'B' word - as recreational instructors we are prohibited to expound upon it and are encouraged to use phrases such as 'in the unlikely event you should…'. By maintaining such a covert attitude we do not honestly provide our students with the true risks of diving nor do we teach them anything about risk analysis or acceptance. We also sentence those who follow human ambition to explore and challenge the limits of human capability as guilty of acting like cowboys. Karl Huggins, in his first edition of 'Dynamics of Decompression Workbook' wrote about truth;
"Some training agencies dictate which decompression tables should be used by exposing their students to only one of the available tables. If any of the other options are discussed, it is generally in a disparaging light. All this does is lure newly trained divers in to the false sense of security that the technique they are taught is 'truth'. They are not exposed to other theories, models, tables and debates which exist in the decompression field that are needed to make educated and knowledgeable decisions regarding their own decompression."
~ Karl Huggins
The truth that Huggins writes about can be applied not just to dive tables, but to training objectives, philosophies and curriculum. We create a false sense of security with phrases such as "…as long as a diver follows all the rules, he or she will never have a problem." Divers need to know that regardless of what kind of diving they are doing, there will always be some risk - exactly how much can be roughly calculated by considering all of the factors involved.
As long as you follow all the rules you will never get hurt - true or false? As a 'technical diver' I enjoy diving deep and in places beyond the recreational or even sport diving limit. Yet some authorities in diver training are reluctant and in many cases adamantly opposed to deep diving. At this time there are no laws regulating how deep a diver can go. Adventurers who climb mountains to reach record summits; skiers that challenge slopes that have never been skied before; Formula One race car drivers who assemble teams to break world speed records; these individuals all maintain the same rights as a diver wishing to dive deep. Yet unlike deep divers, these people are hailed as accomplishing great feats of endeavour.
Ultimately it was science that brought us out of the dark ages. I reached out to Michael Menduno, an award-winning journalist and the editor-in-chief of GUE's InDepth Magazine to get some background information on a non-related research project. It was fortuitous as the conversation circled back to the evolution of technical diving wherein Menduno gave me the skinny on what actually went down 30 some years ago concerning the Nitrox scandal (if you are interested Simon Pridmore provides a much more in depth account in the archived X-Ray Online Magazine). Menduno, who was also the creator of aquaCORPS and renown around the world for coining the term 'technical diving', was one of the original facilitators to help usher the new science in. He was part of a workshop that evaluated oxygen enriched air technologies. The workshop took place in Houston before the 1992 DEMA show opened. Menduno along with a brain trust that included amoung others; Dick Long, Dr. Bill Hamilton, Brett Gilliam, Tom Mount and Dr Morgan Wells, put to rest some very disruptive misinformation and set a precedent for how future issues around Nitrox use could be handled.
I had the opportunity of co-authoring a manual on gas blending with Rutkowski and in a research interview with him asked how the resolution around safe gas blending and the 'oxygen compatibility' debate came about. Dick told me it was Tom's confidence that "science would always win over bullshit" which brought the opposing views to the table and these efforts ultimately led Dick to offering Tom a partnership in IAND.
It was a significant turning point in the launch of Nitrox and mixed gas diving and was further solidified after a determined campaign to have one of the most influential associations in the industry (DEMA) rescind the ban on enriched air mediums. There efforts proved successful sanctioning Nitrox and technical dive training agencies inaugural attendance at the next DEMA show. That same year Tom allied with deep diving pioneers Bret Gilliam and Billy Deans to expand the program to include technical and the training agency was rebranded as IANTD. As Menduno put it, Tom was "…one of the grey beards at the table" who, at the time, "built the world's first technical training agency, pulling together the lion's share of the big names in more than a dozen countries".
Today people without any mountain climbing experience or preparation pay small fortunes to climb Mount Everest. The majority of them are guided by experienced, well-equipped guides to safely reach the summit. Those who wish to make it a record breaking event challenge the summit without oxygen, without safety lines or on trickier faces of the mountain only because the summit of Mount Everest had been reached by hundreds of people and no longer considered a unique and honourable event. These people increased the risk to increase the glory. Today hundreds of divers visit the Andrea Doria, a wreck once thought of as purely exploration. Deep divers will not, however increase the risk to make a dive on the Doria more glorified, in fact they will take advantage of any extra safety measures available.
Unnecessary risk taking and deep diving activity by those who are not properly trained is unacceptable. Yet advanced diving principals such as risk assessment and diving realities should be a part of every diver program. By 1998 nearly every dive travel and manufacturer booth at the DEMA show had some connection with the advanced sport diving industry and expos dedicated to technical diving became an annual event. High tech diving had arrived and was finally as much part of the diving industry as any other. With it came a challenge to accept and incorporate the infrastructure that provided divers with knowledge to make every dive safely. The reserved attitudes towards technical diving and advanced diving technology still seem to scrutinize the value or merit of this technology. In fact there seems to be a reluctance by many divers to even use Nitrox (read Nitrox - An Endangered Technology).
On so many levels Nitrox is a more appropriate, efficient and safe gas to breathe. It may be the failure of the dive industry in North America to continue to develop gas blending systems that produce affordable fills or it may be the reluctance on behalf of divers to pay an extra couple of bucks for a fill. The technology however, is here and the science has proven time and again that Nitrox and advanced diving systems are paving the way for more responsible diving. Accept it pardner.
~ Safe Diving
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