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Jesse,

As you may recall, NAUI's annual meeting was in Houston this year, where 
the technical program was announced. I attended that meeting and asked 
for specifics on the course standards or the opportunity to provide 
input. I was told that the standards were being written by the guy (I 
don't recall his name) down in South Padre Island, Texas that runs the 
dive business "American Divers" or "American Diving". I have talked to 
this gentleman in the past and I know that he does some mixed gas diving. 
But, I specifically remember his voicing a strong preference for Heliox 
versus Trimix. I suspect that his background is in commercial diving 
though I'm not sure of it. 

Anyway, I expressed concern at the meeting that these new standards 
should be reviewed and approved by membership before being implemented. 
The reply I was given to these concerns was that the Board of Directors 
would review the standards but that it was not an issue which needed 
approval by membership. 

My fear is that either 1) NAUI will copy the standards of IANTD or TDI or 
that 2) the standards will reflect the well-meaning but ill-advised 
practices of one south-Texas dive instructor. Its a real shame that these 
things can't be done with a consensus of industry-leading professionals.

As a past-resident of south Texas I thought you (Jesse) might have some 
insight as to the practices and beliefs of this un-named standards 
author. And although I'm known to be an eternal optimist, in the meantime 
I'm expecting the worst.

Chuck Noe

Jesse Armantrout wrote:
> 
> As many of you know, NAUI is in the process of developing a full blown tech
> program.  Rumor has it NAUI will not recognize TDI cards.  Interesting...
> 
> I know there are at least two guys on these lists that could elaborate.  Well?
> 
> Trout

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