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I stopped by the IANTD booth at a major East Coast dive show this weekend, and
overheard something that made me glad I wasn't wearing a full face mask (I
might have drowned on my lunch).

An obvious new diver was talking excitedly with a bunch of guys with IANTD
t-shirts (only one of whom I've ever seen on an actual deep dive).  He was
saying that he had signed up for a trimix course, because he wanted to dive
the Texas Tower.  The IANTD guys were encouraging him to do this.  

Now for those of you who don't dive the US North Atlantic, the Texas Tower is
a radar station that sank off New Jersey in about 185 fsw.  Although one can
dig one's computers in the sandy washouts and get 200 fsw, the only reason to
do this is to try to impress your novice friends.
The wreck rises to 70 fsw, with the most interesting parts not exceeding 150
fsw.  It is considered a standard destination for deep wreck divers, and a
good deep training dive since it is easy to navigate and has outstanding
visibility.  

I explained this to the new guy that this was really best done as an air dive,
but he didn't really want to hear this.  I guess going deep and being trimix
certified was cool, and he wanted to pay his money and get his card.  I later
spoke with the IANTD guys, and suggested that maybe people who didn't have the
experience to handle 130-150 fsw on air weren't ready to do trimix.   They
said that not everyone could do a 185 fsw dive on air - which just made me
suspect they had never actually been there.

The spiel they were giving sounded just like what PADI used to give its newly
cerified open water students about why they should immediately enroll in
"advanced" open water courses and get trained to go deeper.  Fortunately,
common sense has prevailed over profit with the recreational training
agencies, and they now encourage their OW divers to get a little experience
above 60 fsw before enrolling in AOW.  Common sense appears not to have won
out in IANTD.

I know some IANTD instructors (some of whom read this list) whom I respect
greatly as divers and instructors.  I had very positive experiences when I did
tech nitrox in '91, and trimix in '93, but it wasn't quite as big business
then as now.    When I see courses like the "Explorer" (combind crash course
in Tech EAN, Trimix, Deep Air, Cave Diving, and Wreck Diving) or like "EAN
Underwater Modelling" listed in Tom Mount's catalog, I start to worry about
how seriously IANTD weighs its responsibility for safe training against its
potential profits.

John
Heimannj@ma*.nd*.gt*.co*

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