Advanced Open Water Course Students Lucky to be Alive after this Dive 

Duuuuude... this is your best video. I’m glad instructors like you exist

Army CLS instructor: tells privates to stick you 10 times and still not find a vein. Jk that was my CLS class lol, but from an awesome medic! Great video keep them coming!

Going into openwater this week to become a public safety diver and these videos are making me freak out a little😂

There are so many things, that went wrong, as you mentioned, bad environmental conditions, like bad visibility, they had a decent line, but drifted off (currents?) after that no visual reference (?) cold water and , yes bad instructor/student ratio , as my personal add on, no hang tank/regulator, and as you mentioned , no O2 provided after surface ascend . I just wonder how the pre dive briefing was and how many dives, the students had under their belt ? In my almost 20 years, as a professional dive instructor, I had so called “advanced students” with 4 dives (meaning the minimum for open water certification) , last dive 10 years ago !! At our dive shop, the first part of the advanced class is always a review dive, to evaluate the divers buoyancy control/ equalizing/ slow descending/ascending/mask clearing are a huge part of it !!! Nice post Zilla !!!

"... gave me the idea that we can learn from these mistakes". Exactly. Well said. While actual and near mishaps are unfortunate, they can offer fertile ground for "lessons learned". It was only towards the end of my lengthy commercial dive career that I came to recognize just how dangerous "routine" dives can actually be. End of the day/week, near job completion ... peoples' attention and focus seems to dissipate. Good instructional video. I'm sure your students and viewers will benefit from your input..

Aside from the shallow breathing, the 2nd stage sounded pretty bad on Doug. Nice Amigos DC stickers! Last couple of times I was there the sticker supply was gone. Guessing they won't come back.

I watch these videos and realize just how AWESOME my dive shop is. These people are making mistakes they should have learned to handle in OW, this is ADV OW, Our deep dive was two instructors and four students. We stopped at 70 feet because we had a young diver with us and that was the limit. Did all of our exercises and made a good ascent with the required safety stop. This dive looks out of control from the very beginning.

Awesome video!!!! I appreciate you taking the high road. You can hear the diver almost over breathe his regulator

Your videos got recommended and although this is an old video, it helps me a lot during my training. It is good to have your explanations as well. I`ve just started my Open Water Diver (at the very beginning level), but it is helpful to see first hand what can happen under water than just reading it in the manual! One subscriber more!

In defence of the duck call I have mine because it does the fog horn at the surface which is a safety device in the higher risk areas I dive in locally, ie. strong tides and unpredictable weather.

With that many people a Rescue Diver or a Divemaster is always a good addition.......and most were uncontrollably flopping like penguins like when divers rush to get an open water and advanced on the same day without proper training ......I saw it done in Greece.....

I'm a former instructor. I don't like Open Water and Advanced Open Water done back to back. I suggest people get at least 20 dives before taking the Advanced Open Water class.

Can you make the actual video larger and you smaller ?

aw yes a new upload from my favorite youtuber

They all looked overweighted and had poor buoyancy control, not to mention NONE of them had any concept of trim. Then, of course, there were those split fins. And thanks for giving my North Coast Divers sticker a place of honor on your board.

Visibility may have been low by Florida standards by UK standards the visibility was good.

The whole thing looks like they did not have any kind of pre-dive briefing, they all sunk like bricks until they hit the bottom and "walk"!! Before my very first dive to 40m, I had an academic training and a pre dive briefing, no surprise down there and no problem at all.

Yes, a perforated ear drum is painful! And cold water will make the vertigo even worse. Note, early on Wasseum was sinking and continues to deflate his BC while trying to ascend.

I'm not even a diver but I really appreciate the video 🙂 it's all fascinating

I don't know how you only have 125 subs you're underrated.

You deserve much much more subscribers, great video! An Instructor that swims with with his/her hands and half of the group with split fins is always a sign that you are in for a relaxing dive. :D

I had vertigo from an inner ear infection, I lost balance so bad I would trip when walking to be honest it sucked...

Hey man. Good content and video. Keep it up!

That was wild... Your breakdown of the whole ordeal was fantastic. as a case study to show the how the holes in the Swiss cheese can line up it doesn't get much better. I Know this is over a year old but if you tell me where to find your postal address I'll send you a bunch of stickers from the dive centre I work for 🤙

Hi Zach, I just found the channel and wanted to say "keep up the good work!" You deserve more subscribers. On the ear drum and pain thing, I once wasn't able to equalize on ascent after being washed up and down by the current. My experience with the burst ear drum was excruciating pain before the perforation. The pain then suddenly stopped. That was the moment I thought to myself, that it must have popped because the pressure suddenly equalized. I presume, if you are in cold-ish water, there will be pain from the cold in addition to vertigo although your mind might block that out. I can't comment on that (happened on a helmet dive).

i blame it on the split fins

that guy looked like had enough weight for all of them lol

Good quality bro

Good judgement comes from experience and experience comes from bad judgement.

Those look like lp95 tanks the students are using.

Is it just me? If you listen to the breathing rate and the breathing from the regulator - the cameraman is chugging through his air I would guess.

Perforated ear drum is extremely painful.

I just realized at some point in the video I stopped calling the camera man Doug and started calling him David, lol! Also, I know I whined about one of the students having a camera while literally watching video from another student's camera. I feel like it's no big deal if the camera is attached to the diver, meaning it isn't a distraction.

OK, what is an Army CLS Instructor?

Lots of sketchy dives made in this world to make a buck or because of time pressure. IE I’m on my vacation and I’m going diving no matter the conditions.

All i can say is Damn Precisely why I have no intention of being an instructor period

One instructor to four students for a deep dive seems like a bad ratio - having an assistant instructor or other divemaster seems like it would be a better option. My AOW deep dive had two students, one master instructor, one instructor, and one divemaster. Granted we are in Alberta, descended to 90’ in a cold lake (40°f at depth) and had poor visibility (10’ at depth). Students were instructed to keep their hands on the mooring line the whole time and did. Control of is was good; our time in the water was limited… not even 15 minutes total. As an aside, want to exchange stickers? Have any from Alberta, Canada yet?

I know this was two years ago but a little constructive criticism... let the video play, then give your two cents. So incredibly difficult to watch when it's being stopped every few seconds. It's so painful to watch.

For a TRAINING DIVE, this looks like a shit show right off the rip.....

You are good. But try to control your swallowing and lip smacking as you go through this

You talk too much, would be better if we could see the video before you start to talk about it.

My high speed/low drag scuba instructor told me that most dive accidents are caused by students who buy the least expensive "flippers" and "goggles". He sold me the most expensive gear he could find and I've been diving safely ever since, LOL. Just kidding, love ya/miss ya Zack!