Hardest skill in diving isn’t clearing your mask or putting it on after it comes off. The hardest and most important skill in diving is maintaining mental composure and staying aware of everything from your equipment to your environment.
Everyone experiences it differently. For many new beginner divers this is one of the most challenging skills :) Trust me after certifying thousands of beginner divers
@@abigmonkeyformehardest "normal exercise could be fully change of equipment with a partner breathing from the same regulator. Then you can always do weird complications line being blindfolded or three people instead of two. This one may be used on cave training
During our certification (husband and I) our instructor made us sit on our knees on the sea floor (40+ feet below) remove our regulators plus the slack (tossing our regulators behind us) followed by removing our masks totally (as seen in video) put mask back on, retrieve our regulators, clear regulators, then finally clear the mask. In the moment we just did it, it wasn’t a piece of cake (for me anyway) but did it. Then we continued on. Thinking back on it, it’s terrifying 😂 but so worth it. Our instructor did a really good job at testing us in high pressure situations. Albeit, Highest pressure during an amazing dive anyway. We also had to “lose” our regulators, “run out of air” (he slowly turned off our air) signal to our partner and get air from them etc. we also had to take every bit of our gear off in open sea 😆 then put it back on, swim 60 feet away alone and use compass to return back to starting point. I’m glad Ceres are for life bc idk if my anxiety could do it today.
I’ll be honest, that’s a little too dangerous for OW divers to practice 40+ feet below on their initial certification dives. If anything I could see this in AOW or rescue diver training
You did an amazing job keeping your composure. Excellent job! 🤝 As for your instructor, they need remediation and risk assessment training as this is outside the perimeters and scope of the Open Water course. If an accident occured, it would've most likely translated to a student bolting for the surface with compressed air in their lungs, or potentially running out of air on the way to the surface. The depth at which a controlled emergency swimming ascent skill is demonstrated in the open water course is 20-30 feet. If the instructor had ahold of the student's shoulder strap or arm, they could offer them their alternate 2nd stage. Yet, in a panic, a student may not take it. So, even if the instructor could prevent a rapid ascent this way, it still constitutes a drowning risk; a preventable one at that. There's a reason instructors are supposed to follow performance requirements. Thank you.
@@fearlessnomad5311oh wow. We didn’t know this of course, he didn’t have his hands on us at all. We all kind of sat on our knees in a triangle shape while we did it. I did ask my husband later on, “what if we panicked during that? As an instructor, I wonder what he knows to do if we can’t retrieve our air after holding our breaths that long to retrieve our masks etc” I just assumed he knew to shove 2nd stage on our mouths lol. I didn’t really question him though, we got certified in Jamaica and he literally dives all day everyday, getting folks certified etc for his job. No wonder looking back it was so terrifying. 😂 in his defense though, I’m sure after diving with people daily, he had learned to read body language. My husband and I were very chill and didn’t feel any spook or anything that might make the instructor believe we’d bolt. I found it personally much easier to “lose” all of these things on the sea floor vs the pool we initially learned the skill in.
When I was taking classes for the certification I kept choking during this skill and it was a terrible feeling 😩 Took me like 5 tries to finally get it. Luckily it was only in the pool and not in the ocean
Yes it can take some time to practice. Check out my video here where I give some great tips: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-4M34Fn18hKY.html
Aloha - the primary cause of this is allowing the water that is in the mask flow back into your nose as you lean back… to prevent this, start to apply slight exhale (through nose remember) as you lean back… you also, don’t have to lean all that fats back and thirdly - you can always take two or three blows to thoroughly clear it… my last observation in differences in teaching procedures… my students used to get used to opening their eyes underwater… become one with the ocean… one exercise my advanced …. Hey ai’m babbling on… sorry… - Good demo brother -
Same here, except it was in the ocean so i had my eyes closed. I had to keep stopping to hold my nose and breathe as water just kept wanting to go up my nose.
I had mine im the ocean with eyes open. My teacher wanted me to swim without the mask and eyes open and put it on again with a full clear. It was hard but possible.
Loved the instructional video! This was a skill that quite a few people in my open water diving class found very difficult to perform correctly. However, the hardest thing for me to do was either the buddy breathing exercise or the emergency surfacing techniques. Many people don’t see and appreciate the amount of things Scuba Divers need to learn to be certified. But in the end, getting to go diving is a life-changing experience.
I got to go diving without certification in Hawai’i! It was a truly wonderful experience! I hope to get certified someday. I feel like I got to cheat the system haha and I feel very lucky to have gotten to dive with a very good guide.
First step, slowly let water in from the top of the mask. Breaking the seal at the bottom can cause water to shoot up your nose. If needed close the eyes doing this. Everything else is correct. This skill is hard for most students. I was an Instructor for 15 years. Been diving for 40 years.
I did my Dm course in 96 my instructor made me swim around with no mask, as she said what are you going to do wait for someone to hold you hand.. We used to take of our jackets and sit on them @ 40mts like a jockey and paddle along...all you have to do is keep the reg in..easy. Close your eyes lol
@@theessexhunter1305, Did the same things during my DM & Instructor training in 90. Also had to do Ditch & Don all gear with a 10 minute tread (only swimsuit in the pool, no wetsuit) in-between. Also did full gear exchange underwater with another student, and if either of you bailed out you both did the exercise again. While teaching one of the skills was the no-mask swim, and I would "hold" the student on the BC shoulder (more for control if they lost it than leading them).
Same, during my training my teacher wanted me to open eyes under water because if there is a problem it's better to see.. no things to be comfortable, the objective was to be prepared
I legit did this today and I’m searching for scuba tips and this popped up. I surprising (as a 14 year old) did this first try which was amazing because my instructor told me that he had I guy completely fail and just keep surfacing so they just ended the lesson and returned to it later.
I always believed this was the easiest of the skills mostly because im really comfortable in water but also because there are instructors that wont let me die lol my struggle was taking the gear off and putting it back on I kept struggling to find the straps lol
I just had to do it for my OW. No big deal for me but some people had issues. Of coarse we were doing it in cold water with 7mm hood and gloves, so that didn't make it any easier
I just exhale as I’m putting the mask on and it clears itself usually. The harder part imo is simply breathing without the mask on. I’m usually a nose breather but to make it worse the bubbles from your exhale mess with your nose
I remember doing this for an intro training course in the pool! It made sense to me right away but my mom was having some trouble 😂 great skill to learn though, because when we got out in the real ocean and were 30 feet deep, I could easily clear any water from my mask.
This was very easy exercise for me since the first day, I was always having little bit water touching my nose the first day and I didn’t react at all on that because it wasn’t on my eyes. When I needed to take it off and put it back I didn’t have any problem also when you have very good instructor and you feel safe with him since the day 1 there will be no problems at all. The only hard thing for me was controlled emergency swimming 9m horizontal but the vertical was very easy. It was hard for me to swim 9m horizontal with one breath. Can’t wait for more dives and get more certificates so finally I can become instructor ☺️
I'm 17, took a diving certificate this summer. When he said we're going 15 meters on the boat, panic set in. Had to remove the mask, put it back, and clear it underwater for the first time under 15 meters. Took it off fine, but struggled blowing out after putting it back. Failed multiple times, started drowning as water went from my nose to my mouth, pointed to go up while choking. Somehow made it underwater.
This was helpful before I did this yesterday in my open water diver. Also it helped to practice fitting the mask over my face out of water before hand so I grasped the technical skill of actually doing it, when I got in the water it was pretty easy
@@Mr.Voysey wdym you have to partial filly your mask then clear you have to fully fill it then clear them there's this you have to throw your reg out and use sweep arm to get it that's also easy and there's cesa but if you kick of hard your fine the rest are easy
Not sure about everyone else but I did this in salt water and we had to have our eyes open in salt water. it actually hurt less in salt water unless your close to shore.
Im thirteen and when i first did this on a lake i nearly had an panic attack because water ran up my nose ( we were 5 meters under the water ) and obviously i couldnt see. I managed to calm myself down and do it right and i passed! It was my third worst experience because i stopped breathing because of the water traveled trough my nose to my mouth and i needed to cough it out. It was fricking scary because, once again i couldnt see. 😬
Im a beginner scuba diver, and im gonna take a certificate after this! (My instructor said im qualified to take the examination!!) And i know it may be normal, but this thing took me at least more than twenty tries to get right 😭😭 I couldnt see a thing and panic starts to creep in, but my instructor was still near me and i could hear his breathing nearby so i was certain if i couldnt do it he'll help, but nope! I got it on myself!! ✨️
When I did this it was honestly quite scary because I was in the ocean at around 15 meters and had to do this down there! Luckily everything went ok, but I had to do this several times just to make sure that I would always be able to do it in case of emergency…
Hardest for me was taking the BCD/tank off and putting it back on. Rental small was slightly too small and rental medium was slightly too big. Doing that while maintaining neutral was a pain
As someone getting my scuba certification tomorrow i can confirm that putting your mask back on and clearing it is one of the easiest things you will learn, the hardest is not freaking out if something goes wrong
Everything this comment is saying honestly is just so real 😭 im getting my scuba certification soon too! But honestly, the part of doing it is not as scary as the anxiety creeping in and the urge to panic when something goes wrong.
This is one of the tests for freediving certificat on all levels. Lvl 1, 2 and 3. I took a lvl 3 certificate and this was the easy test. Harder to do in deep water with only one lung of air 😅
I did that today with relative...I spiced it up a bit by dropping the mask just out of my visibility range under water then retrieved it and put it back on and cleared...it was my 3rd dive
In the cave course I had to remove my helmet and mask and follow the line for a while. Eyes closed of course. Then put it all back on. Lots of fun.....
i tried my first ever scuba dive and tried but i had to keep reminding myself to breath through my mouth was tricky. sometimes stopped and was like need to breath! but was first time so guess just need to pracite
I felt like my heart was going 200 plus during this skill but I kept calm and did it twice in two days. my problem is not breathing into the nose, it’s a weird feeling lol
Once you're able to doff all gear, surface, tread x10 min, decent, and don all gear demonstrates good confidence. But its definitely not the hardest skill. Try dialing in your BCD so you can hover on bottom controling buoyancy with your breathing.
when i used to need to do this for my owd course i always had trouble maintaining a correct breathing pattern almost ad if i forgot how to inhale. thats literally what it felt like
Removing the mask to clear it of if it falls of is the easy part i forget that my nose is exposed to water so i some times breath in from my nose. If you do this hold the mask with 1 hand and then hold your nose with the other hand and calm down and then try again
When I learned back in the sixties, my instructor had us throw our masks into the pool, then dive down to it and hover over it inverted (to ensure our snoots were full of water), then don and clear our masks. Of course we blew snot into our masks, so then we'd have to doff, rinse and don and clear it again, all in one breath. No tanks, just fins.
That is not an official PADI skill, but if you loose your mask and your regulator at the same time in real life then you can still recover your regulator in most cased by sweeping your arm on the right side.
I had a lousey instructor who told me this was the EASIEST exercises meanwhile everyone else is saying its one of the hardest, he also seems to believe holding lectures in dark rooms where you can't see what you're writing is acceptable, wish this guy would learn to give advice using his mouth not the other end of him :D
I agree with other posters. The single hardest skill is trusting your training. Breathe, everything else is secondary. Saved my @ every time. If you can't do this skill in open water, you need to spend more time with a better instructor.
My father was my scuba coach. I didn’t have a problem with taking of my goggles. I got way better in tha past year, buuuut. I am still not good by not floating up or sinking down
You can clear your mask by breathing out of your nose. After clearing the mask you can open your eye (or even during the skill)... A few drips in your eyes will be ok :)
Did this in the ocean a few months ago when I did my course and my hood broke the mask seal and at first I panicked and had to surface until I realised😂😂😂
Just had my first class today, and honestly this was the worst part for me. The water going up my nose made me choke up and exhale through my mouth. I got it done, but goodness was it absolutely awful lol
It has pissed me off/upset me for a long time that this was _one_ thing that my brother could do when we went to get certified, and he never went back to perform that one skill(and now it's too late and too much time has passed, so if he wants to get certified he has to start over from the beginning, classroom work included.
@@souravghosh7687no problem:) I just did my refresher course and the instructor said some folks go yearssss between diving without getting a refresher and dive shops usually won’t turn away their business, he seemed impressed I was doing the refresher course before my dive trip since it’s *only* been a bit over a year. Hope that helps you!
I recently started an open water dive course (never dove before a week ago), the center I’m at doesn’t have a pool so everything is learned in the sea, and this bit was really easy, not sure how it’s considered the hardest skill in diving
I almost didn't pass this portion because I hate the feeling of water around my nose. It immediately goes into my sinuses and I feel like drowning. I had to come up with a way where I could hold my nose while doing this drill so I could pass.
I personally didn't have any issues with this one but I've seen plenty of students bolt for the surface on this one! Hardest skill for me personally has been finning backwards. I still can't get it 😩
I did this skill today, in the sea, 3 metres underwater. Had to take mask off for 1 minute, then put it back on and clear it. Heard it was hard but didn't find any problems doing it.
Those people would be in serious danger if that happens at 30m deep and they cant orientate them selves up or read their meters. I would so drop that "hold your mask tight" too. In my course the instructor took it and dropped it to my side so that i had to open my eyes and see where it is, exactly to prepare me and prevent accidents
What stresses us when we take off the mask during diving is that we think that the water will disturb our eyes. You can overcome this situation by trying a few times...
This is a great question (which I had too). Take a deep breath, then bite into your regulator, then breathe out. It is not intuitive. But if you bite into the regulator, it helps you only breathe out of your nose.
My 11 Yr old just did padi open water and was told snorkel was mandatory. 1st dive as a qualified diver and he was told to get rid of it because it just gets in the way. Seems stupid to have it mandatory for training of most divers don't even use it.
@@graememckay9972 agreed, and most dive shops sell you on one that is meant for snorkeling. If you need to swim way out a folding snorkel you can stow in a pocket would be the way to go.
When you start training for tech diving you do this with one hand and open your eyes and salt water and you have to stay perfectly flat floating in the water column
For us non contact users it’s easy. Don’t be scared to open your eyes underwater. As long as you flood the mask from the top first you won’t get water in your nose. I’d say my dry suit certification was worse than this skill😂
When you teach the PADI Open Water Course for a lot of people it is, but not for all. Are you instructors? We teach many people and a lot of people struggle with this skill, so in this video I show how easy it can be. Thanks for you great comments!
@@ScubaDivingTips The problem is that the title isn't about 'common issue students struggle with in an open water class' it's "hardest skill in diving" . That's what we're objecting to, there are tons of skills way harder than a mask remove and replace while kneeling on a pool bottom, like doing the same while maintaining trim, or backing out along a cave line with a lost mask drill, or any of the numerous other options.
You should be able to do this while in a head down vertical position, while still clearing ears and still descending, if you can't then you are a liability. A lot of people can talk the talk, few can walk the walk.
