This weekend I shadowed a DSD, commonly known as a “try dive” with instructor ES and 5 students. This is a non-certification course that allows someone to try the kit, and most importantly equalizing and breathing underwater, before committing to a course such as the OW Referral. We started in the classroom, working through the quiz, which is about teaching some basic background information as opposed to an intimidating exam. After that, we introduced the basic kit, the regulator set and the BCD, pointing out the primary regulator from which the student would breathe, the gauges (which we would monitor for them!) and the inflation and deflation buttons on the LPI hose. Finally in the classroom, a few hand signals such as OK, problem, ascend. After that it was down to the pool, where we had pre-assembled the students kit for them with 10L tanks, for fitting with masks and fins, then into the water, where the students kitted up and had their first experience of breathing from a cylinder. Next, we demonstrated the inflation and deflation buttons, and one by one did a kneeling buoyancy check on each one, a couple of them required an extra couple of kilos – but in most cases, with no exposure suit and a steel tank, people require no weighting in the pool. Then the students experienced equalizing by lying on the bottom of the 1.2m end of the pool. Once everyone was comfortable, we took them for a lap of the pool under water one at a time, then down to the deep end, at 3.2m. They were then free to swim around and play with the various toys in the pool such as the frisbee, ES watched from above and I swum with them where I could peek at contents gauges. When the time was up, none of them had used much air anyway, but it’s good to be sure! After that a short debrief and a chat about what else we could offer them at LSD but with no pressure to sign up for anything. All in all it took about 2 hours. For DM I need to be able to run one of these, under the supervision of an instructor, and I am pretty confident that I could do it; now just need to contact my Lead and find out when we can schedule one in.

Still outstanding I have:

• 400m swim
• Skills circuit
• Search and recovery scenario
• Divemaster Conducted Programmes

I don’t want to underestimate any of these but if I can keep the momentum going, I should be a DM before too much longer 🙂