Porthkerris

Tiverton Diving Club On Tour! Porthkerris Divers are a well establised diving operation situated on the Cornwall's Lizard peninsula. Andy organised a weekend away to sample the diving scene, an overnight stay at St Keverne Campsite was essential, otherwise it was over a two hour drive back to Tiverton!  

We weren't "lucky" with the weather, but thanks to being east facing and protected from prevailing winds by a sheer cliff, we got away with most of our planned dives!

Date: Saturday 3rd August          Dive Number: 172
Place: Vase (Manacles)               Buddy: Chris B 
Time Down: 1230                         Dive Time: 00:29
Time Up: 1301                               Max Depth: 30.5m
Visibility: 8-10m                            Water Speed: 0kn
Weather: F4 SCT030TCU W14C   Entry: Boat Celtic Kitten

Our first dive was a hardboat dive. There are two hardboats that run out of Porthkerris, Celtic Cat and Celtic Kitten, the latter was the boat we were booked on. The boat has a front door like a RORO ferry and fronts onto the stony beach, so divers can simply walk on like it's a landing craft - the benifit of this is so that we don't need to kit up on the boat as the deck itself was quite small. Chris and I were uncharacteristically slow at kitting up, so ended up carrying some kit onto the boat and trying to untangle our hoses in front of a group of bemused looking divers from another club! We soon sat down with everyone else and enjoyed the moderately choppy ride out to the site. Dave, the skipper, was a really chilled out guy - most chilled out skipper I've ever seen! He made everything seem so smooth and easy, which put all the divers at ease. Even when Chris' cylinder slipped through the strap prior to entry, he just laughed, pulled him back, set it straight, slapped him on the back and all was well again. Some that I've encountered in the past would have held a grudge against something like that for the whole weekend! 

porthkerris.com

"The Vase is a very pretty, colourful reef dive. It is part of the Manacles and is a rock that is wedding cake shaped with three tiers at varying depths. The rocks are covered in kelp, sea fans and sponges and beautiful jewel anemones of all colours imaginable, coating the granite on the north-east corner of Vase Rock. There are sandy gullies and coves within the rocks that provide shelter from the current and are home to numerous sea urchins, starfish, crabs, pollack and wrasse. The current here can be exceptionally strong, especially on springs when it is only possible to dive on slack". Porthkerris.com

Once on the shotline we descended to a depth of around 20m on the Vase and headed north towards deeper water. Chris and I had previously agreed not to exceed a maximum depth of 35m, so we planned decompression stops from the BSAC '88 Tables, 1 minute at 9m and 3 minutes at 6m. At a depth of 30m we still had some depth ahead of us but we decided to ascend up the profile again for the sake of our air consumption. It was quite light at 30m, rather misleading as it usually gets dark at that depth in the UK. The Vase of course was very colourful, with sponges, fan coral and several fish, including one big pollack and a huge lobster which Chris saw, but didn't tell me! We found a pinnacle which plateau'd at 6m so our final deco stop and DSMB deployment were made easy for us.

One of the best things about Celtic Kitten is the lift. It's so easy to just stand on it underwater after a dive and then Dave winds it up so we can simply walk back onto the deck. Too easy!

Date: Saturday 3rd August          Dive Number: 173
Place: Porthkerris Bay                 Buddy: Chris B, Keith S 
Time Down: 1500                         Dive Time: 00:25
Time Up: 1530                               Max Depth: 14.9m
Visibility: 4-5m                             Water Speed: 0kn
Weather: F4 BKN015 W13C        Entry: Shelving Shore

After a decent surface interval back on shore we prepared for our second dive of the day - Chris' final Dive Leader open water training lesson. The drill consisted of

• Controlled Buoyant Lift (CBL) of a non breathing casualty from 15m
• Tow casualty on the surface for 50m
• Exploratory dive

We summoned Keith to join us on the dive so he could act as the casualty, which would work better from my perspective of monitoring the skill. We needed a depth of 15m, and much of the bay was only 8-10m. We needed to go around the other side of these rocks.

porthkerris.com

This required a moderate surface swim which gave me cramp more than once and further flooding in my drysuit which I have found to occur more when I'm on my back. We reached the far side of the rocks and descended to find a clear patch of sand at a depth of 15m, ideal for the initial casualty set up. The first CBL was too fast and it took a while for me to catch them up on the surface. Everyone was okay though, apparently there was also confusion as to the last 6m whether they held on or separated, and who was and wasn't inflated. While we were on the surface I made Chris do the 50m tow which really did seem to tire him out. We dropped down again to catch our breath before retrying the CBL, this time arresting the asecnt at 6m and then immediately descending without surfacing. There was no way we were going to do a third run as multiple ascents can be detrimental to our biology. Fortunately Chris did really well on the second ascent and made haste without speed, hitting 6m before immediately descending again. Finally, Chris navigated and explored our way back to the beach, reaching it spot on to where we wanted. At three meters depth as we were swimming up the final shelf, Chris bent down, took his fins off and attempted to 'walk' up the beach. He really had to lean forward to maintain any sort of propulsion and made it look rather difficult. Impressive, funny, but not really appropriate if he was leading the dive, or even looking after his buddy should anything happen to them. All we need to do now is to get him to do simulated rescue breaths and compressions on a dummy. Maybe Keith will be available again... 

Back at the campsite, Andy and Sue sorted everyone out with a slap-up barbeque dinner. It was a little cold considering it was August, but it's truly the only way to relax after a hard day's diving!

Date: Sunday 4th August             Dive Number: 174
Place: Volnay (wreck)                 Buddy: Steve G, Keith S 
Time Down: 1200                         Dive Time: 00:43
Time Up: 1243                               Max Depth: 19.5m
Visibility: 4-5m                            Water Speed: 0kn
Weather: F4 OVC002 W14C       Entry: Boat Celtic Kitten

We didn't know if we would even be diving at all today as we had such bad weather overnight and it was so windy at the campsite. We underestimated the degree of shelter the site had though, and when I asked Jo at the front desk if the hardboats were still going out she looked in comic disbelief and exclaimed, "hell, yeah!" 

"Homeward from Canada with luxury goods and ammunition, [Volnay] detonated a contact mine on 14th December 1917 off the Manacles, and was bought into Porthallow bay and anchored a quarter of a mile off Porthkerris beach, where she sank in 21 metres onto a sandy bottom. It is a non-tidal, nice and easy wreck to dive. Although the wreck is well broken up, there are still some very large pieces, but the whole site is covered in a fine layer of silty sand and you must be careful not to stir things up.  You may find some shell cases, lead balls or cordite if you’re lucky". Porthkerris.com

We were back on the Celtic Kitten for this dive and also joined by the same club as yesterday. Dave explained all about the wreck and suggested, as the Celtic Cat had already dropped divers off, that we go north rather than south, where the other divers had probably gone to stir up the silt! Didn't find any treasure though. Found a shoe, but it looked new, so left it to grow some barnacles for next time.

Date: Sunday 4th August            Dive Number: 175
Place: Porthkerris Bay               Buddy: Toby & Kate 
Time Down: 1430                         Dive Time: 00:31
Time Up: 1501                               Max Depth: 8.2m
Visibility: 2-4m                            Water Speed: 0kn
Weather: F4 OVC002 W14C      Entry: Shelving Shore

Final dive of the trip, and after a chicken baguette, a cup of tea, fig roll and two hours surface interval we were ready once more. I took Toby on his final Ocean Diver open water lesson. Drills included

• SEEDS Brief 
• Lead the dive between 12-20m
• Mid water hover on low air
• Weightbelt jettison

Kate, Toby's partner also came along on the dive as Toby's dive buddy, and I would swim along behind and monitor his dive leading. Toby gave a good brief and I was very impressed that he reviewed and reconsidered his original decision to enter via the smaller entrance where swell was being amplified up the shore and took the safer entrance, even though it meant a longer surface swim to where he wanted to go. He was also keen to practise compass navigation, which wasn't necessary but very useful for the exercise.

Toby's conduct in leading the dive was outstanding. He regularly checked Kate's (and my) air - even if it was every ten bar at least he was mindful of it. Assessing the length of time to leave between asking again comes with experience. He was also good at checking the 'ok' sign with Kate and myself as well. Toby successfully used the compass to navigate north through the gully to the left of the bay, and after the first 'third' of air supply then took a reciprocal bearing as he planned in his brief for the second third, leaving a third left in the cylinder as reserve. We reached the final shelf leading up to the beach where Toby demonstrated he could execute a mid water hover whilst low on air, and then I got him to sit down on the stones at 1.5m depth, where he jettisoned his weightbelt and safely bobbed up on the surface. 

We then walked up to the kit washing station and debriefed while spraying each other with cool fresh water, after a salty weekend it felt so good! I was able to sign off OS5 in Toby's book, he has a few more to get signatures for but otherwise I look forward to seeing him and Kate in Sports diver lessons very soon!

porthkerris.com

Total accumulated time underwater: 3 Days, 14 hours, 39 minutes

Instructor Foundation Course

For all those divers who are thinking about instructing, and even non divers who may possibly consider diving in the future I present to you an entry from another blog I had back in 2007, after I took the plunge and took the IFC, the first step towards becoming a scuba diving instructor. I fully recommend it!

April 1st 2007

Moving Up by Going Down

I have passed my IFC instructor course with BSAC scuba diving and am now an instructor!
Matt and I drove to a grotty public school in Pimlico in the middle of London at 7am Saturday (it had stalactites  and sat through a series of lectures before throwing ourselves in the drink and being taught to teach by national instructors.

In my group were Steve, Dan and Simon; or as I thought, Future John Gane, Eric Clapton and Victor Meldrew. We had a few laughs, planned a load of lessons and then were each assigned a topic to complete for the next day. I was to give a theory lesson on BCD's and a practical session on mask clearing.

Got home at about 9pm and spent an hour making a powerpoint presentation and 10 lesson plan for a 10 minute theory lesson, and wrote up a dive slate for the practical.

On the second day we all did our theory lessons. I got the group involved in trying on the BC, cylinder and regs along with demonstrating how it was used, which Pete (our instructor) was impressed by. My mask clear demo was good as well, along with teaching novices to kits up, enter and exit the pool safely. Eric Clapton had to teach buoyancy control, but overnight his cylinder emptied to 90bar, and he wore a wet suit without a weightbelt. So it was ironic that he was floating like a cork and unable to teach!

I'm now a qualified A.D.I. instructor!

And now I'm so tired!

Ocean Diver Training

Over the past eight weeks I have had the honour and privilege of introducing new club members to scuba diving.

We have three new young scuba diving members: Becky, Ollie and Elliot.All three have taken to pool sessions really well. From my memory of Ocean Diver training (only ten years ago!) the first theory and pool lessons feels like an information overload. You want to impress your instructor and appear to be a natural, especially in the pool sessions where you sometimes only have an hour to kit up, get in, complete a series of exercises, exit the pool, de-kit and debrief... Besides, everyone else is making it look easy! I remember glazing over when our pool instructor started to explain regulator stages, high pressure hoses, A-clamps, DIN valves, ponies... for a first timer this is all too much to take in. Fortunately I realise now that I was not in the wrong. The delivery of information available for a lesson is ranked in order of importance. They are as follows:

Need to Know

Should Know

Could Know   

The first time you see diving equipment is in the classroom during the theory lesson. They can be annotated diagrams, or the instructor may even bring in some for a dry practical and let you play with the valves! Setting equipment up at the poolside is another level up from this - in the back of your mind you know that the wrong configuration could slow down the lesson, annoy your instructor or even worse fail completely while underwater - and it would be all your fault! For some anxious people this may compound any reservations they have about going diving at all. 

http://www.bsac.com

I try to keep in mind the Need/Should/Could hierarchy. I have had to stop myself a few times from waffling on and going off on a technical tangent, instead of emphasising the important information relevant to the lesson. I am still quite new to instructing and find that I sometimes have to double back on things I've said because I haven't thought them through. One example is the emergency controlled buoyant lift, and explaining very carefully why the rescuer should inflate their own jacket and not the casualty's, before realising it should be the other way round. That example I felt particularly unprofessional, but my mistake was made during safely contained training session and the only person who suffered was myself from my own mild embarrassment!

You also need to understand the needs of the student and the requirements of the lesson. You can never assume anything. All throughout history lives have been lost where people assume the wrong things. Last Thursday I was asked to run Elliot through a full kit lesson. This came at very short notice, it was in fact my wife who took the phone call just as I was leaving the house. I assumed that I had to use full kit as well, as a good instructor leads by example. On arrival, Elliot was ready in his semi-dry while I kitted myself up in my drysuit. The swimming pool is warm enough without having to sweat buckets in a full body neoprene outfit. Just as we were about to get in the water, Andy our training officer leaned in and whispered, "You do realise that only the student needs to wear full kit?"

I briefly considered getting out of it, but time was getting on. So I chose instead to make progress with the lesson, even if I did look like a sweaty tomato. Sometimes I think that my learning curve as an instructor is as steep as my students!

http://www.ndiver.com

Becky, Ollie and Elliot are very patient with me and I like to think that I am patient with them. Although some exercise drills need a couple of attempts to refine the skill all three seem comfortable and confident in the water.   It is a testament to Andy and Paul and their effective delivery of the theory lessons that all three passed their theory exam with flying colours, and with their pool training drawing to a close the next step will be sheltered open water training in our very own British waters.

As instructors with the British Sub Aqua Club we volunteer our time and do not get paid. The broad smiles after a fun pool session and the feeling that you just may have started someone on their life-long love of diving makes instructing an absolute pleasure. No amount of money can buy that.

Qualifications vs. Experience

I once knew a fellow student diver in my Ocean Diver (first grade) and Sports Diver (second grade) training group who did not want to do any dives without getting a skill signed off. He was adamant that there was no point in diving unless he was undergoing training, not interested in diving recreationally at all. He was always rushing about, and had little patience for other students not learning as quickly as him. We nicknamed him (any diver who is infamous within their club is usually given a nickname) 'Scout', due to the fact he always wanted to "collect badges".

He got through his training quickly, and once passed as an assistant instructor was very keen to start training new members, pass on his wisdom and do his Dive Leader (grade 3) training at the same time. While this was going on we had another member, Taff, who had been with the club several years already. He had long ago stopped at Sports Diver grade. He had logged 200 odd dives and enjoyed the technical side of diving so was always 'fiddling with his equipment'! He did not feel the need to instruct or worry about training to be a Dive Leader. Instead, he buddied up with anyone who had a full cylinder (or better, a full twinset) as long as he got to do at least three dives per day!

There are many types of diver personalities in a club, someone specialising in social studies should do some research on the types of people who like to spend time underwater, especially in the cold waters of the UK! These two divers I feel display the polar opposite ends of training attitude. Scout was enthusiastic and couldn't wait to take trainees out in their first trip to Stoney Cove. Taff went off diving with another instructor to poke around the helicopter. At the time I thought that Taff, the more experienced diver, would have been better suited to taking new people on their first trip, as Scout was so new to the process. 

Thinking about it now I realise there is another side to this. Taff may be an experienced diver, but was he more suitable as a guide and mentor than Scout, who had fresh training in his head? Whereas Taff was more interested in penetrating wrecks and looking for toys to play with underwater than looking after trainees having buoyancy issues, masks flooding, weightbelts slipping off, all of that. Scout liked to be able to pass on his own knowledge of the sport which is what club life is all about - giving back what you have learnt and sharing the enthusiasm.

Although I personally feel safer diving with Taff than Scout (as the latter does rather tend to focus on his own image), it has made me aware that even though everyone's diving attitude is different we all share the same love of the sport, and as long as everyone dives safe and respects each others limits, then we have a great club. After all, scuba diving is more than just a sport. It is a way of life.

Lesson 1

The last two Thursdays I have been instructing at the pool. I have had the pleasure of introducing two new students to the delights of scuba diving.  'OS1' is the first practical lesson for the British Sub Aqua Club Ocean Diver grade.

The objective is to build confidence in the water and introduce some basic skills. This needs to be broken down into a safe and manageable lesson. It is chock-a-block with information, some would say an information overload. Safety, lesson discipline, hand signals, finning techniques, mask and snorkel fitting, names of all the parts of equipment, buddy checks, more safety and applying each situation in the pool to a real life situation in the sea, as well as the skills and techniques of scuba diving! Confucius' proverb comes in handy when teaching such a large volume of information.

Tell me and I'll forget,

Show me and I may remember,

Involve me and I will understand.

It is important to positively encourage the students. Learning a new skill requires the student to be attentive and to want to learn, as well as clear instruction which is understandable and mimicable  Further down the line the skills get tougher and the student (unless he or she is a reincarnation of Jacques Cousteau or a diving prodigy) will inevitably make mistakes, not understand an instruction or even possibly make a dangerous error. It is no good shouting or berating a student that makes mistakes no matter how serious - intimidation is not an effective form of teaching. I find that a condensed form of the R.E.A.P. debrief is a good method of coaching in this instance. Let's say a new skill is not being understood correctly. Review the skill by demonstrating once more or breaking it down into smaller steps. On the surface, verbally Encourage the student in good aspects of the skill or their progress in general, Assess the elements of the skill that require fine-tuning and suggest how to Progress with improvements.

It doesn't take long for everything all to click into place, and you realise that everything is inter-linked and it comes naturally as if the equipment was an extension of your own body, similar to learning to  drive a car.

Becky and Ollie have been great students, and although I occasionally have to backtrack on some elements of a skill due to my temporary rustiness, they have been very patient with me. It has been a pleasure to introduce them properly to the sport, and I look forward to seeing them signed off as fully fledged Ocean Divers this summer!

Hello and Welcome!

Hello!

My name is Tony and I am a scubaholic.

I am a 28 year old Dive Leader. I have been diving for nine years and been an Open Water Instructor for four years (I also could do with losing a couple of stone in weight!).

I joined Tiverton branch of BSAC last year after a couple of years diving hiatus due to getting married, buying houses, having children... not great excuses I know - sorry. Before that I was a member of Kingston University Sub Aqua Club, where I did all of my training. I still dive with them if they invite me!

I hope you find my BLog Book enlightening and entertaining. If you live in Devon and would like to join in with the fun, we welcome all new and experienced people alike! We meet at Tiverton swimming pool every Thursday at 8.30pm. Otherwise, do follow us on Twitter and Facebook, which I also maintain.

:-)

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