A little while ago while I was still super busy with the polish group training and preparing their distance record, I met Anders, a PADI Course Director working for Pro Dive Mexico. Since I have a bunch of friends working there I had already heard that he was interested in cave diving, and now finally he was in the shop to talk about dates and pay the deposit.
From the first moment his enthusiasm about learning something new was obvious and there is really nothing better for me then teaching people that are as stoked about diving as I am. It is also somewhat rare to meet people that are in the industry since a long time but still enjoy to dive for pleasure and even do courses themselves.
Personally I find it very important to be back in the shoes of a student every once in a while to not lose the perspective and to remember that it is hard to learn something new at the beginning.
Since I had a previous work assignment as DSO on a commercial diving project in Toluca and Anders a big IDC right after that, we were a bit in schedule trouble, so we decided to split the course in two four-day runs. Which was also somewhat cool, since it gave him the possibility to practice some of the skills we were working on during the brake.
We started the first day in the classroom to cover some of the basics, and have a look at equipment and communication. In the afternoon we spent about 3h in open/confined water to simply work on buoyancy, trim and propulsion. Plenty of time to really work on the configuration and make the gear and extension of his body as well as introducing Anders to the different fining techniques that are so important for cave diving. Cave diving is about traveling distances as efficient and easy as possible and therefore I spend quiet a lot of time with my students developing these skills.
Second day was all about line drills, first out of the water and then in the water. Training for all sorts of zero visibility emergencies including entanglements and gas sharing. We stayed all afternoon in the water running drill after drill until it became second nature. After that as usual back to the dive center to continue with theory sessions.
Day three arrived and we were ready to go cave diving!!! Having spent all that time before in very shallow open water working on the basic skills with doubles and zero viz now really payed off as we could put all our focus on the cave environment and the team diving concept. It is important that all the other things are somewhat automatic or at least don’t need all of the attention of the diver, if not task loading becomes very fast an issue.
So day three and four were used to practice line laying techniques, team communication and emergency drills inside the overhead environment.
After the brake we met again in December to continue and Anders had really used the brake to work on his skills and study some more the manuals which set us up for a good start.
So we first went to Chac Mool to talk about lost line and lost diver scenarios and give it a try later in the water. Not the easiest skills to start with but Anders did a good job and stayed focused throughout the looooong day.
The next days we started with navigation, completed a complex circuit, negotiated restrictions while sharing gas in simulated zero visibility and did a couple of long awesome cave dives!
It was also nice to hang out and chat as we are both since quite some time in this industry and have in some ways very similar experiences and in other ways very different ones. The one thing we definitely share though is the pride and perfectionism in our profession. Anders just created a training center for people that are interested in becoming a dive professional where candidates have the opportunity not only to get pushed through courses barely fulfilling the minimum requirements. Instead they have the possibility to work in the resort environment, under supervision, to get a real taste of what it is like to work in this job and get the foundation that prepares them to work wherever in the world the day after they completed their training. He and his team also offer additional training in things like free diving and workshops on the underwater environment amongst other things. All in all I think it is an awesome idea and great to see that there are more and more instructors interested in giving a little more rather than just pushing people through the ranks.
If you wanna get in touch with Anders to find out more about what him and his team are doing, please don’t hesitate and write me an mail and I will put you in touch.
The last day we went down to Tulum to dive in Grand Cenote. The perfect finish were we could apply all the things we had worked on during the course. Prepared with a detailed dive plan utilizing the map at site we completed two long dives incorporating several jumps and passing restrictions of all seizes and shapes.
So from my side there is nothing left to say but: “Congratulations Anders and welcome to the dark, mysterious and wonderful world of cave diving!”
Cheers
Patrick