Having seen, firsthand, the "training" offered to Snuba divers, and also
having read what the Snuba proponents and dealers have to say about it,
it's pretty obvious to me that these people are operating in the same
mindset as the people who operate the Space Shuttle:

"We haven't killed anyone lately, so it must be safe."

I'm a certified scuba diver, ultralight pilot, paraglider pilot (powered
and unpowered), and skydiver.  So I've gone through a lot of training
courses over the years.  It's always the same.  If you want to get trained
in a day, and then take your chances, there are dealers and trainers who
will oblige you.  Their position is summed up by a sign I once saw in a
Baskin-Robbins ice cream store:  "There is nothing that some man cannot
make a little worse, and sell a little cheaper, and people who consider
price only, are this man's lawful prey."

All of these quasi-scuba operations (Snuba, BOB, Seawalking, etc., are
based on the same idea that we can give people a quick explanation of the
fundamentals (clear your ears and don't hold your breath), don't warn them
about the potential dangers, don't train them to handle emergencies, and
then just hope that everything goes okay.  And most of the time, it does.
But that's not being safe.  That's playing Russian Roulette.

When my buddy received his Snuba "training," he was told how to clear his
ears, and not to hold his breath while ascending.  However he was never
told what would happen if he failed to clear his ears, or held his breath
while ascending.  I suspect this is very typical of most Snuba "training."
Give the customer just enough information to keep him alive (hopefully),
but don't inform him of the very real risks he's taking.

Needless to say, this is a very dishonest way to do business.

I don't believe in government-mandated safety regulations.  If some idiot
wants to buy a scuba rig, and go scuba diving without any training, that
should be his right.  That's how things should work in a free country.  And
if someone wants to take an hour of training, and then go scuba diving,
that should also be his right.  People have the right to risk their own
lives (but not the lives of others).

However anyone who offers scuba diving to the public, but fails to warn
them of the potential dangers, and fails to provide proper training for
dealing with emergencies, ought to be fully liable in a court of law when
something goes wrong.

When I was taught scuba diving, we had to be able to handle underwater
emergencies such as loss of air, flooded mask, dropped regulator, etc.  I
remember one exercise where we had to sit on the bottom of the pool, in the
deep end, remove our tank, turn off the air supply, and then make a free
ascent to the surface.  Then from the surface we had to dive back down to
our tank on the bottom of the pool, turn on the air supply, replace the
regulator, and redon the tank.

The idea is to be trained to handle the likely emergencies one is liable to
encounter underwater.  Someone who hasn't received this training, isn't
qualified to be breathing compressed air underwater.  At least with any
reasonable degree of safety.

All of the quasi-scuba proponents are attempting to evade the simple laws
of physics when it comes to breathing compressed air underwater.  They are
trying to pretend that this isn't a dangerous activity, and that any
civilian off the street can do it, safely, with only a few minutes of
training.  And that just ain't so.

Basically, what all these quasi-scuba proponents have done, is to drop all
emergency training, and pretend there is no risk.  This really brings in
the suckers, who have no idea of the risks they are exposing themselves
too. I doubt if any of these Snuba customers even know what an air embolism
is.

It's like those "swimming with the dolphins" tourist attractions that claim
to be perfectly safe.  They don't tell you that this is a wild animal that
can suddenly turn dangerous.

But what really ticks me off are those scuba dive shops and operators who
offer things like Snuba, "on the side."  For example, the guy who runs the
Snuba franchise in Key Largo doesn't have a boat or a building.  He runs
his Snuba operation out of his van.  So he partners up with the Silent
World dive center on Key Largo.  Silent World supplies the basic equipment
(masks, flippers, wet suits), provides space on their dive boat, and
promotes Snuba diving.  (There is a big Snuba poster on the wall of the
Silent World dive shop.)

Now the people at Silent World have to be aware of the danger they are
exposing Snuba divers to, but they elect to do it anyway.  I consider them
equally guilty of endangering the lives of their customers.  In the future,
I will refuse to patronize any dive shop that offers any of these
quasi-scuba activities.

Scuba diving is too dangerous to be treated as just another tourist
activity, like jetskiing, or snorkeling, or parasailing.  It's not
something that you can do safely, after just an hour of training.  And
taking the tank off the diver's back, and floating it on the surface,
doesn't suddenly make it safe.

I'm an ultralight pilot, and I can teach someone the basics of flying an
ultralight aircraft in just a couple of hours.  He'll even be able to take
off and land.  But he won't know what to do, in an emergency, if he
encounters bad weather, or has his engine suddenly quit, or hits some bad
turbulence.  It's the same case with Snuba diving.

Before I went to Key Largo, I did a web search on "Snuba danger" and "Snuba
problem," just to see what was being said.  I found nothing at all.  If I
had not been a trained scuba diver, I would have not known of the potential
dangers.

I'm going to change that.  I'm going to set up a web page, warning people
about the dangers of things like Snuba diving, BOB, etc.  At least then
they'll have a chance of learning the facts before taking the risks.

Chris Wolf
cwolf41@comcast.net