Fire Diving Classes

From an active Fire Diving Instructor
I am a XXXX Instructor (OWSI-xxxxx) and after many months of training, finally have become the first in the state of West Virginia to offer the Fire Diving Specialty Course. It was a difficult road, but very rewarding to have reached this pinnacle. I am looking forward to filling our first class , which will take place in the Spring of '97 at Summersville Lake in the Central part of the state. There has been a lot of interest and question on the part of local divers, but many seem somewhat hesitant after some of the recent bad press over the unfortunate few in our sport who fall victim to the minor albeit everpresent risks. We have been assuring the inquisitive that the new equipment which leading dive manufacturers are going to unveal at DEMA in Orlando, will cater to the enthusiasts of this segment, and go a long way to make the sport safer. Keep up the great job of keeping us informed!

DV

I've got a firediving experience which I thought you should know about.

Did my Fire Divers course last weekend. Exxxxcellllent!!! I haven't had so much fun diving in ages, and the PADI shop sold me a new patch for my jacket for only $12.95.

Anyway, it is winter here in Australia, so I thought it would be a few months before there were any bushfires happending so I could go firediving. But one of my buddies from the course just didn't want to wait that long. He had an old Datsun 180B in the back shed that he didn't want anymore so he got one of his mates to load it up with petrol and some old tyres and drive her out bush where it hadn't rained for a while, so we could start our own fire.

I was stoked, my first post-class fire diving experience was about to happen.

Anyway, to cut the story short the fire took off like a rocket. Our PADI course was exxxxcellllent for teaching entry skills and we lined ourselves up with the waterbombers scoop perfectely and up we went! All going according to plan so far but... ... the f*****g bastards, the goddamn PADI store didn't tell be they use _foam_ in the water over here!!!

I couldn't see a goddamn thing, my mask filled up with foam and when I tried to clear it it just foamed up more. Then it went right up my nose and made me sneeze for the entire flight to the fire. I was getting pretty f****** stressed, I couldn't see and the foam bubbles kept popping in my ears and I couldn't tell the difference between that sound and the crackle of the fire so I didn't know when we were going to get dumped.

Fortunately the rip cord on my BC must have caught on something on the way out of the bucket because my parachute opened OK and I made a safe landing but I was shit scared.

I'm looking forward to visiting Europe or North America where there is no foam in the water so I can do some real fire diving without getting foam up my nose and nearly killing myself. Anyway, what's the story with this foam stuff anyway. Is the fire brigade just putting it in the water to cheese us fire divers off?

Joshua Boyd

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