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A BSAC Ocean Snorkel Diver is a snorkeler, who has achieved the status of Snorkel Diver, and has received further training to take a full and active part in open water snorkelling activities, including rescue techniques and further advanced exercises.
This grade of student, on completion of training, should be competent in the safe use of all appropriate open water snorkelling equipment including protective clothing and should be able to act safely as one of a buddy pair of snorkelers
This course consists of a practical, theory lessons, practical skills, including rescue skills and rescue towing and a series of open water dives.
The entry requirements for this course is as follows, · The student must be a minimum age of 8 -years old · Must be rated as a BSAC Snorkel Diver · The student must have completed a self - declaration ‘Fitness to Snorkel’ and this should be signed by their parents or guardian, if under 18 years of age. · The student must be competent in swimming a least 50 metre (freestyle)
The duration of this course is 9-hours
The first part of this theory lesson addresses ‘Breath-hold Diving’ It starts by reviewing and elaborates on the relationship of the water pressures and volume changes and explains how such changes effect our body airspace, in which the air inside these spaces are compressed and expands as we descend and ascend on surface dives. The main affects of this pressure changes is more noticeable on our ears and sinuses. Our lungs are also subjected to these pressure changes, which will affect our overall buoyancy. These effects are discussed in this lesson.
We also look at what we called the ‘dead airspace’ this dead airspace is created mainly in the snorkel tube. Dead airspaces can affect our breathing and in particular oxygen and carbon dioxide levels in our lungs. So we now look at these issues and we will explain how to avoid problems relating to dead airspaces.
Section -2 covers Skills and Equipment. In this lesson section, we take a look at thermal protection in the form of a wetsuit and wetsuit accessory. As we will be making dives down to depth, we may need to record this depth and time by using a depth gauge and watch. We may also want to snorkel out to a reef from shore, so in this lesson we look at compasses and how to use them
In some cases, when making snorkel dives we may need to wear a weight belt on descent; especially in the case where we are wearing a wetsuit. Therefore, we look at some different weight belt configurations and how to jettison them by using a quick release mechanism. Finally, we finish off this section, by taking a look at surface support buoys or floats together with reels used in deploying these floats – floats are an essential piece of equipment for open water snorkel diving.
Section 3 covers some physiology issues which relate to snorkel diving. Knowing some background on how our lungs work, together with the respiratory process, is important to snorkel diving. The build-up of carbon dioxide in our lungs and the dead airspaces can cause unconsciousness underwater.
So knowing how to breath through a snorkel and control your carbon dioxide level is crucial. Hyperventilation is another concern, in particular to snorkel divers. Hyperventilation is caused by the snorkel diver, when they try to increase the amount of oxygen inhaled in an attempt to extend their snorkel dive. This delays the stimulus to breath out causing the oxygen level within the lung to drop rendering the diver unconscious. In this lesson we show you how to avoid such conditions.
As mentioned earlier, snorkel diving is safe, if you are properly trained and it is conducted properly. However, there may be on very rare occasions an incident where you may need to perform a rescue of your buddy or other snorkeler. In most cases, this rescue will entail conducting a surface tow of your buddy, either back to shore or the boat. However, incidents that happen underwater will be more serious and may require you to dive down and recover your buddy and administrate rescue breathing once back at the surface. Section - 4 addresses how to prevent such incidents form occurring in the first place by proper planning and following snorkel safe diving procedures, and how to deal with an incident if one arose.
Safe Snorkelling Practices is the title of the fifth section. This lesson is design around Snorkel Dive Planning. The lesson will give you an insight on planning your own snorkelling trips. This section will give you advise on planning trip both in the UK or temperate waters or planning oversea holiday dive trips.
On completion of the above theory lesson, the instructor will conduct a short theory assessment in order to check you current level of knowledge at Ocean Snorkel Diver level. The assessment consists of 20 – multi choice questions.
These practical skills build up on the ones you have already gained as a Snorkel Diver. The new skills you will learn in this section are as follows,
Snorkel skills · Back and forward Entry rolls · Breath holding dives with a distance of 15 metres · Finning without mask: face submerged, breathe through snorkel. Fining at least 50m · Mask removal, replacing and clearing · Swimming with a weight and emergency jettisons at the surface · Using lifejacket inflation and deflation techniques
Rescue Skills · Recovering a casualty to the surface · Towing casualty while administrating AV · Recover casualty onto the boat or shore
The practical session finishes with a Snorkel Diver Skill tests which consists of the following,
Fin 200m, including 8 surface dives in appropriate depths. Fin 50m without mask, face submerged, breathing through snorkel. Fin 50m on back, with mask and snorkel removed. Fin underwater for a distance of not less than 15m. Fin 100m on surface, wearing an appropriately weighted belt. Rescue Assessment
On completion of the practical skills, the Ocean Snorkel Diver will then make 3 open water snorkel dives. Each dive will be around 20 minutes in duration
One of the 3 - dives will include the use of a compass.
The final qualifying dive should include the Snorkelling Skills Test below.
Make a breath-holding dive to a depth of 5 - 6m. Carry out a rescue and tow of a buddy simulating unconsciousness at the surface: - giving two full breaths of AV at the rate of 2 breaths per 15 seconds and towing for 50 metres. The rescuer will then remove the casualty from the water and place in the recovery position.
On completion of this course the student will be awarded with the BSAC Ocean Snorkel Diver qualification.
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BSAC Ocean Snorkel Diver
