CYPRUS (11 July 2007) -- ANYONE can open a dive centre in Cyprus, with the government unwilling to enforce a minimum set of safety standards that would regulate the industry, professional divers said yesterday. "A monkey can go and open [a dive centre] tomorrow unfortunately. There are people who teach and train who are not insured," said Clive Martin, general secretary of the Cyprus Union of Dive Centres. Martin said the union had been set up precisely because the island lacked regulations. "We are working with the CTO [Cyprus Tourism Organisation] to implement these requirements… We can't force people to join the union, but what we want is to force people who open dive centres to comply with basic minimum standards." Martin told the Cyprus Mail that although the government had recognised the union and its charter, it hadn't enforced the minimum set of standards on non-union members. "There are people who teach and train [diving] who are not insured. Who do we call? If I call the marine police and report someone, they might know the person and nothing happens. It's a case of who you know, and it's not worth it. If I see a PADI [Professional Association of Diving Instructors] school doing something irregular, I'll refer it to PADI international in the UK. Here, I don't know who to send it to. No one really bothers." He added: "We just look after our members and keeping sending emails to non union members to try to push for more people to join so that we increase safety levels and improve the levels of professionalism on the island. Once everything is standardised, at least tourists will be free to go wherever and will feel safe and secure with whichever dive centre they choose." Martin said the union's charter stipulated that dive centres should be registered companies or trading companies, they should have a minimum set of equipment, access to clean and tested air, proper classroom audiovisual facilities to teach with, have all of their equipment annually maintained and hold maintenance logs for anyone to check; all instructors must also be licensed through an RSTC (recreational scuba training council). "It must be a recognised agency that they're supporting their courses on and they have to have liability insurance to at least 1.5 million euros, with any vehicles and boats that they use licensed and insured under the laws of the Republic." "These are the basics… It doesn't mean we're not going to have a death but it does minimise rsiks." John Irvine, a PADI staff instructor for the past 10 years and a partner in the Latsi Watersports and Diving Centre, agreed: "Basically, anyone can open a dive centre here. Do they need a license? No. you just put up a sign and that's it." He said no one inspected dive centres in Cyprus and that there was total self-regulation. "There are many dive centres not registered with PADI or another diving organisation because they don't want to pay the fees." He added: "What I would say is only dive with a PADI five star dive centre or BSAC premiere centre or a Naui five star dive centre. Nearly all these types of centres are members [of the union]. It's these small fly by night centres, and there are many of them in Cyprus, which you need to be careful about." Irvine said most accidents occurred when people did not keep to the rules. "Diving is actually very safe and statistics show it's one of the safest sports in the world. Less people get hurt diving than in football or hockey," he said. The diving instructor explained that PADI had a strict set of rules about what you could and could not do, including how long you could stay underwater and at what depths. He said a four-day PADI course could give you the basics, but that you would need to dive with professionals to build up experience and confidence. "Here, we'll only allow people to hire a boat and diving equipment if they've done at least 50 dives. If someone has only completed the four-day course, then we'll insist that they come on the diving boat with us." | | Any monkey can open a scuba diving centre but can he dance, chew gum and blow underwater bubbles at the same time? Irvine said it was best advised to go diving with a 'buddy' (diving partner) in whom you had confidence. "It must be someone able to rescue you if you go unconscious in the water." Where that happened he said it was important to bring the person to the surface in a controlled fashion, do in-water rescue breaths at the surface, and then take the person to the boat and administer CPR and put them on oxygen immediately. "It's good diving practice always to have oxygen on the boat, to know how to surface a diver, and to know CPR and administer in-water rescue breathing," Irvine said. Servicing equipment was also vital. "It's most important to have your diving cylinder checked. Last week, the marine police came here with two diving cylinders and they said please can you fill them for us. One was out of date and so we said, 'no we cannot fill it'. "Many, many divers in Cyprus don't service their equipment and don't test their cylinders, and every Sunday we get divers that bring cylinders that are old and quite frankly dangerous for us to fill." Additional tips for safe diving include gently equalising your ears and mask as you descend, never holding your breath under water, not diving deeper or longer than is allowed by the dive tables or is advised by your computer, never drinking alcohol before a dive, having a medical check up every year, especially if you're over 45, checking with a doctor before diving if you're on medication, not flying for a minimum of 24 hours after diving, and going to the nearest emergency room if you don't feel well or are in any kind of pain after your dive. A 34-YEAR-old diver died on Monday night after he lost consciousness diving off the Famagusta district coast, police said yesterday. Kyriacos Angeli from Dherynia was diving with two friends in the sea region of the Liopetri fish farm at around 8pm. The trio were about 1.6km from the shore when the accident occurred. Seventeen minutes after Angeli descended, one of the two other divers surfaced and told the third man, who'd remained in the boat, that Angeli had lost consciousness and was on the seabed. The pair immediately notified marine police, who dispatched a boat with divers to search the area. At around midnight, Angeli's body was pulled out of the sea from a depth of 52 metres and taken to shore where a doctor pronounced him dead, police said. His diving partner was transported by helicopter to Limassol general hospital after he displayed symptoms of the bends and was placed in the facility's decompression chamber, police added. SOURCE - Cyprus MailSCUBA FORUMDISCUSS THIS TOPIC - Dive in and have your say at Scuba Forum |
