On timing the proposal.
If it really didn’t made any difference for the proposed paper to be published before or after, why not publish it after the accident report when everyone has been able to cope with the accident? To me, it seems that the proposal committee wanted to ride on the emotionally driven anti-sled wave that always seems to pop up after an accident. This doesn’t feel right, nor sympathetic for its cause.
On the social effects on AIDA.
I don’t know how the press works in New Zealand. But I do know that with the recent accident in Nemo, even the press commented that the diver didn’t follow safety standards. No-one was blaming the sport of freediving of even mentioned AIDA. If a sled diver would fail safety procedures in an attempt or training, it might have an much lower impact than the proponents of the removal of the disciplines seems to think. Sled diving might become more expensive, but that is the problem of those who wants to do it, not of the organization body that put forth the safety rules.
Safety rules might be followed if it is still an practiced discipline. There is no use for safety rules if you are not expected to do the disciplines attached to it. If AIDA wouldn’t have detailed safety rules with an practice like no limits or variable weight, AIDA would not taking responsibility of the deaths caused by sled diving. And the lack of proper safety rules could be something which AIDA could be held responsible for as “World Freediving Organisation”. This won’t change if the discipline wouldn’t be recognized, unless AIDA would actively ban any sled diving and would persecute divers and instructors involved with it. The latter could push more people to the organization that does take its responsibility: CMAS. Please read Trux posting about how CMAS seems to overtake AIDA in its goals.
What are sportive disciplines?
That a discipline isn’t “sportive” doesn’t sound like a strong argument to me. Why not just ban all depth disciplines, and do constant weight without fins, without a suit, fluid goggles or dive line? Isn’t that how mother nature would want it? I can see why people would consider sled diving less sportive, but isn’t that just an opinion? And as mentioned earlier, an world organization should respect all opinions. And yes, I might even consider to become an proponent to recognize diving under ice
.
Did AIDA made sled diving safer?
Over the last 16 years, No limits resulted in 4 deaths, each accident with almost 4 to 5 years in between. At the same time, the use of variable weight and no limits seems to increase. Nowadays, even in the Netherlands, some divers have made their own rigs and are diving with it. And somehow, the death rate stays the same over all those years. Sounds like an achievement to me.
Relative risk
Relative risk is an nice example how statistics can be used to proof something without having clear proof. Some years ago, reports emerged that Nitrox was 100% safer to dive with compared with compressed air. Compressed air however, is safe. So this “100%” safer doesn’t mean anything because the absolute risk wasn’t large to start with.
You need absolute risk to be able to tell how risky an procedure is. For sled diving, you would need an total amounts of dives and the amounts of dives that would turn out into an accident. Sadly we don’t have those numbers, so we can’t say anything substantial how unsafe no limits and variable weight diving really is. Any statement regarding to its relative safety is a guess, not a fact.
The second problem with the used statistics is the effects of low numbers. We have only four cases with each distinct causes of death. The cases are not comparable, and therefore are not eligible to be clustered. It would be different if you would have fifty ascent black-outs in spearfishers or twenty samba’s in dynamic apnea. That is something to do statistics on. But four black-out deaths on different circumstances with different causes cannot be used to make statements about the disciplines safety as described in absolute or relative risk.
Even if you have gathered objective numbers, you still can use it for bad science. Often, this isn’t done by purpose. People want to make a point, and work with the limited information they have. However, it is dangerous make all kinds of statements and “facts” about such few numbers.
The paper of the proposal committee doesn’t held anything substantial against sled diving with the exception of the opinion about the disciplines of no limits or variable weight. Nevertheless, I am willingly to assist the proposal committee to help to gather significant evidence, if they would want that kind of assistance.
