Keeping your safety standards up in a diveschool is not just a matter of making sure your staff is experienced and you have a first aid kit on your boats.Diving Safety is about accident prevention. And if an accident does occur, you want to be prepared as much as possible.
Before our season began - we did a lot of work already to ensure all our guests a safe experience over the season, both above and under water.
While it is often overlooked by the divers - the Equipment we use is quite literally the difference between life and death. Here at Wicked Diving we take that very, very seriously.
Thus, we would like to keep you a little bit informed on what is exactly involved in operating a safe diveschool.Certainly the list would be too long to put it all in one article, so we will just start with one of the most important things for divers joining us to the Similan Islands or Komodo: The Scuba Tanks.
Tanks or scuba cylinders need to be visually inspected once a year. During visual inspection, the tank valve is taken off and the tank is inspected from the inside for corrosion or moist. All parts are being cleaned before being assembled again. One very important part of the tank is actually the threading where the valve is screwed in the tank. If this is corroded, it might be necessary to “cut” the tank neck and make sure the thread is clean and functioning again. Most people think a tank can’t fail a visual inspection, but it is very well possible that a tank might not pass this test.This is all done by a professionally trained technician as many small knicks and marks that may seem acceptable to an ordinary eye reveal much more to a skilled technician. We prefer to trust a professional for this.
Upon inspection - this tank failed in the threads. So it gets marked, removed from inventory and will be used for teaching courses on equipment.
Every five years, a tank needs to be hydrostatically tested. On this test, the tank is pressurized with water, quite a bit over the normal tank pressure of 200 bar. If the deformation of the tank during this test is outside certain values, this might be an indication that the structural strength of the tank is too weak to use safely on a dive. When this is the case, the tank doesn’t pass this test. If a tank doesn’t pass a hydrostatic test or visual inspection, it needs to be taken out of operation. As you can see on the picture, not all tanks pass the test….:(
How do I know a tank is visually inspected or still within its hydrostatic test date?
If done by a fully trained technician, the tank will get a label or sticker after visual inspection. Next to that, our diveschool keeps a record of each tank where the dates of the visual inspections, hydrostatic test or any other maintenance is being kept up-to-date. The date of the hydrostatic test is actually stamped in the tank. You will see the date and a small logo of the technician who tested the tank. The tank in the picture below was produced and tested in July 2006 by the tank manufacturer; Catalina, not used in our low season and hydrostatically tested by Aquamaster in September 2011. This means the next hydrostatic test needs to happen before September 2016. If you do find a tank in operation with an expired hydrostatic test date, please inform the staff!
Where does Wicked Diving have their tanks inspected?As an Aqualung Partner center, we have our tanks tested by Aquamaster in Phuket. They have fully trained technicians and all the right tools to do the tests according to various international standards, such as A.S.S.E.T.
What tanks are used by Wicked Diving?
Most of our tanks are aluminium scuba cylinders of the type S80, which means they hold 80 Cuft of air at a working pressure of 3000 PSI or about 205 bar. We have INT valves, but quite a few of our tanks have inserts that can convert the INT valve into a DIN valve, which means our guests with their own DIN regulator don’t have to use a DIN adaptor.
Wicked Diving wishes you safe diving!
-Similan Diving
No comments:
Post a Comment