CLUBFOCUS
We organise charter boat trips too , some in West Wales , but we also go to the southwest of England , diving out of Plymouth and Portland . We have visited Malta and Turkey . Due to Covid-19 the planned club trip to Egypt last Easter was cancelled .
How else has Covid affected the club ?
Our club meets on a Thursday night . During the lockdowns we have met virtually via Zoom each week . We have had a weekly quiz with each member taking it in turns to be the quizmaster . The questions , which frequently include some link to diving , have covered some weird and wonderful topics . Although the question of how deep the Mariana Trench is has come up multiple times , there are plenty of us who still get the answer wrong !
What about any effect on training ?
Recently our local council pool re-opened and started to allow the club to use it . Our Training Officer worked with the staff of the pool in order to develop a risk assessment and the measures required in order to be Covid secure . Pool sessions are now limited to a maximum of 12 in the water so this means we have a system in place to ensure each member has as much fair access to the pool as possible .
What training is happening ?
We have six trainee divers at the moment ; two going for Ocean Diver , two for Sports Diver , one for Dive Leader and one for First Class Diver . Sports Diver training has been completed through a modular approach , alongside regular club diving . We run a variety of Skill Development Courses ( SDCs ) and between the club ’ s instructors we can deliver all of the recreational SDCs . Coming back into a rather late diving season , Buoyancy and Trim has been popular this year . We have delivered boat handling training too , as well as twin-set theory delivered over Zoom , which meant getting a twin-set out of the Training Officer ’ s garage
and into his kitchen . During lockdowns , BSAC has done remarkably well , using new ways of transmitting lessons , events and other stuff via internet platforms .
Where do you go for open-water training ?
We visit NDAC , near Chepstow , Vobster Quay in Somerset and the West Wales coast . We usually dive all year round , but mainly at the weekends . This year , however , during the longer summer evenings we also moved our normal Thursday night pool training to open water , which gave us a more varied training offer .
We are fortunate to have been given permission to use a lake , which is reasonably local to us , near Glyn Neath , for training . It has a maximum depth of around 10m , with a couple of tiers up to
the surface . As a project we sourced some pallets and scrap scaffold boards and built ourselves a pontoon training platform . We then sank this onto a 6m tier so that we had a decent training area raised up off the muddy lakebed . This has been used to carry out training including twin set shut-down drills , plus Buoyancy and Trim practice .
What about the future ?
Once pools open again , we will meet for pool training every Thursday from 9pm to 10pm . After the pool we meet for a social , with refreshments and some dive planning at Ystrad Rhondda Labour Club , which is right next to the Sports Centre . We will be doing courses , going diving , organising club trips in the UK and overseas and hopefully increasing our membership once again . �
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