Sidemount Training Philippines

Diver’s Network Philippines now also offers UTD Instructor courses.  If you are looking at taking UTD Instructor course contact us through email and send us your biodata and history of diving.

As Instructors:

• We are dedicated to teaching people to become “Thinking Divers.”
• We have the best Instructor support materials ever produced including a full “Playbook” covering every class and skill.
• We work with the highest set of Standards and Procedures in the industry.
• We are leaders in the scuba community and belong to an ever growing social network for UTD divers.
• We are supported by a Headquarters that responds quickly and effectively to our students and to our teaching needs.
• We are supported with a full and comprehensive set of materials for our students.
• Most importantly, we have fun teaching and diving.
• The Instructor Development Course

  UTD’s IDC/Crossover is a modular program. To get started you will need to complete the first three core modules, which are mandatory and can be completed ANYTIME and in the comfort of your own home or workplace. All you need is web access. These 3 Core Modules are:

• Registration Module 
• Online Classroom and Prep Module 
• Academic Module -online- Check Out The Schedule of Academic Modules on the Calendar listed below

The Registration and Prep modules will be done on your own with guidance from UTD HQ staff instructors.

The Open Water/Foundational Module are generally held worldwide and consist of a 4 day “in-person” and in-water IDC class that covers instructor candidate lectures, dry run presentations, and in water teaching and evaluating.

Here is a typical OW/Found. Instructor Development Course Outline:

Note: Keep in mind you must successfully completion the three core modules (Registration, Prep, Academics)  to be able to attend.

Day 1

• Gas Planning, Ascent Strategies, Proper Weighting lectures
• Dry Runs of all personal skills by the IT
• Pool Session – all personal skills
• Video Review

Day 2

• Ratio Deco review
• Instructor Candidate dry runs
• Instructor Candidate teaching in the pool
• Video Review

Day 3

• Instructor Candidate lecture
• Instructor Candidate dry runs
• Instructor Candidate teaching in Open Water
• Video Review

Day 4

• Catch-all pool/open water
• UTD Instructor operations, database, etc.
• Final paperwork and IT evaluation

Once you have completed the core modules and the Open Water/Foundational module and received a recommendation from your Instructor trainer, you will be evaluated by the UTD Training Board. Upon successful evaluation by the UTD Training Board, you will be a certified UTD Instructor with the ability to teach either the Open Water category or the Foundational category classes and the specialties. Depending on which In-Person IDC you attend you may then continue on to one of the other Category Modules such as Technical, Trimix, Rebreather, Cave, Wreck, Side-Mount and so on.

Instructor Categories and Classes:

Open Water – Open Water, Nitrox, Rescue, Drysuit

Foundational – Above, plus Rec 1, Rec 2, Rec 3, Essentials, DM, Scooter 1

Technical – Above, plus Tech 1, Tech 2, Tech Gold, Overhead Protocols

Trimix – Above, plus Trimix 1, Trimix 2, Trimix Gold

Cave – Overhead Protocols, Cave, Addons: Cave Gold, Technical Cave, RB Cave, Scooter Cave, Adv. Side- Mount Cave

Wreck – Overhead Protocols, Wreck 1, Wreck 2, Wreck 3

Rebreather – Essentials of RB, mCCR 1, 2, 3, pSCR 1, 2, 3

Side-Mount – Ess. of Rec. Side-Mount, Ess. of Cave/Tech/Wreck Side-Mount

Instructor Evaluations

Instructor Candidates will be evaluated by the UTD Training Advisory Board (TAB). Following the foundational module (and the other category modules), the Training Director or Instructor Trainer will submit for evaluation with the TAB evaluation videos of the candidates doing a formal lecture, teaching a dry run segment, doing an in-water demonstration, and doing an video evaluation, along with the candidates’ in-person evaluation forms completed by the IT.

Depending on your prior experience and performance during the IDC, you will either be evaluated and signed off to teach or you will be asked to complete a teaching internship(s).

The candidate evaluation process will take up to 10 days. During that time, the TAB will meet and review the videos and the forms, discuss the candidate’s performance, then make a decision on whether or not to accept the candidate as an Certified UTD Instructor or suggest more work such as Internships and practice. A skype or webex meeting will be held with the candidate to discuss the evaluation and the results.

This same procedure will be followed for all instructor category modules.

Preparing for the IDC

Although much of the preparation for the IDC you’ll do on your own, we are available at any time to guide you, answer questions, and talk about the programs. You will complete the online classroom programs and tests for each class you plan on teaching. You’ll study our Standards and Procedures and Instructor Operations Manual. Then you’ll explore our Instructor Playbook.

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Diver’s Network Philippines now offers training for  TDI Cavern, TDI Intro to Cave and Full Cave Diver Instructors courses.

TDI Trainning Board has granted Tom Morato Full Cave Diver Instructor Trainer.  This is a great achievement with Tom being one of the new Full Cave Instructors Trainers in the World.

If you are interested in getting your TDI Instructor training in Cavern, Intro to Cave or Full Cave give us  a call or email us at tom@diveph.com.

Cavern Instructor Course

Course Overview

The Cavern course is the first level of cave courses. The main focus of this course is teaching the skills and techniques required to safely penetrate caverns within limited depth and in the limits of light penetration.

Introductory Cave Instructor Course

Course Overview

The Introductory Cave instructor course is the second level of cave courses. The main focus of this course is teaching more advanced skills and techniques building upon the cavern course.

TDI Full Cave Instructor Course

Course Overview

This course is the third and last stage in the training of cave instructor development program. Advanced cave diving planning, the practical execution of different types of cave systems and scenarios divers encounter are presented. This cave diving course is not intended to prepare instructors for evaluating all facets of cave diving. The objective of this course is to expand and critique previous skills accomplished in the Cavern and Introductory cave diving instructor programs. Emphasis is placed upon dive planning and skill perfection trough actual cave penetration.

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Training

The past few was quite busy in the shop,  James, Karl and me where fully packed with courses.

James spend most of the time in Anilao and Subic, doing most of the recreational training.  We had a lots of our friends doing specialties, divemaster courses and core recreational courses.

Karl was busy between Technical Diving and Recreational Courses.

I was also busy between Technical Courses, Cave Courses, Crossovers and IDC’s.  And will like to take the opportunity to congratulate the following friends;

Jin Hoon Hwang: Korean national, working at Red Sea Dive Team in Egypt.  Jin had excellent dive skills, and came really prepare for his courses here at Diver’s Network Philippines.  He recently applied for the CDTC and got accepted and now join the ranks of being a “Course Director”. Congratulations!!

He took the PADI TecDeep Instructor course and Advanced Sidemount Instructor Course.

Gary Makdessian: We had Gary from Coral Divers Saudi Arabia back at  Diver’s Network.  Garry frequents the Philippines every year and has taken multiple Instructor Courses with Diver’s Network.  He is a PADI Course Director and owner of Coral Divers.

This time he took the Basic and Advanced Sidemount Course and get his new UTD Z-harness.  Congratulations!!

He took the PADI TecDeep Instructor course and Advanced Sidemount Instructor Course.

Wellun Tsang: Born in Holland, now residing in Switzerland. Came to do his TDI FullCave, Sidmeount and CCR Cave.  He was referred to us by our good friend Matti Lampinen.

Thanks mate for helping me with the video camera, it works great.  Let see if we can plan something for Mexico.

Alex Ponh: We had Alex a Master Instructor form Hong Kong taking multiple TDI Technical Courses.  Great guy, new to the shop.  It was a pleasure teaching you mate.

Congratulations!!!.  Hope to see you back later this year for your sidemount courses.

Jin Chang: Jin came to us from China where he teaches Master Degree in the University of China. He took his Divemaster Training in Bali and decided to take the PADI IDC with Diver’s Network.  He had a lot of experience in teaching, so we work most on water skills and theory.

Great Job, he sign up for the IDC and Instructor Specialties.

Alex, JC and Josheph: Finish there Divemaster course!!! Congratualtions, this guys been helping us out through months, working there way up, through specialty training rescue course and now Divemasters.

They’ve now joined David and IDC Staff James through there IDC with us.  Soon to be great instructors. Cheers mate!!

Warren, Lana and Andy: Great to have you back!!  This guys are sponges always practicing their skills and learning new things. Warren and Andy from the UK and Lana from Russia, they have been diving with us for the past 6 months and accumulated 200 technical dives in different environments.  Great guys to have around the shop, FC.

Through this six months, they finish their TDI extended Range, TDI Full Cave, TDI Sidemount Cave, Equipment Technician, Gas Blender, Technical Wreck and now thinking on taking the Cave Stage Course.

They got the their UTD harness 6 months ago, and there was no turning back for them!!

Upgrading Diver’s Network Credentials

James went to Diving & Resort Travel Expo 2011 in Hong Kong on July 8th, and took most of the seminars there.  James will be our next Course Director in the Shop.  And will be taking the CDTC next year.  We are all looking forward to that.  He will manage all IDC at Diver’s Network.

Karl work with Andrew Georgitsis from UTD / DIR Training Agency, go through Deco on the fly, in water decompression and Ratio Deco.  He is now in the process of making a hand book to include in our technical courses.

Tom crossover to UTD / DIR.  Andrew Georgitsis, was our guest in the Philippines for 2 weeks, where we did the crossover and assisted with some UTD student.  We had a great time, and lots to chat about.  We share and combined ideas for training and different equipment.  It was awesome diving with Andrew.  This september we will be working together in a project in California and Truc Lagoon.

Andrew Conducted a Ratio Deco Seminar in Manila.

Now we can teach for UTD:

• UTD Essentials of Rec
• UTD Essentials of Sidemount
• UTD Essentials of Overhead
• UTD Overhead Protocols
• UTD Essential of Tech
• UTD Wreck 1
• UTD Wreck 2
• UTD Cave 1
• UTD Cave 2
• UTD Tech 1
• UTD Tech 2
• UTD Advanced Cave Sidemount
• UTD DPV

Shoot Television Program – GMA 7 – Born To Be Wild

We had the pleasure of making a 3 episode Show with Kiko Rustia, former student of ours and host of GMA 7 Network – Born to be Wild.  We have a great time, with Kiko, we are now working on making the forth expedition with Born to be Wild in un-explore cave in Tawi Tawi on Novemeber.

Video0004 New Cenote in Tawi Tawi

New Equipment in Shop

New sidemount harness has arrive at the shop:

• Z-harness sidemount

• Delta Hybrid, doubles, singles, backmount, sidemount harness

• Z-Plus sidemount

• Razor 2

I had a chance to try some of this harness in the Pool and Open Water, they work great.  Quite surprise how easy is to trim yourself out in this harnesses, even with 4 to 6 tank.

Please note that bellow videos are first time practice, if you are a sidemount diver you know how hard some harnesses are to trim, specially with 4 to 6 tanks.

I will try staging dive this weekend and hopefuly we can get some footage, so you can compare to your existing setup. Enjoy.

Our new Oxygen Electric Pump is setup already, and we have have bigger gas storrage / bank for standard mixes.

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Diver’s Network Philippines is proud to offer a new line of products from the following brands that we now carry in the shop. From guages, miflex hoses, pockets, neoprene shorts with pockets in them, regulators, octopus, scuba tools, new sidemount harnesses, mouth pieces, bladders with comfort harnesses( available also bladder only), canister lights, video lights, primary reels, smb bags, carry away bags, sofnolime absorbers for rebreathers – CCR, snorkel whistles and many many more..please come by and check out our vast array of items….Hope to see you soon!!!

XS – SCUBA

HIGHLY OPTIMIZED GEAR – HOG

UTD EQUIPMENT

LIGHT MONKEY – REELS AND PRIMARY LIGHTS

SOFNOLIME ABSORBENT FOR CCR REBREATHERS 4.5 kg and 20 kg

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We have just placed an order for a new Oxygen Pump for our dive shop.  After giving it a lot of thought, debate and research, which booster pump will be best for our application, we decided to go for an electric driven pump from Hydraulics International, Inc.

Here are the details;

Finally our pump has been ordered and we are all exited to have this new piece of equipment in the shop very soon .  If you need to pump oxygen for your rebreathers or your decompression bottles at 3,000 psi / 207 bars let us know if we can be of service to you all.. it should be around in 2 weeks. Just drop by or give us a call.

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The first 2 months of 2011 was a very busy time for all of us at the dive shop with loads of new and interesting students walking thru our doors though we were very busy, meeting all this interesting and inspiring divers was an honor to teach and be part of their “diving”lives. I believe that is one of the outstanding perks you have as an instructor — you meet a lot of people from all over the world, learn about their culture, see different styles of diving, pick up a line or two from their native tongue and most of all– make new life long friends….

It is with pride that I woud like to Thank and Congratulate our new friends:

Al -TecDeep and Sidemount Instructor

Congratulations to Al Williams on completing his PADI TecDeep Diver course and PADI Advanced Sidemount Instructor course.  Originally from the UK, Al is a PADI IDC Staff Instructor from Edmonton, Canada, and was vacationing in the Philippines for several weeks.

During his stay Al had arranged to complete his PADI TecDeep Diver course.  After finishing all the TecDeep dives using a twin tank set-up; Al decided he’d like to give the Sidemount option a try and liked it so much he ended up completing the instructor course.

Well done Al and hope to see you back here sometime soon!

Dingo TecDeep Instructor and Blender Instructor

Congratulations to Dirk “Dingo” Garland on completing his PADI TecDeep Instructor course and Blender Instructor course.  German by birth, Dingo came to the Philippines from Thailand where he was working in an Diveshop and decided to hop on a plane to check out the Philippines..we had a great time doing the course since he was so eager to learn it was a breeze teaching him, he loved the Philippines and I hope to see him back soon!!

He also works in Mallorca, Spain during the peak seasons.

Dingo has thousand of dives under his belt, awesome guy with  great skills.

Hope to see you around in the future. Caving!!!

Congratulations to the New PADI Instructors Onjay and Tim

Congratulations to Onjay Micua and Tim Cartwright for being successful in their IDC and IE on January 2 which was held in Puero Galera.

Onjay a filipina , who was previously working in El Nido as a DM went for the next step and decided to become an instructor and she did it with flying colors.

Tim British a national, newly certified in Thailand as a Divemaster came over tot he Philippines to try his luck with being an instructor and luck was on his side..he passed the IE without a hitch and now is on his way in becoming a successful PADI instructor.

Great job guys!!! you make me proud!!!

Congratulations,  enjoy it!

Frans Full Cave Diver, Cave Sidemount and Advanced Sidemount

Congratulations to Frans Van Oorscho on completing his TDI Full Cave Diver certification / TDI Cave Sidemount  and PADI Advanced Sidemount courses.

He came from Holland and spent a month of diving around the Philippines for fun!  He arrived with his Cavern and Intro to Cave which he accomplished in France..he decided to venture more into caving and was thrilled at the awesome caves we have here in the Philippines…he was fearless!!

A perfectionist  by heat and mind—Frans continues to  practice and improving his skills. A true Cave Diver addict!!!

Hope to see you next year Frans, we had some good chats!!!

Thanks for the drysuit. To cold now a days.

Rob PADI Tec Trimix and TDI Advance Trimix

Robert from Lake Tahoe,USA came over to complete his PADI TecTrimix and TDI Advanced Trimix courses in Anilao. Having previously completed his PADI Tec50 course in Puerto Galera, Robert is no stranger to diving in the Philippines.

The full moon currents and cold water (well, just above 25C/78F – very cold by Philippine standards!) did nothing to dampen Robert’s enthusiasm for the course and it was a pleasure to teach someone so keen on learning.

We even managed to find a huge giant moray eel on one of the earlier dives at around 65m in depth, the big stuff didn’t stop there….  we also managed to spot a couple of enormous starfishes (close to 1m in diameter!) at around 80 (265ft) on the penultimate dive – sadly we didn’t have a camera on that dive but we’ll aim to find them again and get some pictures for ID on our next Trimix course in Anilao!

Well done Robert on your new Trimix certification and we’re looking forward to seeing you over here again sometime!

Jojo, Frans and Minos PADI Advanced Sidemount Diver/  Instructors

Congrats to all of you!!

Jojo Gador, long time friend and Instructor has been diving for 35 years now, with thousands of dives to date….

Minos from France, a CMAS & PADI Instructor is not a stranger to Philippines diving. He has worked in El Nido as a Dive Shop Manager…

Frans, Cave diver from Holland who has a immense thirst for diving knowledge and skills….

We all had a BLAST!!! testing new equipment and we even had time to fool around with the scooters..

GREAT TEAM!!!

IDC Candidates, Ferdi, Geoffrey and Allan

Congratulations to Ferdi, Geoffrey and Allan for completing the Instructor Development Course with Diver’s Network.

Allan Milarosa, a Filipino working in Dubai who is an Ex military, now working as a para-medic ,he will be taking the PADI IE in the Middle East soon ( update us!!)

Ferdinand de Guzman, a Filipino based in Abu Dhabi, he works as a Pulmonary Therapist,  Ferdi will be taking the PADI Instructor Examination on March 15 in Puerto Gallera (nwe’ll be waiting to cheer you on!!)

Geoffrey Atilano, Filipino, military man.  Geoff will be taking his PADI IE in CEBU in April ( we’ll be standing by you to cheer you on too!!!)

Roger Smith PADI Sidemount Instructor Course

Roger a PADI Course Director, ANDI Instructor Trainer, owner of Aquanauts PADI CDC Center located in Pattaya, Thailand and good friend came over in January to take his PADI Advance Instructor certification. We had a great time since Roger is a frequent visitor of the Philippines thus very familiar with the kind of diving we have here, so all our dives were a breeze to do and so much fun we had great conversations together.. see you soon Roger!!

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Matti Lampinen, Minos Hubert and Michael James Etherington went on and took their respective Trimix Course.

Michael came over to the Philippines from the U.K. and this being his first time in the country; all his previous technical diving trainings were done in the Red Sea and Thailand. He has experience in diving worldwide.

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Our congratulaton to Karl, Onjay and Geofrey for completing our  IDC – Instructor Development Course.

While Karl went straight to the PADI Instructor Examination in CEBU conducted by Examiner Geroge Wegman, Onjay and Geofrey got certified as Assistant Instructor and will be taking the IE on February 2011 in Puerto Gallera.

Congratulations also to Minos (French PADI and CMAS Instructor) and James (Irish PADI and TDI Instructor) for completing the PADI IDC Staff Instructor Course.

Looking forward for the next IDC in January 2011!

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After the  PADI Instructor Examination in CEBU, George Wegman and I had the chance to dive in Pawood Cave and search for new passages that I had been working on for the past months.

George is a Swiss-Filipino, who used to own some diving operations in Boracay and the  M/Y Tabibuga,  He had been one of the first IANTD IT in Asia, as well as PADI Course Director, PADI Tec Trimix IT.  He had to leave all of that when he got the position as an examiner in PADI Asia Pacific.  Presently he conducts most of the Instructor Examination in South East Asia.

After getting the news that George was conducting the IE in Cebu,  I contacted him asking if he would have the time to make some cave dives in Sidemount, and mentioned to him the existence of a new hole I have been trying to dig for the past months that I had been there.

We both had a real good time, and as always, it’s awesome to have the opportunity to dive with George and talk about new developments in Technical diving, caves, etc….

We where successful in seeing the other side of Pawood Cave after the Sidemount passage, since he was the first one to see it. Therefore, starting as a mere joke, we later on decided to name it Wegman’s Hole!!!

Looking forward to the next, mate!

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There has been increasing number of Instructors and Course Directors coming over to Diver’s Network interested in our Padi Tec Courses.

This month we had Matti Lampinen coming back from Finland.  Matti is a PADI Instructor, Cave Diver and CCR Diver.

Together with Matti, Raphael Virchaux, from Switzerland, a PADI Course Director and the owner of EasyDiving in Dumaguete, Philippines.

Both of them took the PADI Tec 40 / Tec 45 and Tec 50 Instructor Level and Advanced Sidemount Instructor Course together.

These guys are so detail-oriented and like “sponges” in absorbing information – Both have thousand of dives under their belts.

We had many long conversatiosn on possible exploration of caves and new wrecks in different part of the Philippines.  We now just have to find some time for it.

See you next year!

Cheers, mates!!!

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