A PADI 5-Star Center Takes Issue

In our May issue, we carried a story about Undercurrent subscriber Lorraine Elowe (Colorado), who suffered a severe injury in Belize from a shattered windshield of Ramon's dive boat on the way for a dive. A shard of glass pierced her leg, requiring several operations, and has permanently limited her mobility.

She selected Ramon's based on their 5-star rating with PADI. "We felt we were in good hands . . . . We do not expect that a 5-Star PADI resort would improperly maintain their boats nor shirk full responsibility for the damages caused by their admitted negligence. Ramon's had lax safety standards, hid behind their limited insurance policy, 'thirdworld country' status, and antiquated British laws. The PADI 5-Star status is a joke."

Richard Thomas, who owns the PADI 5-Star International Scuba Frisco (Frisco, TX), responded to this story.

Dear Undercurrent,

"Please take a second to look at what a PADI 5-Star represents. They are required to operate like a real and professional dive center. That means maintaining regular hours (something many struggle with). They invite inspections and standards other shops may choose not to bother with. Such as timely air-check samples. Yes, there are requirements that a center offers a well-rounded curriculum. Is that a bad thing? How many dives are little more than a half-ass boat and a stand to coral tourists?

"[A 5-Star Resort] must . . . . have not committed any verified PADI Quality Assurance violations within that period; they should also have no open Quality Assurance inquiries in progress.

"They must . . . . have been awarded all three Dive Center Recognition Awards, including education, community involvement, and environment.

"They must distribute regular communications pieces designed to recruit and retain customers and conduct at least one PADI Advanced Open Water course, one PADI Rescue Dive course, one PADI Dive Master or AI course, and one PADI Specialty Diver course per year.

"They are expected to have issued at least 30 percent of total diver certifications for courses above the PADI openwater level and display items promoting dive travel and dive experiences.

"They must exclusively issue and advertise only PADI certifications for recreational scuba diving courses and have not conducted, sponsored, or advertised any non-PADI recreational scuba instructor training programs.

"Unfortunately, industry-wide liability insurance is left up to the country it is based in [the thrust of the original article in Undercurrent]."

Dear Richard,

This may all be true, and your last point acknowledges that PADI will be absent should a diver at a 5-Star operation get injured, as was our reader, who was severely injured at Ramon's. PADI was nowhere to be seen in her effort to collect from Ramon's and provided no compensation. She required an American lawyer to squeeze an insufficient sum out of Ramon's insurance company, which was hesitant to pay at all.

She chose Ramon's because she believed being a PADI 5-Star resort meant it would offer greater diver safety and, if things went wrong, insurance with PADI behind it. As her attorney Michelle Bass, said, "This 5-Star rating attempts to convey that PADI has oversight and control of the resort, which it definitely does not. PADI 5-Star does not protect U.S. Divers or provide insurance coverage."

The truth is, when divers are injured in a foreign country, the problem is between the divers and the local company, and not with the American training agency with which it is affiliated. So divers must carry plenty of insurance because they will get little, if any, compensation otherwise.