Padi Open Water Final Exam B Answers

[Rafael Nowning]

Intheory, an expert diver should be writing this post. Logically, he or she could tell you what to expect, give you insider tips and prepare you for the challenge ahead. That said, I have one distinct advantage over the experts: I know exactly how hard it is for nervous first-timers.

You will find the practical side of diving much easier if you read through the theory first. Your dive centre will supply you with a book comprising five different chapters. If you can confidently answer the tests within the chapters and the knowledge reviews at the end of each, you will likely pass the exam without difficulty.

Depending on your learning style, it is possible to blitz through chapters 1-3 on one night and 4-5 on the second. Naturally, if you have more time to play with, then feel free to split up the studying even further. You can also choose the eLearning option. This may be provided by your dive centre as standard, or you can choose to self-learn before beginning the practical course.

You must complete four open water dives in order to pass the course. Dive 1 will orientate you, get you comfortable with the scuba gear and test a few of the above skills. Dives 2 and 3 will rigorously test the above skills while Dive 4 is usually a more relaxed affair allowing you to use and enjoy your newly developed skills.

When I was four years old, I told my mom I was running away from home. I filled a little red wagon with my prized possessions (mostly stuffed animals) and set out for the unknown: our driveway. My mom stood at the front door and watched me tow my wagon to the end of our carport. I took one look at the pouring rain, turned around, and came back inside.

Twenty years later, I found myself dragging a wagon piled with dive gear along the picturesque waterfront of Avalon, California. As I gazed toward our destination, the famous Casino Point dive site, my guts churned with the same mix of excitement and fear I had when I stepped off the front stoop.

The next morning, we hauled our scuba gear to the dive site, ready for adventure. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of putting my wetsuit on first. In a matter of moments, I was sweating like crazy under 7mm of neoprene.

Neither of us had been in a kelp forest before, but getting tangled in kelp was the furthest thing from my mind. Why? Because all I could think about were the equalization problems I had during my open water training dives. It took ages for me to descend below 10 metres/30 feet.

Like many divers, I incorrectly assumed Advanced Open Water is only for divers who have reached an advanced skill level. Luckily, someone explained what Advanced Open Water is actually about: working with an instructor to gain dive experience. There are no quizzes or exams and you spend the majority of the class in the water.

An advanced scuba certification will allow you to dive deeper, introduce you to different diving environments, and help you to develop the skills you have learned in your Open Water course. Many dive sites are not accessible to divers who hold a mere OW certification as they lie below 18 m or require a special skill set to explore them comfortably and safely.

In addition, many liveaboards, a gateway to some of the best dive destinations in the world, will require a certain amount of logged dives and sometimes an Advanced Open Water.

This is not an easy question to answer. Chances are most dive centers will convince you to take your Advanced Open Water course immediately after your done with our OW. After all, this is how a dive center and a diving instructor make their money and the more certifications an instructor has under their belt the better for them.

Doing an advanced diving course is meant to give you a glimpse into different diving environments (i.e. wreck diving, drift diving) as well as hone the basic skills you have acquired during your Open Water course.

The setup for an SSI or PADI Advanced is pretty similar (and I imagine for the other agencies as well though I cannot speak for them with personal experience). In your course, you will do 5 open water dives which are so-called Adventure Dives.

These dives are equivalent to the first dive of any given specialty course thus you will gain a bit of knowledge in each of them. Mandatory is a deep dive as well as underwater navigation. You are free to choose the other 3 and this choice will depend on your interest, your instructor, and where you are diving.

There are not many prerequisites to get started with your Advanced Open Water. You do need to be a certified PADI Open Water Diver (or equivalent from another agency) or PADI Junior Open Water Diver.

To do your Junior Advanced Open Water you need to be at least 12 years old. Once certified you will be allowed to a depth of 21 m until you are 15 years old when your certification will be turned into an AOW and you can dip down to 30 m like the grown-ups.

The deep dive is especially important as it will show you how depth and increased pressure affect your body. You will notice that your air consumption may go up and that you may need to add a little more air to your BCD in order to stay neutrally buoyant.

Please note that you will be allowed to go to 30 m once you have completed your Advanced Open Water course. In order to go deeper, you will need to do the Deep Dive specialty course. The deep dive you are doing during your AOW can count towards it.

The other 3 Adventure Dives will depend on your interests, your location, and your instructor. A firm favorite for many is Peak Performance Buoyancy and for good reason. Buoyancy is one of the most important skills a diver should hone and this class will teach you some nifty tricks on how to get it just right. Mind you, practice makes perfect so your buoyancy will get better the more you dive but still, this specialty is a great place to start.

Alternatively, you can choose courses like Fish ID, Drift Diving, Search & Recovery, Digital Underwater Photography, and many more. As I said, check what is available and see what sounds interesting to you. The Advanced Open Water is not only a great course to gain some new skills but also to dip your toes into different areas of diving and see what you like and may want to get specialties in.

Both will include some theoretical knowledge development however there is no exam at the end of it. After you complete either of these courses you are what is commonly known as an Advanced Open Water Diver (AOW) and are allowed to dive to 30 m.

You can however combine the SSI Advanced Open Water and the SSI Advanced Adventurer. Either you can count the adventure dive towards the corresponding specialty or count one of the specialty dives as part of your Advanced Adventurer dives.

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