how old do you have to be to get advanced?

[BouzoukiJoe A.K.A. wrecker130 AKA Chuck Norris AKA joeforbroke (banned)]

In my experience, most kids do not have an appropriately developed sense of fear. The positive intent of fear is risk control. Hence they do not control risks appropriately.

My 9 year old son wants to get certified next year. He is *not* ready for it. He does not have enough fear. He doesn't recognize danger.

I would much rather dive with my 6 year old daughter. She's a water-baby, listens to instructions, recognizes things that could go wrong, has a healthy amount of fear, and manages it well.

[Dive-aholic]

Good point. I won't certify just any 10 year old for that very reason. Some 10 year old simply aren't ready for that responsibility. Just because the agency allows certification at 10 doesn't mean it has to happen.

[Silverlode]

Originally Posted by downunder

Yikes! My wife is 4'11" and around 95 pounds.... my eleven year old is bigger than her! At 12, we are predicting that he will tower mom in both size and strenght.... but I sill wouldn't look down at her and say "you too whimpie do that" if I were you!

And, I'm 6'5" around 240 pounds.... can a 40 year old 5'2" 110 pound female diver (just a typical size) rescue me? Hmmmmmm.... OK... no comment!

& from a petite female as well! My 12 yo is also tiny for her age, and she's already wearing my shoes/clothes but I'd seen a lot of 12yos who are a lot bigger than myself and I won't say 'boo' to them at all.
I did wonder about my size and doing Rescue Diver; but I reckon strength, fitness is more important than size.. and yes, like someone else said, just tow the other person to where one can get help.

[Silverlode]

Wow! Going to check that out. He must be pretty matured.

Originally Posted by RoadRacer1978

I know you can become a PADI master Scuba diver at age 12. There is a Kid that is 12 years old that wrote a book "SCUBA diving for kids" and he is a master Scuba Diver.

12-Year-Old Master Diver, Cody Brown, Writes the Book on 'Scuba for Kids'; Idaho's Youngest Master Diver Writes a Book for Other Youth and Children about His Underwater Adventures Business Wire - Find Articles

[Scubling]

well i heard that you can get your jr. advaned at 12 and a O/W wih padi

[Dive-aholic]

I'm a PADI instructor. It's 10 for both OW and AOW.

[ChrisA]

Originally Posted by jlittlejohn321

I was wondering how old you have to be to get your advanced or adventure diver. I was also wondering if you have to be a certain age for the rescue diver course?

When I took my AOW class there was just one other student, a 12 year old girl. The only difference was that she got a "jr. AOW" c-card and PADI would not let the instructor take her all the way to 100 feet. I think she and a DM stopped at 60 or 80 or something. Other then that the class is the same. Don't wait take the class now. Then on to the rescue class....

[I ate nemo]

i took padi at 14 but that was just to be a open water diver. im not sure what rescue is. maybe 18 i dont know.

[Neptune]

Originally Posted by couped243

Very well said JMAY. NAUI may be not for profit but I bet you can't get certified for free so what difference does it make what agency you use. My son who is 15 and just got his OW is going to be one of my dive buddies. I certainly would like him to help his old man if he is in need. Actually he's getting so big I may not be able to get his butt on the boat..hahahah

"Not for profit" does not mean they get free electricity, rent----well you get the picture. I work for a "Charity" hospital and there are still big bills to pay every month. It "costs" me about $800USD per year just for the privelege of saying I'm a "SCUBA INSTRUCTOR." You just can not teach for free.
NAUI recently lowered the minimum age to 10. I think some concepts are not ready to be grasped by some 10 y.o.'s. I know a diving Dr./Inst that limited his teenage sons to 2 ATA due to no conclusive research on bone growth and pressure. Better safe than sorry.
Bill NAUI 5709L CD

[Kingpatzer]

Both of my boys (14 and 12) are got certified, AOW and Rescue this last summer, and are well on their way to their 5 specialties.

Being a well-trained, aware diver is, in my view, just as important for kids as for adults.

I was proven right at the last dive of the fall when my 14 year old had his reg free flow on the end of a dive. We were doing a pretty "hard" dive for kids -- diving to 40' in a quarry below a line of submerged trees. we could go straight up, but couldn't just shoot for the surface, we had to watch for the odd branch on the way up. I had just checked everyone's air, we are all just below 1,000 and it was time. His air was gone just a few seconds. He calmly swam to his brother, they air shared on the way up. I came up with them. I decided to have them blow the safety stop since the 12 year old was only diving a 60 and he was down to about 400 lbs once we cleared the trees.

We surfaced, swam back to shore, and my son went about fixing his reg. We made one more dive that afternoon and had lots of fun.

Plenty of adults, even a few with AOW and Rescue, would have had kittens in that situation. My kids, without their additional training, most certainly would not have been in as good a situation. All I know is that I was very glad that they'd been to all those classes, and that we spent time practicing those skills on a regular basis.