Here we go again. The sport of diving is in jeopardy on 2 fronts. First, the Texas Board of Health has determined that the depth of all pools in that State will conform to the dimensions set by FINA. FINA is the international governing body for competitive diving events such as the Olympic Games. Why did Texas choose to follow International competitive depths for recreational facilities? Why not follow one of the others? Not one regulatory agency including FINA guarantees the safety of the depths they recommend. Not many pools in Texas will conform to that new ruling and as a result, diving boards are being taken out or lowered. No one has yet defined what a safe depth is, primarily because nobody knows or is willing to stand behind any recommendation.

The second front comes from risk management. Risk managers in some areas decided to remove diving boards for fear of lawsuits. The lawsuit referred to is a 6.6 million-dollar judgement given to a person who was injured diving from a board in a backyard (residential) swimming pool. NSPI was the organization regulating that part of the pool industry and was part of that judgement. It seems like a pretty big leap to equate a residential pool incident to public pools, which have larger and deeper diving areas.

We as coaches and divers should prepare to see our sport vanish. It doesn’t seem to make a difference when we have proven that shallow water and diving boards in residential and apartment complex pools are dangerous and are the places where diving accidents, like the one above, are occurring. Trial lawyers and the lawsuit mentality in our country will cause the sport to disappear. It appears that the safety record we have had for years doesn’t really matter. The potential for serious injury seems to be the concern but there are no statistics to show that’s the case.

If injuries and lawsuits cause the disappearance of diving boards, those who are behind these decisions had best realize that the potential for catastrophic injuries remains with diving into shallow water.

People will ask me if I am giving up? I believe that there is justification to do exactly that. After successfully arguing to keep diving at the high school level in Illinois and researching the safety of the sport twice, writing numerous articles in defense of Diving Safety and getting no support from any National Governing Board maybe I should give up.

At this point, I don’t know how to change the perception associated with the "potential for injury" or the "fear of lawsuit" phrases that keep re-surfacing. The original concern for diving board injuries was hitting the pool bottom. I have been observing recreational divers during public swim hours this summer and have noticed that almost every diver does not reach the pool bottom. During diving lessons, I have to teach kids to go deeper. Many of them only go 3 to 4 feet down and never get near the bottom. Since diving is a learned rather than an innate skill, divers must also learn how to operate in pools with varying depths.

A one-time member of the National Safety Council’s Aquatic Safety Committee stated that since we went to ten foot depths, the incidents of hitting the pool bottom dropped to virtually nothing. All US Diving and the NCAA will say is that they have never had a serious injury in pools that follow their recommended depth. Texas has a lot of pools that don’t meet that requirement but boast 40 years of no injuries in those pools. Risk Managers seem to leap to conclusions with knee jerk responses but don’t check the facts or recognize that there is a difference between residential and municipal/public pools. It is not simply an apples to apples comparison. The Texas Board of Health also admits that it doesn’t even keep track of these types of incidents. If that’s the case, why are they even making these decisions?

Also how do we curb trial lawyers and the high awards associated with their lawsuits? The Courts and Legislatures have been concerned about the effects of frivolous lawsuits for years. As I see it nothing will ever be accomplished because that will make it more difficult for those lawyers to earn a living (or make their fortune). Nobody has suggested that the injured party doesn’t need to be taken care of… but at what cost to the rest of us should this be done? These Lawyers make us believe that the injured party is just plain stupid and the courts seem to agree. Has there ever been a case where the injured person was found to be solely at fault?

It appears that I have been fighting a losing battle since 1977. The same perception keeps surfacing under similar but different circumstances. Safety is a true concern but there is no standard for reasonable safety. Trial lawyers expect absolute safety, which is impossible while living on this planet.

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