All Episodes

SH269: What Is the Purpose of an Investigation in Diving?

SH268: The Hidden Cost of "Never Show Weakness": Why Hiding Instructor Errors Undermines Dive Safety

SH267: “Diver's depression” It's time to tackle stigma and taboos

SH266: A Review of 2025. Looking Forward to 2026.

SH265: Analysis from a Human Factors Perspective - Cave Double Fatality: Calimba 2004

SH264: Teamwork in Diving: The Power of Clear Roles & Task Division

SH263: The desperate need for blame

SH262: So what can we do? The Practical Steps/Tools for Bringing HF/NTS into Diving

SH261: “Would you speak up to the Commander?” - “No. They already know” - Making changes to your team's diving

SH260: Top Tips for Technical/Cave Divers: Decision Making. To manage risk, we have to be exposed to uncertainty and harm

SH259: Top Tips for Technical/Cave Divers: Situation Awareness. Risk Perception is a critical skill - Experience Doesn’t Equal Judgement

SH258: Top Tips for Technical/Cave Divers: Psychological Safety and Just Culture

SH257: Top Tips for Technical/Cave Divers: Performance Influencing Factors - Even the best of us are only human

SH256: Top Tips for Technical/Cave Divers – Leadership

SH255: Top Tips for Technical/Cave Divers: Teamwork - It's more than a back up plan

SH254: Top Tips for Technical/Cave Divers: Communication

SH253: Top Tips for Diving Instructors: Decision Making

SH252: Top Tips for Diving Instructors: Situation Awareness

SH251: Top Tips for Diving Instructors: Psychological Safety and the Thumb Rule

SH250: Top tips for Diving Instructors: Performance Influencing Factors

SH249: Top Tips for Diving Instructors: Leadership - Creating the space for others to be heard

SH248: Top Tips for Diving Instructors: Teamwork

SH247: At a system level, we don't learn from diving fatalities, and here's why

SH246: Top tips for Diving Instructors: Communication (especially the difficult kind)

SH245: Asking Why. Telling Stories. Owning Accountability

SH244: Top Tips for Beginner Divers: Decision Making

SH243: Top Tips for Beginner Divers: Situation Awareness

SH242: Top Tips for Beginner Divers: Psychological Safety & Just Culture

SH241: Top Tips for Beginner Divers: Performance Influencing Factors

SH240: Top Tips for Beginner Divers Leadership and Followership

SH239: Top Tips for Beginner Divers: Teamwork

SH238: Top tips for Beginner Divers: Communications

SH237: Decision Making: Normalisation of Deviance in Rebreather Cave Diving

SH236: Reframing The Dirty Dozen - Part 4

SH235: Reframing The Dirty Dozen - Part 3

SH234: Reframing The Dirty Dozen - Part 2

SH233: Reframing The Dirty Dozen - Part 1

SH232: Instructor Toxicity: Why one bad apple really does spoil the bunch

SH231: What do you mean, the damn box is missing again?

SH230: What We Get Wrong About Psychological Safety in Diving

SH229: Debriefing a Challenging Dive- a real-life experience

SH228: Designing Checklists that work. Slowing down to get it right.

SH227: Navigating Online Narratives and Learning from Feedback in Diving

SH226: 'They Lost Situation Awareness'

SH225: The Challenge of Psychological Safety

SH224: CCR Diver Goes Hypoxic on Surface – What Causal Reasoning Taught Me About Learning from Events

SH223: The Effect of your Environment on your Decision Making: Performance Shaping Factors in Diving

SH222: You can’t risk assess a hazard you don’t know about: DeltaP

SH221: The First Human Factors in Diving Liveaboard- Living our values

SH220: I thought: "WTF did you just say?" I actually said: ....nothing. How to say when it’s not okay

SH219: Why are dive briefings important? How to deliver them effectively

SH218: Being Understood, not just Transmitting

SH217: Normalization of Deviance (Risk): How Socially Accepted Drift Can Impact Your Diving

SH216: Diving Deep into Diving Safety: The death of Linnea Mills through a lens of HF and System Safety

SH215: Situation Awareness and Mental Models: Making it easier to the do the right thing

SH214: What if Just Culture and Psychological Safety is not enough?

SH213: The Diving Professional: Leadership is not Optional

SH212: Stress - A challenge we all face

SH211: Teams. Buddies. The Difference.

SH210: Communications - Ask better questions

SH209: You're biased, I'm biased, We are all biased!

SH208: The Lost Fin: A Lesson in Situation Awareness

SH207: Change your Language. Change the World

SH206: Single Diver Fatality in Cenote Nariz, 3 February 2024. CREER Report

SH205: What one thing...

SH204: Follow me! Trust me! I am your Leader!

SH203: The Importance of Psychological Safety in Debriefs

SH202: Accountability? Just another word for blame?

SH201: Knowledge is not enough. We must apply. What can you do to build HF into your training or education?

SH200: Why we find it so hard to say no or change...the sunk cost fallacy

SH199: Safety is boring...

SH198: Were you lucky or were you good?

SH197: We’ve got an attitude problem!

SH196: They broke the rules! So...?

SH195: Murphy was wrong!

SH194: Surely if we blame and punish, things will be safer?

SH193: The problem with bringing Human Factors into Diving is...

SH192: Quarks and Meows - the state of diving safety!

SH191: Are there Cobras in diving?

SH190: You can't learn from adverse events if you are going to blame

SH189: ‘Pilot error’. Don't 'fix' the Pilot. ‘Diver error’. 'Fix' the diver.

SH188: The Status Quo Bias. We don’t like to change

SH187: The risks we take. The decisions we make. The lessons we MIGHT learn.

SH186: Being Efficient? Being Thorough? Which One Did You Choose?

SH185: “Whenever there is any doubt, there is no doubt.”

SH184: Why change is hard in diving

SH182: Joining Dots is Easy, Especially If You Know the Outcome

SH182: My Biggest Mistake: Context Driving Behaviour

SH181: “Blame is the enemy of safety” - moving from blaming to learning

SH180: Challenger Safety: As an Instructor, don't I lose control?

SH179: How and Why Checklists Work

SH178: The Importance of Experience: Expertise is different to Experience

SH177: We see what we think we’re looking for

SH176: How to Integrate Human Factors Education into a New Diving Class: A Real World Example

SH175: You can't pay MORE attention: the myth of 'loss of situation awareness'

SH174: When The Rescuer Nearly Needs Rescuing! - Task Fixation

SH173: How to conduct effective pre-dive checks on a busy dive boat

SH172: Making sense now to see what the future might bring

SH171: If A=B and B=C, then why A≠C?

SH170: From an acorn to a two-day global virtual conference in four months!

SH169: “The root cause of an accident is our imagination”

SH168: What is a mistake? What is an error? Words have meanings.

SH167: Only 20% of surgeons would like to use a checklist in their operations…

SH166: You can’t run before you can walk...

SH165: “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.” Or can you..?

SH164: Plan to fail safely – Part 2: Passing the test doesn’t say it all

SH163: Who owns the risk in diving when something goes wrong?

SH162: Plan to fail safely - teaching students/candidates for the real world

SH161: ‘One mistake and you are dead’ – isn’t how accidents normally happen

SH160: Outcomes are so sexy and attractive…

SH159: The best is the enemy of the good

SH158: Predictive Profiling & diving: “what deviates, deserves attention!”

SH157: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly!

SH156: CCR pre-dive checks and checklists are not always enough to prevent an equipment-based accident!

SH155: How safe is your diving?

SH154: The Importance of Decision Making in Setting Goals: Ensuring “The Juice is worth the Squeeze”

SH153: Why ‘They should have’, ‘...could have’ or ‘I would have..’ do not improve diving safety

SH152: The Bend is Uninteresting...The Related Decisions Are Much More So

SH151: When the holes line up...

SH150: Are you a good enough diver?

SH149: 'Choices': Guaranteed small loss or a probable larger loss, injury or fatality?

SH148: Risk of diving fatality is 1:200 000. However, you cannot be a fraction of dead…!

SH147: Dive safety leads to nothingness...and nothingness is unemotive!

SH146: Why ‘everyone is responsible for their own risk-based decisions’ isn’t the right approach to take to improve diving safety.

SH145: Cognitive Dissonance - Why you are right and I am wrong...Or are you?

SH144: Just another brick in (under) the wall...taking action

SH143: 'Entirely Predictable' vs 'Managing Uncertainty': How many rolls on the dice?

SH142: The standard you walk past is the standard you accept

SH141: We cannot improve if we don't learn. We can't learn if we don't understand.

SH140: Safety is not _the_ priority...

SH139: What does Human Factors in Diving mean?

SH138: Why ‘Human Error’ is a poor term if we are to improve diving safety

SH137: Stop making stupid mistakes. If only they’d follow the rules

SH136: Nine ways to stop your dive team improving

SH135: 17 Cognitive Biases which Contribute to Diving Accidents

SH134: Human Error in Diving: Is it really that simple?

SH133: Blood, Banks and Diving: The value of knowledge, experience and training

SH132: Leadership in Diving? Why is it needed, it is only a sport...

SH131: With Errors: Aviation Blames The System, The Diving Community Often Blames the Individual

SH130: The Power of One

SH129: We judge based on outcomes, not on process

SH128: I am biased...you are biased...we are all biased...!

SH127: Can divers learn from the US Forest Service?

SH126: Why did he make such an obvious mistake...?

SH125: "Known Unknowns" - Are they considered enough in diving...?

SH124: Congratulations on surviving. Dude, you’re one lucky f***er

SH123: Why is it so hard to thumb a dive, or end something that you have committed to?

SH122: "Human Error" or "Diver Error": Are they just an easy way of blaming the individual?

SH121: We all make errors. Let’s not judge those involved without understanding the ‘how’ it made sense.

SH120: Why is it so hard to talk about failure?

SH119: Local Rationality: Why an old lady vandalised art and how to improve diving safety!

SH118: Being a deviant is normal...

SH117: Complacency: The Silent Killer... But it's not that Simple!

SH116: Incompetent and Unaware: You don't know what you don't know...

SH115: It's the little things that catch you out...

SH114: What relevance does Human Factors have to recreational and technical diving?

SH113: How to help correct the biases which lead to poor decision making

SH112: Authority Gradient - Why people don't (or can't) speak up.

SH111: Big Data - Use as a Predictor? Or Not?

SH110: Looking in the (Cultural) Mirror...

SH109: Anyone could have done that...!

SH108: How Much Are You Willing to Risk?

SH107: Summary of RF4 Paper: Human Factors in Rebreather Diving

SH106: Language Matters: An HF Approach to Reviewing an ‘Accident Analysis’

SH105: Mistakes are good- learning from mistakes is sometimes better than getting it right

SH104: Communication- What stops people speaking up?

SH103: The Dunning Kruger effect- Incompetent (or Competent?!) and Unaware

SH102: Decision Making- How do we explain our decisions to others?

SH101: Running out of gas- Why does this happen and how can we prevent it?

SH100: Illusory Truth Effect

SH99: Standards- why do we have them and what can we do if someone breaks them?

SH98: How do novices know what questions to ask?

SH97: Survival instinct: Reaction to stress

SH96: What do we mean by experience?

SH95: Speaking the right language

SH94: Practical Guide to Applying Teamwork in Diver Training

SH93: Who is responsible for learning?

SH92: Diving accidents: the want to know what happened and why

SH91: Mind Reading for Beginners

SH90: The Backfire Effect: Why our brains make it difficult to change our mind

SH89: To Dive or Not to Dive? The Power of Decision Making

SH88: Cognitive dissonance or why we don't always follow our beliefs

SH87: The road to excellence: Systems and structure form the foundation of a culture of improvement

SH86: Selective Attention Exists! 5 Tips to Increase Situational Awareness in Diving

SH85: Ergonomics- not just about comfy chairs

SH84: Why is it so hard to admit to our mistakes?

SH83: The Curse of Knowledge

SH82: Familiarity as Distraction: Operating on Autopilot

SH81: Complacency and Efficiency

SH80: Why is it so hard to concentrate?

SH79: 5 Common Misconseptions about Human Factors

SH78: Work as Imagined vs Work as Done

SH77: Analyzing the Hidden Consequences of Undermining Standards

SH76: Navigating the Depths Safely: Risk Management & Incident Reporting with a panel of experts

SH75: Psychological Consequences of a Diving Accident

SH74: Who is responsible for change?

SH73: Why we need change

SH72: Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda

SH71: The Five Hazardous Attitudes

SH70: Mentoring: Both sides of the story

SH69: Leadership in a Short Term Team

SH 68: Scientific Diving: Trust and Communication in the depths

SH67: Diving Liability Insurance: Enabler or Barrier to Diving Safety?

SH66: The Value of Loops for Learning: Don't Just Fix the Diver /Instructor

SH65: Building a Short Term Team

SH64: Price vs Quality: The Efficiency-Thoroughness Trade Off

SH63: Unlocking the Secrets of Safer Diving: A Guide to Learning Reviews in Diving

SH62: Blame vs Learning

SH61: Racing through courses- how fast is too fast?

SH60: Facing One's Own Shadow

SH59: Drift vs Advancement: How do we push limits safely?

SH58: Changing the way we think about training

SH57: My Attitude Impacts Your Behaviour...

SH56: Navigating the Authority Gradient #2

SH55: Navigating the Authority Gradient #1

SH54: Brrrr- Cold water and the effects on our brain

SH53: Hot, hot, hot- Challenges of diving in the heat

SH52: Change is difficult- consider the opposite

SH51: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly- learning from achievements, challenges and mistakes

SH50: Learning from stories isn't easy...here's why

SH49: Unleashing Your Sixth Sense: Building capacity and directing attention

SH48: Lost in Translation: Unravelling Misunderstandings, Assumptions and Communication breakdowns

SH47: They should have lined in. I would have done that.

SH46: You need more than mistakes to learn

SH45: It’s obvious why it happened!! (In hindsight)

SH44: Near-misses: Were you lucky or were you good?

SH43: Please sir, my brain is full...We're not stupid

SH42: Would you do the same thing again?

SH41: Assumptions: A paradox

SH40: Watch what you say

SH39: Risk Management in Diving: Using Best Practice

SH38: How to Improve Diving Checklist Design and Use - Part 2

SH37: How to Build an Effective Checklist - Using Human Factors Principles

SH36: What does safe mean? How would you measure safety in diving?

SH35: Risk or Uncertainty in Diving: What’s the difference? Why it matters.

SH34: Success or Failure. Success and Failure. What do they mean?

SH33: Introducing Human Factors into Scientific Diving: first impressions

SH32: Five Key Principles to Adopt: How to Improve Individually and Organisationally

SH31: Do you trust me? Can I trust you?

SH30: DEBrIEFing Capturing the experience and improving learning

SH29: Making a deviation to end up with a better outcome

SH28: Whose job is it to create change?

SH27: Teamwork in Diving - What I Learned From a Recent Training Course

SH26: Why diving incident stories are ‘good’ and ‘bad’

SH25: Human Factors Analysis of a Maltese Diving Fatality

SH24: Don't just focus on the errors

SH23: The Four Stages of Learning

SH22: The Need for a Different Perspective

SH21: A 'Just' Culture or a 'Just Do It' Culture?

SH20: Common Sense: It doesn't exist, or if it does it isn't what you think it is

SH19: Speaking up to prevent an adverse event

SH18: What are we pretending not to know?

SH17: Human Factors. What it is. What it isn't. Why you need to knw.

SH16: How do I improve Situation Awareness?

SH15: Normalisation of Deviance

SH14: Building a Team. Part 4. Challenger Safety.

SH13: Building a Team. Part 3. Contributor Safety.

SH12: Building a Team. Part 2. Learner Safety.

SH11: Building a Team. Part 1. Inclusion Safety.

SH010: HF for Dummies. Part 10. Human Error. Psychological Safety

SH09: HF for Dummies. Part 9. Performance Shaping Factors.

SH08: HF for Dummies. Part 8. Leadership.

SH07: HF for Dummies. Part 7. Teamwork.

SH06: HF for Dummies. Part 6. Communication.

SH05: HF for Dummies. Part 5. Decision Making.

SH02: HF for Dummies. Part 2. Human Error.

SH03: HF for Dummies. Part 3. Just Culture.

SH01: HF for Dummies. Part 1. Human Factors.

SH04: HF for Dummies. Part 4. Situation Awareness.