There it is, the 2022 annual report. Due to several factors, the 2022 annual report is ready later than previous years. Here it is important to emphasize that the DOSA consists of volunteers who do this entirely selflessly. There have also been shifts within the board.
The analysis as it is for 2022, is based on reports from direct and indirect stakeholders. For this, then, the reports are very important. Be it a broken mask strap, a slip on the dike or a decompression accident. Our request: always report! This can be done completely anonymously. Our goal as DOSA is to make diving safer and certainly not to condemn the persons/parties involved. The latter is unfortunately something that happens a lot these days on social media which sometimes makes it difficult to form a clear and objective picture of an incident or accident.
For 2022 we see that the number of (reported) accidents is decreasing compared to past years. This would mean that assuming the same willingness to report accidents, diving is becoming safer. Of course, the figures are influenced by the corona periods, in which in 2022 the restrictions for practicing the diving sport expired. But if we are honest we suspect this is due to a drop in the number of reports in 2022.
Looking to the future, we as DOSA have set a number of goals. Increasing awareness and thus increasing the number of reports. We do this by, among other things, expanding our team of volunteers, more actively sharing experiences and cases on social media with the aim of learning and finally updating our website. This is high on our list but of course involves the necessary costs that we have to bear with our limited resources.