Oxygen is the most basic life support system our bodies employ, and yet also has the capacity to cause great harm. Keller (1946) has called oxygen “The Princess of Gases. She is beautiful but has to be handled with special care”. We cannot live without it, but in prolonged breathing exposures or in deep depths … Read more
At DEMA one year, I met an elderly Frenchman based in Bonaire who exhibited paintings of all manner of wrecks that lay there. When questioned about them, it seemed that most lay well beyond one-hundred feet deep. When I asked him if he used trimix for these dives he retorted as only a Frenchman can, … Read more
The era of dive tables as the only method of calculating dive plans is one that is largely forgotten by many in the “modern” world of electronic diving computers and the plethora of algorithms and deco models that now are available. I have long been an advocate for embracing innovation and new technologies, including being … Read more
It was back in 1993 that rebreather evangalist Peter Readey first introduced me to the pleasures of rebreather diving. I was meant to do his pioneering course with Martha Holmes, a producer/presenter for the BBC, but her employer decided this diving technology was far too hazardous and after the first day she went off to … Read more
Scuba diving should be in no way competitive. If you are part of a group of divers, you want everyone to have a good time. We don’t want winners or losers. That said, the human spirit is without doubt naturally competitive and we will find ways to compete, however irrelevant. You’ll often see divers post-dive … Read more
