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Category: Tech Diving

Questions Cave and Tech Divers Get Asked

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 6th February 2023

Editor’s note: Among other Zen practices, Steve is an ardent disciple of the metric system. For those of you who aren’t, try an online surface gas consumption calculator such as www.divebuddy.com/calculator/sac.aspx Q: Sandra, Open Water Diver In your book Six Skills, what made you mention the importance of breathing? How is that a special …

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Staying Calm Can Be Tricky

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 17th September 2022

By Steve Lewis (Originally published in Fall 2022 issue). Participate in DIVER’s survey here. When it comes to the nuts and bolts of making it through to the safe and comfortable side of an emergency, scuba diving is way different to most other outdoor adventures. It’s not like back-country …

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Openwater: Sidemount vs Backmount

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 25th August 2022

Words and Photography by Drew McArthur Over the last ten years or so, diving sidemount has become all the rage. After decades of lurking in the depths of cave systems around the globe, it’s almost like one day it crept out of its hole and became seduced by fame …

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Can you benefit from a drysuit cert card…?

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 20th May 2022

Words by Steve Lewis I can’t recall what the original meeting was about. Probably something to do with training schedules or core standards or perhaps what flavour wings we’d order later that evening at ‘beer night’, but I do recall the head of the agency running up the stairs, swinging …

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Is Scuba First Aid Really Good Enough?

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 6th May 2022

Words by Steve Lewis What a strange year 1994 was; not as famous as 1984 perhaps, and certainly not even close to the strangeness of 2020, but memorable in its own sweet way.  The movie Forrest Gump was released in 1994 and—at the other end of the interest spectrum—it was …

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Decompression Illness and Denial – Part 2

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 29th September 2021

Demystifying Dive Computers Words and Photography by Jill Heinerth In my previous article I looked into incident reports that fell outside of the data gathered by organizations such as DAN. In this article, I’m going to dive into the physiology of decompression, gradient factors, and conservatism strategies. When you …

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How about the Rule of Scrooge & Buddha?

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 20th July 2021

By Steve Lewis I can’t recall which Charles Dickens character I am misquoting—I believe it is Ebenezer Scrooge from the novella A Christmas Carol — but the gist is this: “Income one pound; expenses 19 shillings and 11 pence; outcome bliss. Income one pound; expenses one pound and one penny; outcome misery.” Which …

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Learning from Failure: Strength from Weakness

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 9th June 2021

By Steve Lewis Nobody likes to screw up. None of us start marching along a pathway to a personal goal with the intention of losing our way and falling short—failing. Failing has the potential to ruin your day, or, at the other end of the spectrum of possible consequences, …

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Sidemount: Keeping diving accessible for seniors

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 25th May 2020

Aging divers and divers with physical limitations could find freedom within their gear configuration… Words by: W. H. “Hank” Halliday Recent issues of DIVER have featured sidemount diving: one focused on the need to practice skills and the other related to cave diving. I suggest a third, covering a …

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Situational Awareness

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 16th April 2020

By Steve Lewis A few years back I wrote a book called “The Six Skills…” One of the skills mentioned in it was Situational Awareness. At the time, Situational Awareness (SA) seemed like a neat catch-all phrase, and it still sounds good as far as it goes. I wanted …

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Is warm water better for tech training?

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 10th April 2020

Words By Steve Lewis Even if you’re a cold-water diver, there’s a strong case to be made for doing your next advanced diver training in warm water (read tropical or sub-tropical temperatures). Let me explain. When we think about what we expect to get out of technical diving classes, …

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Ask the Right Questions

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 3rd January 2020

By Steve Lewis Choosing an instructor? Well, there are scores of blog entries and posts on various scuba forums giving advice.  Much of it is good; some of it is excellent. It can certainly help put you on the road to making a good choice, the right choice. Of …

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Primary Sidemount Skills

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 1st November 2019

By Steve Lewis If you have aspirations of moving your scuba diving into the world of sidemount diving this article might interest you. If you are a bona fide sidemount diver and especially if you’re going a little deeper, planning exposure that require staged decompression, use exotic breathing gases …

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Tech History: You’ve Come A Long Way Baby

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 31st October 2019

By Michael Menduno Depending on how you count it, technical diving quietly turned 30 years old last Fall, marked by the anniversary of Dr. Bill Stone’s Wakulla Springs Project 1987. What was once considered the radical fringe has taken its rightful place as the vanguard of sport diving. Today, …

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Rebreathers… according to Steve Lewis

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 22nd January 2019

By Steve Lewis So, you’re looking at taking the big step into rebreathers, are you? Let’s chat. It’s okay, your secrets are safe with me. I’ll admit it, I have owned a few rebreathers myself. At last count, there have been twelve. But no worries, I am getting better, …

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How Rebreathers Work

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 24th November 2018

  By Dr. David Sawatzky Rebreathers are becoming ever more common in the diving community, and in diving fatality records.  I wanted to write a column on rebreather fatalities but immediately realized that it would make no sense to most divers unless they had a good, basic understanding of …

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Tech Diving: Rebreathers…

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 6th November 2018

By Steve Lewis So, you’re looking at taking the big step into rebreathers, are you? Let’s chat. It’s okay, your secrets are safe with me. I’ll admit it, I have owned a few rebreathers myself. At last count, there have been twelve. But no worries, I am getting better, …

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Protect Your Noggin’ – Things to consider when gearing up with a dive helmet

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 6th October 2016

Text and Illustrations By Jill Heinerth I have never figured out why so few North American technical divers wear helmets. Perhaps helmets never reached the Pantheon of hip here? Divers in other parts of the world would never consider exposing their scalps to the ceiling of a cave or wreck …

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The Cave That Changed The Game In Russia

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 17th September 2014

In Orda of priority it’s No.1 Text by Bogdana Vashchenko / Photography by Victor Lyagushkin  – The Orda cave revolutionized cave diving in Russia. In every respect it’s a ‘dream’ compared to other sumps in the Russian Federation, and it also claims some bragging rights on the world stage. Extending more …

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EXCLUSIVE – Edge Hog Gear Sidemount BC revealed!

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 28th May 2014

Announced a week ago at the TekDive USA show in Miami, the new Edge / Hog Gear sidemount system created a wee bit of interest to say the least. Little is officially known at this point, but that hasn’t stopped people getting excited at the prospect of a new, …

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CHUUK: Adventure on the Thorfinn

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 9th April 2014

Our antipodean friends at Sport Diving magazine have just released this rather good five minute film about Chuuk Lagoon. Filmed nearly 70 years after Operation Hailstone laid waste to the Japanese fleet, it features a local captain’s historical retelling. CHUUK: Adventure on the Thorfinn from Sportdiving Magazine on Vimeo. …

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Dive Tables and Decompression Models

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 15th November 2013

Dive industry pro Bret Gilliam offers the historical perspective The first research work in decompression physiology was not directed at scuba divers. Records from 1841 show that construction workers working at elevated pressures in either caissons (water-tight boxes inside which workers did construction underwater) or construction tunnels beneath rivers …

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Civil Disobedience Wreck Diving

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 21st October 2013

More than a decade ago a group of technical divers made a series of ‘unofficial’ deep dives on the heritage wrecks of Hamilton and Scourge in Lake Ontario. This is their story Text by Scott Stitt   It feels like we’ve been dropping forever. Descending through 150 feet (46m), …

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Dead set on the Dead Sea

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 8th July 2013

For the diver who’s done it all, this place is one for the logbook Text by Michel Braunstein Photography by Michel Braunstein & Jacki Soikis    I’ve had the good fortune to dive in many parts of the world. It’s the variety of experiences I’ve enjoyed that keeps my eye …

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Sidemount: For open water divers too!

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 11th November 2012

  By Jill Heinerth Once a technique exclusive to elite cave explorers, sidemount diving today is trending in the ranks of recreational divers. Versatile and comfortable, the rig merges a specially designed wing with a harness and thanks to companies such as Hollis, Dive Rite and Golem Gear, they’re …

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Under Stress

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 11th November 2012

  Some divers handle it better than others, but underwater we all deal with it for better or worse Text by Bret Gilliam The following continues a discussion on diving and stress that appears in the current issue of DIVER Magazine, Volume 37 Number 8, now available on newsstands. …

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Light and Motion Sola 800 review

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 1st August 2012

It can be hard to get excited about a light. They are after all, just things that make dark places a little brighter. For some, a dive light is not always an essential piece of gear. For cold water divers, wreck or night divers, they are as essential as …

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PADI on rebreathers: Are they safe for recreational divers? Pt1

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 18th May 2012

The world’s largest dive training agency thinks they are, and they’ve developed courses for the rec and tec diver alike. Here, the agency’s Vice President of Rebreather Technologies, Mark Caney, weighs in on PADI’s new direction, the rise of a new ‘Type-R’ recreational rebreather, and the voice of opposition. …

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PADI on rebreathers: Are they safe for recreational divers? PT2

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 30th April 2012

The Professional Association of Diving Instructors (PADI), the world’s largest scuba training agency, has expanded its course offerings in recent months to include recreational rebreather instruction. What follows is the continuation of an interview with Mark Caney, PADI’s Vice President of Rebreather Technologies, published in the current issue of …

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Marketing Rebreathers

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 31st October 2011

Jarrod Jablonski talks with Michael Menduno   Credit Where Credit Is Due In my interview with explorer Jarrod Jablonski in DIVER Vol. 37 Number 1, I incorrectly stated that Jablonski and his team from Global Underwater Explorers were the first to video the USS Atlanta in 430 feet (130m) …

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Helium RI$ING?

  • DIVER Editorial
  • 7th July 2011

Reserves are going down, which may mean prices go up? And how might that affect the future of mixed gas technical diving? The answer is up in the air. Text by Jeremy Heywood and Lee Newman   The future of mixed gas technical diving may be uncertain due to …

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