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
A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE There have been numerous articles written on the subjects of inert gas narcosis and attendant depth limitations. Many have re-hashed old formulas relating the preposterous “Martini’s Law” etc. and sanctimonious admonitions against any sport diving below 130 fsw. The authors of these materials are motivated by the best of intentions: diving safety. … Read more
My mother always insisted that we children waited an hour before swimming after eating in case we got the cramp. As a diver, I often ate a hearty meal immediately before diving without, I believed, ill effect. Cramp, though uncomfortable, doesn’t cause a diver to drown. During my long career as a diving journalist, I … 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
