Section

Diving

Scuba, freediving and the people who go under: safety, training, incidents and the water itself.

Page 2

Diving

In a Current You Are Not Swimming Anywhere, and the Skill Is Knowing That Early

Drift diving turns a dive from a route into a ride. The techniques that make it safe are mostly about the surface and the boat, and the mistake that kills people is trying to fin against water that is stronger than they are.

Sep 5, 2026/3 min read

A diver moving beneath an enormous school of silver baitfish in open blue water

Diving

Solo Diving Is Either Reckless or Honest, Depending on What You Think a Buddy Actually Does

Two agencies now certify divers to dive alone, with redundant gas and a long list of prerequisites. The case for it rests on an uncomfortable observation about how often the buddy system already fails in practice.

Sep 5, 2026/3 min read

A single scuba diver in silhouette against bright water above, with nobody else in the frame

Diving

The SMB Is the Only Piece of Kit That Talks to the Boat, and Almost Nobody Practises With It

A delayed surface marker buoy is what turns a diver in open water from invisible into findable. It is also the item most divers buy, clip on, and deploy for the first time in the situation where they actually need it.

Sep 5, 2026/3 min read

A scuba diver preparing to deploy a delayed surface marker buoy at depth, beside the boiler of a wreck

Diving

Aluminium or Steel Decides How Much Lead You Carry, and Almost Nobody Is Told Why

The standard aluminium 80 is negatively buoyant full and positively buoyant empty, which is why safety stops go wrong at the end of a dive. Steel behaves differently, and the valve and testing rules differ too.

Sep 5, 2026/3 min read

A scuba cylinder valve in close up, showing the threaded outlet, the handwheel and the pressure rating stamped into the body

Diving

Lumens Are the Number on the Box and the Least Useful Thing About a Dive Light

Manufacturers compete on brightness because it is a single large number. Underwater, beam angle, burn time at full output and the switch you can operate in gloves decide whether a torch is any good.

Sep 5, 2026/3 min read

A diver holding a torch in green low visibility water on a wreck, the beam scattering off particles in front of them

Diving

The Sting Will Not Kill You, and the Wrong First Aid Might Still Ruin the Trip

Lionfish, stonefish, stingrays and most jellyfish deliver venoms that heat breaks down. The standard measure is immersion in fresh water as hot as you can stand without burning, capped at 45 degrees, for thirty to ninety minutes.

Sep 2, 2026/4 min read

A common lionfish, Pterois miles, hanging over coral at Shaab El Erg reef in the Egyptian Red Sea, venomous spines fanned out

Diving

Most Divers Who Cannot See Solve It the One Way an Eye Doctor Would Not

Glasses do not fit under a mask, so the default answer is contact lenses. Eighty-five per cent of cases of a rare blinding corneal infection occurred in lens wearers who swam or dived in them, and there is a better option most divers never price.

Aug 20, 2026/5 min read

A diver underwater looking through a half mask

Diving

How a Scuba Regulator Is Actually Tested, and Why Most Reviews Are Not Tests

A breathing machine pressurised to 198 feet of seawater measures the work it takes to pull air through a regulator. Almost nothing you read online involves one, and the difference is the whole review.

Aug 18, 2026/4 min read

The internals of a scuba demand valve, showing the valve lever and flow deflector

Diving

The 2026 Dive Computer Question Is Not Which Screen. It Is Whose Algorithm You Trust

Shearwater, Garmin and Suunto now sell wrist computers that look broadly alike and cost between 760 and 1,800 dollars. What separates them is the decompression model, the transmitter, and what you are really paying for.

Aug 18, 2026/4 min read

The Shearwater Peregrine TX dive computer

Diving

One Company Now Owns Aqualung, Apeks, Mares, rEvo and a Training Agency

HEAD rescued Aqualung out of receivership with a 50 million euro package. The result is a single group holding four of diving's best known equipment names and SSI, the agency that certifies divers to use them.

Aug 18, 2026/4 min read

Diving

Three Divers Drifted Off Puerto Galera and Lived. Most of Surviving That Happens Before You Get In

Two men and a woman surfaced from a dive at Canyon Reef, found no boat, and were carried kilometres out. Whether lost divers are found has surprisingly little to do with the search itself.

Aug 18, 2026/4 min read

A scuba diver at the surface in open water