NAUI Tek Conference 2000
copyright© 2000 Joe Cocozza


Hemingway, alternative life styles and Margaritaville: Key West Florida. A location known for the eclectic co-existence of divergent communities. Amidst the cyan waters and the nightclubs, Key West is also home to the US Army’s Special Forces Underwater Operations School.

For four days in October, the Special Forces Underwater Operations School (see sidebar) hosted the NAUI Tech Diving Conference 2000. For the first time military, scientific, commercial and technical divers came together to exchange information and techniques.

Traditionally, these divergent sectors of the diving industry did not communicate well with each other. In the past, the scientific and military diving was skeptical of technical diving. Even within the technical diving community there has been a schism between cave and wreck divers. However, in this new millennium, the key to staying current is the convergence of new technology and information.

During the first phase of the conference we used the Special Force’s training facilities to conduct practical workshops in decompression techniques, trimix/heliox and closed circuit rebreathers. For the second phase, all conference attendees came together in the base conference room for seminars that where given by a virtual who’s who in military, scientific and technical diving. The room was full of scuba legends, cave explorers, top military divers and PhDs on the cutting edge of hyper-baric science. It was quite humbling to be in the presence of so much diving nobility.

Speakers included: Navy Captain, Maria Knafel MD. She is the Chief Medical Officer of Naval Experimental Dive Unit NEDU. Also, from representing the Navy was Commander Ed Long and Professor ML Nuckuls from Naval Systems Research.

Deep cave explorers George Irvine and Jarrod Jablonski gave of multi-media presentation covering exploration logistics. The multi-media presentation included the newly discovered Wakulla P-Tunnel and GUE expedition the site of the Britannic (the world's largest shipwreck)
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Cave diving veterans and world record holders Jim Bowden and Ann Kristovich discussed there deep cave explorations in Central America and how they conducted survey, and mapping at sites such as Zacaton, the location of the world's deepest known water filled pit (1080 ffw) Ann Kristovich is also a MD spoke about remote site management of Decompression Illness.

The discussion of what’s new in the field of decompression theory was fascinating. Dr. Bruce Wienke, Ph.D. from Los Alamos National Laboratory, gave an in-depth discussion on Phase vs. Dissolved Gas Models and Helium vs. Nitrogen Decompression strategies. As a scientist he is very excited about what technical diving decompression data has provided him with a rich data source for his research..

Dr Wienke is revolutionizing decompression theory with the Reduced Gradient Bubble Model. This model takes into account the presence of "micronuclei" (gas-phase bubbles in blood and tissues) and what factors cause these bubbles to grow or shrink during decompression. Initial decompression stops are much deeper than those suggested by neo-Haldanian decompression models. Though much of talk was scientific in nature, it was extremely helpful for the technical diver who wishes to better understand what is really happening inside his/her body as he/she breathes mixed gases at depth.

There was a lot of cross pollination of ideas that occurred as speakers and attendees, mingled in-between the presentations. Peter Ready (President of Steam Machines and designer of the Prizm Topaz rebreather) told me how the US Government and the US Navy in particular have a high regard for what the technical dive community is doing. The Navy, recently approved the purchase of an off-the shelf Prizm Topaz, rebreather. This represent a shift, the Navy is now able to purchase state of the art, off-the-shelf technology, at a fraction of what it would cost to develop this equipment from scratch.

The Navy’s respect for technical diving extends to the area of dive training . The Navy has now authorized military divers to train with technical instructors. For example, the Navy had a revised the mission statement for its Explosive Ordnance Disposal divers.

Navy EOD divers, typically use the Mark 16 rebreather. The mission PO2 set point was to be changed from .7 ATA to higher level of 1.3 ATA. This was facilitate deeper dives with shorter decompression time. The new mission requirement would have EOD divers working depths up to 300 fsw, without direct surface support. The EOD divers would then have to do a drifting decompression and get picked up on the surface maybe a dozen miles from the entry point.
To quote Cmdr Ed Long of the NEDU. “ (Whereas) Tek diving is done routinely below 200, diving below 200 fsw on scuba is new territory for the USN. The Navy does not want to reinvent the wheel. It is the Navy’s intention to take advantage of lessons learned, techniques and tactics already developed by the civilian technical diving community.

The exchange of data is a win-win for everybody and it can save lives. Dr Hamilton the pioneering hyperbaric scientist who has developed and decompression and operating procedures for NOAA, NASA and commercial diving . In the late 1980s he became interested in what the technical diving community was doing. . His custom decompression tables have strongly influenced the development of technical diving.

At that time, technical was in its embryonic and experimenting stage. Dr. Hamilton saw accident rates grow, most fatalities where due to breathing the wrong deco gas. Unfortunately, the early days of technical diving could have learned much from history of commercial diving. In the early 1970’s, Commercial North Sea Divers experienced similar wrong breathing gas fatalities. If in the early days of technical diving there was a conference like NAUI Tek Conference, the tek diver community may have learned some these life saving lessons from the commercial divers.

Today technical diving is maturing as training standards and protocols are based on sound science. Now as we enter the 21 century, the various diving communities seem to be converging. This convergence promises an exponential benefit for all forms of diving, whether it be miniature rebreathers for Caribbean diving or high tek gear for exploring the final frontier of inner space.

One the speakers, was Terrance Tysal. Terrance the president of the the Cambrian Institute. He is an example of the new breed of diver. He is former Navy Diver who currently teaches technical diving to both the US Government and civilian communities. He founded the Cambrian Institute which conducts serious archeological and geological diving. Terrance believes that diving technically has so much father to go, that we are just at the beginning of a revolution in equipment and techniques.
Terrence made an impassioned plea for all of us in the diving community “get along”. We need to work together for the common good of diving.

Personally I think that all the new technology and techniques are great, However, what I see as the most important thing is that now divers from various groups are developing a mutual respect for what each other is doing. The diving community is like Key West, eclectic, sometimes contradictory but we all can do our own thing and still come together as a unified group.