Scuba Training

Recreational Diving Spots Popular activities in scuba diving include wreck diving and reef diving. There are numerous dive spots throughout the world, including the U.S. Atlantic coast, California, Mexico, the Caribbean Islands, Hawaii, Australia and the Mediterranean Sea.

To train for scuba diving, you should be in reasonably good physical condition. It would not hurt to have a medical check up and discussion with your physician prior to training. The first step is to take an open water certification course (PADI or NAUI). For this course, you must be at least 10 years old. The course addresses:

• Orientation - receive a basic introduction to the sport
• Academic training - learn about diving physiology and hazards, scuba equipment, safety, use of dive tables, planning and emergency procedures
• Skill training in confined environment - practice diving skills in a pool or other confined body of water
  • clear a mask that's filled with water
  • recover a regulator after it has come out of your mouth
  • put on and take off equipment in the water
  • perform neutral-buoyancy techniques
  • establish proper weighting
  • do a controlled emergency ascent
  • breathe from a buddy's air supply
• Open-water skills - demonstrate the same skills in an open-water environment (river, quarry, lake, ocean)

  You will make at least four open-water dives as part of your open-water training.

You need your open-water certification card to rent dive equipment. Although you do not need to renew your certification, refresher courses are advised for certified divers who have not gone diving in a long time.

After open-water certification, you may decide to pursue further dive training at several levels:

• Amateur levels
  • advanced training
  • rescue diving
• Professional ratings
  • master training
  • dive master
  • instructor
  • master scuba trainer

See PADI Recreational Programs for details. Regardless of your level of training, scuba diving is an exciting sport that lets you explore unknown environments and interact with your surroundings in a whole new way.