Introduction to Technical Diving

This course is designed to give the open water or advanced open water diver an opportunity to improve their skills, knowledge, and equipment configuration, thereby increasing their safety and efficiency. This course is also intended to introduce divers to the discipline of technical diver training.
Graduates are considered competent to enter into a NAUI technical diver course as long as all prerequisites are met. This course gives a recreational diver the ability to increase their confidence and skills while remaining within no-decompression limits, and by utilizing streamlined and efficient equipment configurations improve their skills. Graduates will have an increased skill set awareness and responsibility. Additional goals of the course are improving non-technical skills and techniques and building diver confidence.

Get Started

Getting started is easy! Individuals ages 15+ and in good physical condition may enroll in a NAUI Intro to Tech course. Signing up for a class is easy, while wetsuits and fun await!

What’s Next?

Continue your training by enrolling in a NAUI Technical Decompression course.

COURSE DETAILS

Academic: E-learning/Classroom

Practical Application:

Open Water Dives: 4 dives

REQUIREMENTS – SKILLS

      • Applied Sciences
        • Decompression theory
        • Decompression tables
        • Maladies associated with diving and increased risks of decompression diving
        • Nitrogen narcosis
        • Thermal aspects of technical diving
        • Breathing gas calculations
        • Psychological aspects of technical diving
      • Technical Diving Equipment
        • Selecting and configuring diving equipment for staged decompression
        • NTEC
        • Equipment configurations being used and alternative configurations they may encounter
      • Decompression Procedures
        • Conducting a decompression dive
        • Oxygen breaks
        • Decompression systems
        • Methods (Drift, Line etc.)
        • Equipment
        • Safety
        • Introduction to support team operations
      • Dive Planning
        • Utilize the ODIGTML Dive Planning format or address each of the elements in the ODIGTML format
          •  Oxygen
          • Decompression
          • Inert Gas Narcosis
          • Gas Management
          • Thermal
          • Mission
          • Logistics

PRE- AND POST-DIVE SKILLS.

  • This is an introduction of the skills demonstrated in NAUI technical diver courses. Focus is to be on the diver’s proper buoyancy and trim. Propulsion techniques are introduced, including frog kick, modified flutter kick, helicopter turns, and back-downs.
      • Breathing gas analysis
      • Predive equipment inspection
      • Dive planning
      • Safely execute each dive
      • Each diver is to demonstrate:
        • Switching and isolating a malfunctioning regulator, first in confined water, and following adequate practice, in open water at a depth of 10m (33 ft.) or less.
        • Out-of-air sharing through a simulated restriction
        • Underwater navigation appropriate to the dive plan
        • Deployment of a surface marker and upline.
        • Proper buoyancy and trim throughout the dive
        • Hover without sculling for 5 minutes.
        • Introduction to single stage bottle rigging and handling
      • Each diver will participate in emergency and diver rescue simulations to include:
        • Management of a diver experiencing oxygen toxicity underwater.
        • Out-of-gas scenario.
        • Unconscious diver

PREREQUISITES

  • Age. Minimum is 15 years by the water phase of the course. (Junior certification for ages 10-14 years is allowed. See “Policies Applying to All Courses: Age, Junior Certification.”)
  • Certification/Experience/Knowledge.
    • NAUI Scuba Diver or equivalent.
    • NAUI EANx Diver or equivalent.
    • NAUI Advanced Diver or equivalent
    • Proof of at least 25 logged dives with 10 dives on EANx.
    • The instructor is to ensure adequate student knowledge and capability before any open water training and shall use skill or other evaluations to do so. One open water dive (which does not count toward the minimum number of dives required for the course) may be used as a screening and evaluation dive. This is not required when the student’s diving proficiencies are well known to the instructor.