Just how deep can divers go — and to what end?

When I became a dive instructor in 1998 I became interested in the human physiology of diving — what pressure does to the body, specifically. It’s an enormous field of study in the diving community although most divers pay little attention to it. 

I was living in southern California at the time, working for the Professional Association of Diving Instructors (PADI) and discovered I could become a Diver Medical Technician at the Catalina Island Chamber. A buddy and I studied at a local community college and became EMTs and then took a week-long course with Karl Huggins to earn that diving certification. 

The Emergency Diving Accident Management course was centered around treating injured divers (think “the bends”) in a hyperbaric chamber. One thing that really opened my eyes, though was doing a dive in the Catalina chamber to 160 feet for the experience of it. I made a second dive to 160 in the process of treating a patient, but that’s a story for another time. 

Not long after that, I was offered the opportunity to work for Divers Alert Network (DAN). I ultimately became the training director for the organization and developed or updated a number of the first aid programs available specifically for divers that are still in use today. For me it felt like going back to school. 

There are a number of reasons for this, but the one relevant to today is the president of DAN at the time was Dr. Peter Bennett. One of his many accomplishments over the years was the Atlantis Deep Diving trials in the hyperbaric facility at Duke University. In 1981 he took three men to 2250 feet (equivalent pressure) inside a small chamber referred to as Golf ball  —  it was the G chamber and was ball shaped.

It was barely big enough for the three men. They were compressed to depth in just a couple days, and spent four and a half days at depth but then the decompression protocols took them a month to return to the surface without injury — a total of 40 days inside the chamber and a second one at shallower depths. I recall stories that the air inside the chamber was so thick from the pressure, they couldn’t eat anything too solid. They choked on steak that was locked into them because they had to chew for too long. 

It was ultimately successful and led to the development of what we now know of as TriMix and early protocols for deep and saturation diving. The commercial diving industry used these, and developed more, for divers to go to deeper depths to build and maintain oil rigs and other structures. 

Which finally brings me to my point. A few years ago, Fabien Cousteau lived in an undersea habitat for about a month. His grandfather Jacques was an innovator in this 50 years before.

That effort sparked an idea and I wrote a short story about someone doing the exact same thing — but in reality being a grifter and conman. Check out Life Under the Sea. 

More recently Joe Dituri stayed inside the Jules Verne Habitat in the Florida Keys for 90 days. Both efforts took significant topside support to send down food, fresh water and other supplies. The Jules Undersea Lodge is in about 20 feet of water reducing worries of decompression when it was finally time for Joe to return to the surface. 

Just this week another group, called DEEP, announced plans to set up a permanent habitat. This from Oceangraphic Magazine. 

“DEEP, an ocean technology and exploration company whose purpose is to 'Make Humans Aquatic’, will today announce its ambition for a permanent human presence under the oceans from 2027 by installing sub-sea stations that enable researchers to operate continuously down to 200 metres.”

The release does say, at first, they will limit operations to 28 days, but allowing work up to 200 meters. That’s more than 600 feet down. For comparison, the recreational diving limit is 130 feet.  

“The Sentinel underwater habitat will be complemented by a revolutionary range of submersibles, dive and scientific research equipment to cover the full range of ocean depths. All of this will be backed up by technical, human performance and operational training and qualification programmes through the DEEP Institute to enable scientists to live and work at depth, as well as a unique underwater R&D test and operations facility, the DEEP Campus.”

These are pretty eye-popping plans —  if nothing else for the costs that will be incurred to get it all set up. Another challenge is they plan to operate in the ocean near Wales. That’s relatively cool water, adding another layer of complexity to they operation. 

It will be fascinating to watch how all of this develops. I’m sure there will be set backs and problems. In recent years, deep exploration has been handled by Remotely Operated Vehicles, removing the need to decompress humans after trips to extreme depths. We’ll see how this works out. 

I’m keeping this Substack free for now, but if you’d like to support it anyway, buy me a cup of Kofi.