I have heard that I am a Technical Diver. I never asked to be one. I am not sure I can even tell you what one is.

In the beginning there were commercial and military divers and the US Navy Dive Tables were designed to help the Navy divers avoid the "bends". Then in 1933 came Jacques Cousteau a French military diver who invented a self contained underwater breathing apparatus that could be used recreationally.

Within a few years the world was introduced to Cousteau's underwater realm and recreational diving was born. At first there were only a handful of these very brave divers but soon there were hundreds and by the late 1950’s there were thousands of divers exploring the water universe. With so many entering the new found "sport" of SCUBA clearly a training and certification process was needed.

Today there are over a dozen certifying agencies in the US alone. Every one of them is in the business of training the recreational diver to dive in a variety of environments and conditions with relative safety. Until recently SCUBA was defined as a recreational sport although over the years there have been many recreational divers that have ventured to the fringe of SCUBA.

These fringe divers may have been called nuts by some or cave divers, wreck divers, deep divers and even gas divers by others. One fact though is that every one of these divers started at the same point. SCUBA 101. Some found out the hard way what is involved with the more complicated diving environments by making costly mistakes. Others obtained the proper training and experience before proceeding.

One thing is for certain as the diving approached this fringe area there became less room for error. Ego has always been a real problem in recreational SCUBA. Usually it is the diver pounding his chest saying "how deep did you go" or "how much air did you use?" that allows their ego to get in the way of common sense and safety. Divers are now bragging about the latest diving phenomenon. Technical Diving.

I have read and heard different definitions of Technical Diving. Some of these definitions involve diving deeper than the recreational limit of 130 feet, decompression diving, cave diving, wreck penetration dives, mixed gas (anything other than air) dives and hanging lots of dive gear from your person. If this is Technical Diving than I guess I am guilty as charged.

We are still recreational divers. Very few of these self proclaimed Technical Divers are diving as a profession or even on a regular basis. These divers are stretching the traditional limits but I am not sure that the average diver understands that we are still recreational divers. You see the problem lies in average and even below average divers thinking that a Technical Diver certification makes them some how better than the rest of the recreational dive community. It is sort of like the old saying "a little knowledge is dangerous".

Too many of these new self-proclaimed Technical Divers do not belong in the above mentioned technical environments. They are accidents waiting to happen. Their egos and lack of true knowledge and experience is placing them in a very dangerous and precarious position. Do not get me wrong more training and knowledge with the associated experience is good, however more and more divers are talking the talk but unable to walk the walk.

The end result is that if the accident rate starts climbing because of the Technical Divers, then the entire SCUBA industry is going suffer. I for one know my limits and do not venture far from what I have learned, trained and equipped myself for. If this makes me a Technical Diver so be it.