Diving into the History of Scuba Diving (and its Future!)
Written by Urve Patel, 3 March 2023.
The history of scuba diving goes back many centuries, long before Jacques Cousteau and Émile Gagnan invented and popularised the use of the demand regulator and open-circuit scuba technology. In ancient Greece and Rome, people used to swim and dive while holding their breaths (i.e., freediving) or by using hollowed out plant stems as snorkels. The latter was commonly practiced in warfare or while gathering food, sponges, and pearls from the ocean. When freediving, divers would go deep as 130 feet (40 meters) with the aid of any air or equipment. And even today, many people all over the world still engage in this risky yet spectacular activity. You could say that freediving is based on a preconditioned and subconscious reflex in human being – for the first nine months of our lives, we exist in an aquatic environment and as infants we instinctively hold our breaths for up to 40 seconds (unfortunately, we lose this ability as we get holder).
The Greek philosopher Aristotle also recorded the first use of a ‘diving bell’ in the 4th Century – “They enable the divers to respire equally well by letting down a cauldron, for this does not fill with water, but retains the air, for it is forced straight down into the water”
It was not until the 16th Century that diving started to take leaps and bounds. People started to stretch the limit of human physical endurance by making dangerous trips beneath the water without knowledge of the properties of gases, breathing gas mixtures under variations of absolute pressure, temperature, and solubility of gases in fluids. Leather diving suits and diving helmets that delivered air via a long leather hose in the 17th century (the original concept involved using a double bellows) were developed. In the 18th Century, the self- contained breather system, consisting of a cylindrical iron ‘belt’ was invented by Englishman William James. This belt had just enough air for a seven-minute dive. Towards the end of the century, another Englishman Henry Fluess, invented a closed circuit, oxygen rebreather (Fig. 2). Unfortunately, both of these early pioneers in diving died due to their lack of knowledge of breathing gas mixture under variation of absolute pressure.As a result of these and other deaths whilst diving, scientific studies took place on decompression sickness, gas solubility, and effects of water pressure. At the same time, technological innovation was taking place with the invention of compressed air tanks, regulators, and diving suits. Harry Houdini even had a hand at developing diving suits. His invention was inspired by his fascination with escape stunts, and allowed divers to escape their wets suits quickly and safely whilst underwater.
Starting at the beginning of the 19th Century, scientific studies helped explain the effects of water pressure on the human body and defined limits for compressed air diving. Concurrently, improvement in scuba diving technology included compressed air pumps, CO2 scrubbers, and regulators allowed dives with longer bottom times.
However, it was not until the 1940’s that diving become more accessible to the public. During the winter of 1942-43, Jacques Cousteau and Émile Gagnan designed and developed the first open-circuit, Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus (SCUBA for short) known as the Aqua-Lung. The original Aqua-Lung was a single stage unit, packaged in a circular brass housing mounted on the cylinder valve (Fig. 3). This device allowed breathing on demand gas to be provided from a high-pressure storage tank carried by the diver, when the diver inhales and reduces the pressure in the supply hose. The flow is shut off when not required, and once breathed, the exhaled gas is vented to the surrounding environment. The Aqua-Lung allowed divers to dive for much longer and to go deeper than before.
Scuba Diving in the Present
The ocean covers ~70 % of the worlds surface, and ~90% of this remains unexplored. Thanks to Jacques Cousteau and Émile Gagnan, we can now explore this underwater world. As the original Aqua-Lung design has improved leaps and bounds, the underwater world that was once so dangerous can now be explored by more and more divers each year. The present basic day scuba diving equipment is shown in Fig. 4. Each of these equipment has been designed and improved over and over again to keep both recreational and professional divers safe.
Future of Scuba Diving
If you enjoy an activity like scuba diving, then it is natural to look ahead and consider what changes will take place in the near and distant future. How will technology and scientific advances affect how we train and dive in the open water? What will the equipment look like and be capable of?
Let’s take a quick glimpse into the future of scuba diving based on current trends in dive computers, training material, equipment etc:
- Open circuit scuba will likely remain the most popular form of scuba diving. However, more people will likely take up CCRs (closed-circuit rebreathers) and other technical training courses e.g., twin tank and sidemount (see our article on ‘Sidemount – the right mount?’). However, their popularity with beginners will remain relatively low due to non-standardised equipment configuration and cost of the equipment. Underwater voice communication may also likely be common in CCR since a typical CCR diver is not as price sensitive, they can handle the additional equipment complexity, and because CCR are quiet and favour voice activated transmission.
- Heads up display in scuba masks will become more common, but not until technology becomes inexpensive and compact. Such devices would allow hands-free data monitoring
- The standard scuba diving gear will become more compact, lighter, streamlined, and high-tech.
- New decompression modelling methods will alter decompression methods during recreational and technical diving.
- Diver training will become multifaceted learning – thanks to online and hybrid learning courses. Instead of theory being taught in a classroom environment, it can be completed online at your convenience (time and place). You can then visit your local dive centre to meet with scuba diving instructors, briefly review the material, before going directly to the confined water component of the course which covers diving planning, preparation, and skills.
Fingers crossed for these future gadgets!
Technological advances in diving equipment have made a giant stride in the last 10 to 15 years. So why not dream about certain features and gadgets becoming a reality in the future!:
- More advanced dive computers with features such as underwater GPS with 3D dive site maps for popular locations. This is currently in its infancy and a truly functioning underwater GPS system may take time to appear at your nearest dive shop. However, there are companies like Aqwary that are working on communicating through ultrasonic, subaquatic networks. So maybe, soon?
- ORB rebreather helmets. Based on a new material recently synthesised by scientists that allows O2 to be absorbed out of seawater, a small amount taken on dives could provide enough breathable air underwater. If the material was incorporated into a helmet, we may be able to ditch our cylinders in favour of the ORB helmet for all our breathing needs. The ORB helmet is a closed-circuit rebreather which covers the entire head of a diver (Fig. 5).
Scuba diving has come a long way since it evolved from using reed stems and cauldrons in ancient Greece and Rome. Yet, it is still one of the most adventurous and exciting recreational activity of all time. So if you are keen on taking the leap into the ocean, make sure you hit us up for your PADI Open Water course. In this course, you will learn about all the basics of Scuba Diving and you’ll be trained on how to be a competent scuba diver!