A few months ago I reported about the EuroTek 2010 Advanced Diving Conference. At that time I did not think I was going to attend. I was wrong.
I arrived in Birmingham (England) on October 15, 2010. The conference started on the 16th. I had never been to a EuroTek before. The last one was held here in 2008. I was just giving my first few steps in technical diving back then. Altough I have made extensive research on technical diving, rebreathers, decompression theory and many other advanced diving features actually being in EuroTek was a really great opportunity to meet famous divers and explorers in the advanced diving community.
The conference was made up of two main attractions. One was a “mini show” with booths where the manufacturers and sponsors of the conference had their products and representatives. The other, and main attraction of the conference are the numerous speakers from all over the world. EuroTek features Cave Diving, Equipment, Imaging, Physiology, Rebreathers, Safety, Technology, Wreck Diving and other general interest advanced diving topics.
Although this was my first EuroTek I did found myself familiar with the exhibitors and diving personalities in the event. I found a couple of new and innovative things I would like to report. These are mainly on my interest for rebreathers, technical diver training and my newly acquired challenge: cave diving.
EuroTek 2010 was the first time in which the KISS GEM was physically presented to the public as a product. As far as I know, on October 9, 2010 the system was first introduced to the ever demanding and never forgiving community of rebreather divers in rebreatherworld.com by Kim Smith, CEO of KISS Rebreathers. If you want to know more perspectives on this fine piece of equipment you can follow this link.
The GEM is an acronym for Gas Extender Mechanism and it is technically a semi-closed circuit rebreather with a very high gas usage ratio. According to Product Development KISS representative Mike Young, the standard version comes with a 3:1 ratio mouthpiece. In this newly presented mechanism (the KISS people don’t want to call it a SCR or rebreather) unit the trick for venting gas is not in the lung but in the mouthpiece.
Mike and I had the chance for a long talk about the unit. He told me that this GEM system will be available to divers for about $ 3.400,00 CDN (about 3.360,00 USD as of today). This system will be upgradeable first with higher ratio mouthpieces up to 10:1. It can also be upgraded to become a KISS fully closed circuit rebreather which will be lightweight, easy to use and aimed for the recreational diver.
I have been working on some “post” about rebreathers and their appliance for recreational usage. Now that I write this report I realize that this was the piece of equipment, and philosophy, that I needed to complete that long hold draft. I will publish it sometime soon.
Following the subject of recreational rebreathers there was another presentation. PADI, a major player in the recreational diving market gave a preview on their rebreather courses to be launched next year.
Mark Carney the Rebreather Technologies Director of PADI gave outlines on how the recreational en technical rebreather courses will work, who may qualify to teach and enroll and about the units accepted by PADI, their categorization of them and how these will accepted either in the recreational rebreather courses or in the Tec Rec range.
Basically, two recreational rebreather courses (rebreather diver and advanced rebreather diver) will be created. These courses have to be taught on the units PADI categorizes as recreational or “Type R”. On the Tec Rec side of things, three levels will be created. These will be Tec 40 CCR Diver, Tec 60 CCR Diver and Tec 100 CCR Diver and will be taught on technical units (Type T). Obviously the focus is in air diluent, normoxic trimix and hypoxic trimix. Mark mentioned that work is underway and that the recreational courses will be released first. Technical courses will follow and (if I understood correctly) all will be launched during 2011.
One of the diving activities that have been in my mind for a while is cave diving. I attended Martyn Farr’s presentations on Cave Diving, Phill Short’s stories about his cave diving adventures and Jill Heinerth’s presentation on her Antartic Expedition and Ice Caves. I also had the chance to personally meet Jill, exchange interesting information about ongoing projects in Latin America and get a signed copy of her book “The Essentials of Cave Diving”. I will be training in cave diving during 2011. I still have to decide my instructor and the type of rig (CCR or OC). The place will most probably be Florida.
The conference finished today. For me it ended with a lecture from Mark Powell, author of the "Award Winning" book Deco for Divers. I have to say being at EuroTek has been a great experience for me. I am very happy to have assisted the conference, to have met all these advanced diving personalities and share a bit the place to where I belong. I will definitely do my best to be here on the next Edition of EuroTek in 2012.
Jorge A. Mahauad
