Reasons For Diving
See also: Recreational diving and Professional divingDiving may be done for a number of reasons, both personal and professional.
Recreational diving, is purely for enjoyment and has a number of distinct technical disciplines to increase interest underwater, such as cave diving, wreck diving, ice diving and deep diving.
Divers may be employed professionally to perform tasks underwater.
Commercial divers are employed to perform tasks related to industries involving underwater work, including civil engineering tasks such as in oil exploration, offshore construction dam maintenance and harbour works. Commercial divers may also be employed to perform tasks specifically related to marine activities, such as naval diving, including the repair and inspection of boats and ships, salvage of wrecks or aquaculture.
There are a fair number of divers who work, full or part time, in the recreational diving community as instructors, assistant instructors, divemasters and dive guides. In some jurisdictions the professional nature, with particular reference to responsibility for health and safety of the clients, of recreational diver instruction, dive leadership for reward and dive guiding is recognised by national legislation.
Other specialist areas of diving include military diving, with a long history of military frogmen in various roles. They can perform roles including direct combat, infiltration behind enemy lines, placing mines, bomb disposal or engineering operations.
In civilian operations, many police forces operate police diving teams to perform search and recovery or search and rescue operations and to assist with the detection of crime which may involve bodies of water. In some cases diver rescue teams may also be part of a fire department, paramedical service or lifeguard unit, and may be classed as public safety diving.
Lastly, there are professional divers involved with the water itself, such as underwater photography or underwater film makers, who set out to document the underwater world, or scientific diving, including marine biology, geology, hydrology, oceanography and underwater archaeology.
The choice between scuba and surface supplied diving equipment is based on both legal and logistical constraints. Where the diver requires mobility and a large range of movement, scuba is usually the choice if safety and legal constraints allow. Higher risk work, particularly commercial diving, may be restricted to surface supplied equipment by legislation and codes of practice.
Reasons for diving may include:
| Diving activities | Classification | Scuba or Surface Supplied Diving Equipment |
|---|---|---|
| aquarium maintenance in large public aquariums | commercial, scientific | Scuba, SSDE |
| boat and ship inspection, cleaning and maintenance | commercial, naval | SSDE, occasionally scuba |
| cave diving | technical, recreational, scientific | Scuba, occasionally SSDE |
| civil engineering in harbors, water supply, and drainage systems | commercial | Almost exclusively SSDE |
| crude oil industry and other offshore construction and maintenance | commercial | Almost exclusively SSDE |
| demolition and salvage of ship wrecks | commercial, naval | SSDE, sometimes scuba |
| professional diver training | professional | SSDE or scuba as appropriate |
| recreational diver training | professional, recreational | Scuba |
| fish farm maintenance | commercial | Scuba, SSDE |
| fishing, e.g. for abalones, crabs, lobsters, pearls, scallops, sea crayfish, sponges | commercial | Scuba, SSDE |
| frogman, manned torpedo | military | Scuba |
| harbor clearance and maintenance | commercial, military | Almost exclusively SSDE |
| media diving: making television programs, etc. | professional | Scuba, occasionally SSDE |
| mine clearance and bomb disposal, disposing of unexploded ordnance | military, naval | Scuba, occasionally SSDE |
| pleasure, leisure, sport | recreational | Almost exclusively scuba |
| policing/security: diving to investigate or arrest unauthorized divers | police diving, military, naval | Scuba |
| search and recovery diving | commercial, public safety, police diving | Scuba, SSDE |
| search and rescue diving | police, naval, public service | Scuba, occasionally SSDE |
| spear fishing | professional (occasionally), recreational | Scuba |
| stealthy infiltration | military | Scuba |
| surveys and mapping | scientific, recreational | Scuba, SSDE |
| scientific diving (marine biology, oceanography, hydrology, geology, palaeontology, diving physiology and medicine) | scientific | Scuba, occasionally SSDE |
| underwater archaeology (shipwrecks; harbors, and buildings) | scientific, recreational | Scuba, SSDE |
| underwater inspections and surveys | commercial, military | SSDE, sometimes scuba |
| underwater photography | professional, recreational | Scuba, SSDE |
| underwater tour guiding | professional, recreational | Scuba |
| underwater tourism | recreational | Scuba, occasionally Snuba |
| underwater welding | commercial | Almost exclusively SSDE |
Read more about this topic: Underwater Diving
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