Learn To Dive – Online!
With SSI Online Learning – Learning to scuba dive has never been easier! Whether you prefer to study at home or would like to save your vacation time for DIVING - you can now complete the academic portions of the Open Water course online with SSI Online Learning for FREE. Right now! Start your adventure today with the Open Water Diver course online and SSI Online Learning!
The Open Water Diver course is by far, the world’s most popular SCUBA diving certification course. Millions of people have started diving as certified Open Water Divers. Learning to scuba dive requires both knowledge development (facts, principles, concepts) and Physical training (skills, techniques, methods). The SSI Online Open Water Diver Course via provides the knowledge development portion you need. You develop the remaining skills by actually diving with an SSI Instructor. The Online Learning is FREE.
It’s Easy! Simply Login – then SSI’s Online Learning system presents you with interactive presentations that include videos, audio, graphics and reading. As you progress you can pause, and take some time off – or speed through. Short reviews let you gauge your progress – allowing you the opportunity to go back and correct anything you might happen to miss. This lets you move through the program efficiently and at your pace. At no cost to you!
SSI Online SCUBA Dive training is designed to be easy, straight forward and always fits YOUR schedule. Access the Online Learning center anywhere you have an Internet connection. Feeling stressed? Don’t be – complete the Online Learning entirely on your own schedule. eLearing will keep track of your progress, and you can begin again where you left-off last time.
The FREE Online SCUBA training system has many features…
- Interactive Multimedia content – pictures, video and presentations
- Links to more-detailed explanations of relevant information
- Instant feedback on quizzes and tests – correct as you go!
- An online dive buddy to talk you through the training
- Access to background information
- Links to equipment knowledge and understanding
Why not start your FREE online dive training course today!
Similan Scuba Diving Dive sites: Koh Bon
Koh Bon
Located just between Mu Koh Similan National Park and Mu Koh Surin National Park, Bon is a small island that features underwater sharp rock walls. Technically it is part of the Similan Islands National Park – but it is geologically separate.
The Wall on the inside of Koh Bon Bon is covered with soft corals that are shorter in size but more colorful than normal, which is their uniqueness at this site. Great place for seeing small critters.
Turn around and look into the deep and look for Manta Rays and Whale Sharks. They can Occasionally be found here at around 25 to 30 meters deep.
Always choose a dive center that has staff speaking your language, have insurance and are certified.
Breath holding and diving animals
Nature has shaped through evolution they way animals behave. This means that some animals have adapted to feed in places where the rest of the animal kingdom living around them cannot go. This naturally then eliminates a large part of the competition from the food chain.
The Similan Islands have whales, dolphins, turtles, birds and many other non-aquatic species that dive under water
So how are they able hold their breath for so many minutes without losing consciousness or dying? First, let’s revise some other physiological principles in order to understand more clearly what is happening.
Oxygen (O2) and CO2 are carried around the body by the blood in two different ways. One is simply the fact that both O2 and CO2 can dissolve in the blood. This will account for a small fraction of the whole transportation process. The other method uses the haemoglobin, a protein present inside red blood cells. Both O2 and CO2 molecules have the ability to attach themselves to the haemoglobin, but the carbon dioxide has a much greater affinity to do this. Therefore, whilst haemoglobin can carry up to four molecules of O2 it carries a much larger amount of carbon dioxide, normally about 23 percent is transported in the blood. However. The main point is that in most animals the O2 reserve is solely in the lungs and the blood. Once this reserve is depleted, the animals will need to breathe again to exhale CO2 and inhale new O2.
Breath holding diving animals have the advantage of an additional mechanism which, relies on another very similar protein called myoglobin. This protein is located inside muscle cells. In humans it makes up for only a very small percentage of the muscle mass. This percentage changes drastically in the animals with the need to hold their breath and it goes up to 45% of the muscle mass in sperm whales, animals that can hold their breath for up to two hours.
How does it work? Simply the blood will carry O2 to the tissues and the extra oxygen that is not used “immediately” will be stored in the myoglobin more or less in the same way as in the haemoglobin. Once the animal is under water and can no longer breath, the O2 stock of the blood will become depleted, the myoglobin will then release its O2 in to the blood that will carry it around where it is needed. At the same time the myoglobin will “catch” the excess CO2 in the blood restoring to a level that does not trigger the need to breath. When eventually the animal returns to the surface to breath air, the myoglobin releases all of its stored CO2 and replaces it with fresh O2. The amount of myoglobin present in the animal muscles will determine the maximum time the animal can spend underwater.
The more the animal wants to stay under water, the longer the period it has to stay at the surface for the gas exchanges to take place. A dolphin needs to breathe a few times (about two to four minutes) to stay submerged 20 to 30 minutes. A sperm whale will breathe 4 or 5 times per minute for up to 15 minutes at the surface to stay two hours under water. Sea birds normally dive for 3 to 10 minutes according to the species they belong to and need to breathe for about 2 to 3 minutes before diving.
