EQUIPMENT



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    SCUBA diving requires a lot of equipment, but it is necessary to keep divers safe underwater.

    MASK- Protects your eyes from the water and allows you to see. The air pocket that the mask creates needs to be equalized as the diver descends due to the increase in pressure that is decreasing the volume of the air. To do that you just blow a little air from your nose into the mask

    SCUBA TANK- The SCUBA tank is what holds the air you breathe when you are underwater. As mentioned earlier, Boyle's law says that gases can be compressed when subjected to pressure, which allows the small tank to hold enough air  to last the duration of your dive. Because the air is pressurized, there needs to be a way to regulate it back to something we can breathe. This is called a regulator.

    REGULATOR- The regulator converts the the high pressure air in the cylinder to a lower pressure that you can breathe. There are two parts to a regulator, the first stage, which is attached to the SCUBA tank and converts the pressure, and the second stage which is the part you breathe out of.

    BCD (Also called BC for Buoyancy Compensator)- The BCD alloys you to control your buoyancy underwater, which as said previously, is very important. You can use air from your tank to inflate your BCD if you are over weighted or sinking. Most BCD's today have pockets where you can put your weight, and if not, you put weight on a weight belt. Many people don't sink very far when SCUBA diving, so lead weights are added to make them more negatively buoyant.

    FINS- Fins make you move more efficiently through the water, they increase the surface area of your feet, giving you more of a push through the water.

    EXPOSURE SUIT- Dependent on the climate you are diving in, you could either wear a wetsuit or a dry suit. A wetsuit is for warmer climates where you only need a little insulation. Wetsuits are made out of neoprene which is very buoyant, so they make you more buoyant as well. Drysuits are for colder climates, and they create a pocket of air between you and the water. Your drysuit sort of acts as a secondary BCD in that you can inflate it and deflate it and adjust your buoyancy. With drysuits you also need to be aware of squeezes as you descend and increase the surrounding pressure. Just like with a mask, you just add a little air into the drysuit to increase the volume of the air, and the squeeze will go away.