The Human Diver was founded in the UK by Gareth Lock, with the objective of improving global safety in diving through the application of Human Factors education and techniques. 

After many months of study and a ten day internship in the UK, Darryl Owen qualified as a Human Diver instructor in the first Human Diver Instructor Development Program.

Freestyle Divers is the first education center in the Middle East to teach Human Factors in Diving (HFiD) and Darryl has also contributed course content to the Human Diver curriculum. 

Counter-Errorism in Diving

Even the most experienced divers make mistakes. The goal of the Human Diver programs are to make it easier for divers to do the right things and harder to do the wrong things. You can read an introduction to the Human Factors in Diving concepts here.

Most accidents and incidents are not down to undetected equipment failures, poor buoyancy or incorrect trim.  They typically occur due to a chain of events, caused by complacency, breakdowns in communication, poor decision-making, a lack of situational awareness or ineffective teamwork and/or leadership.

The Human Factors in Diving training is designed to help divers of all experience levels understand how accidents and incidents happen and equip them with the understanding and tools to be a safer diver. 

If Only...

This documentary is about a tragic and avoidable accident which took place during a diver training course in May 2018. As with many adverse events, there were many contributory and causal factors involved. With hindsight, it is easy to spot them, but in real time, they aren't so obvious. Especially, when they happen relatively frequently without any adverse consequences.

Click below to watch the documentary.

Under Pressure

Gareth Lock's book 'Under Pressure' contains a wealth of real life stories about accidents, incidents and near misses, contributed by some of the leading underwater explorers, instructors and divers in the world. The book is a must-read for anyone who takes diving seriously and is available from the Freestyle Divers shop.