PADI Rolls out Updates to Advanced Open Water Diver Course

The PADI Advanced Open Water Diver course’s focus has always been on specialty diving. That hasn’t changed, but what’s new is that special adventure options have expanded. Now, the first dive of any PADI or AWARE Specialty Diver course and the PADI Rebreather Diver course can count toward your certification. This boosts the options to 24 different dives.

To earn a PADI Advanced Open Water Diver certification, you need to complete only five dives, two of which must be the Deep and Underwater Navigation Adventure dives. You and your PADI Instructor choose the other three dives based on your interests, what’s available in the area and what your instructor can teach. For example, if you like photography, you could complete the Digital Underwater Imaging Adventures Dive to learn underwater shooting techniques. If you want to know more about the plight of sharks, you could do the AWARE Shark Conservation Adventure Dive. If there are shipwrecks in your local area, then the Wreck Adventure Dive is a good choice.

Want to find your underwater obsession? Wrecks | Photography | Night Diving

The point of completing different Adventure Dives is to check out specialty diving. For example, if after the Night Adventure Dive you realize you really like night diving, you can credit the dive as the first of three dives required for a PADI Night Diver certification. This means you need to enroll only in the PADI Night Diver course and complete the two additional dives. There are some specialty diver courses that require only two dives, so by completing the corresponding Adventure Dive, you’re halfway toward earning that specialty certification.

The revised PADI Advanced Open Water Diver materials are what you use to learn about popular specialty dives. The eye-catching photos and video were shot in Kona, Hawaii, Catalina Island, California, and in a high mountain lake near Whiskeytown, California. Also included is a new section called “Thinking Like a Diver,” which introduces you to strategies designed to develop your thinking skills along the lines of an experienced diver. With your PADI Instructor’s guidance, you apply these strategies while planning your dives, then make adjustments based on what you encountered during each dive.

The best place to get started is at your PADI Dive Center or Resort. You’ll want to pick up your learning materials and discuss which dives you plan to do so you know what chapters to complete. Want a digital-learning option? A new eLearning program that allows you to conveniently study using your mobile device or personal computer will be released in early 2017.

Want to further your education? Start your Advanced Open Water Diver education online.