Nuno Gomes (diver)

Nuno Gomes is a South African scuba diver. He was born in Lisbon of Portuguese descent, but his family relocated to Pretoria when he was 14 years old.[1] He is the holder of two world records in deep diving (independently verified and approved by Guinness World Records), the cave diving record from 1996 to 2015 and the sea water record from 2005 to 2014.

Records

Gomes used self-contained underwater breathing apparatus to dive to a depth of 1,044 feet (318.25 m) in the sea. This depth excludes the rope stretch of 11.68 feet (3.56 m).[2] The dive was done in the Red Sea at (Dahab), off the coast of Egypt, in June 2005. Gomes' total dive time was 12 hours and 20 minutes; the descent took only 14 minutes.[3] He is one of only three men verified by Guinness World Records to have dived with scuba equipment (using trimix) below 1,000 feet; the other two divers are the late John Bennett and Ahmed Gabr.

Gomes is also a renowned cave diver and holds the official current Guinness World Record for the deepest cave dive, done in Boesmansgat cave (South Africa), to a depth of 927 feet (282.6 m), in 1996.[3] The cave is located at an altitude of 5,085 feet (1,550 m) above sea level, which resulted in Nuno having to follow a decompression schedule for an equivalent sea level dive depth of 1,112 feet (339 m) to prevent decompression sickness ("the bends").[2] The total dive time was 12 hours and 15 minutes; the descent took 14 minutes with 4 minutes spent at the bottom.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Venter, Pieter. "Short biography of Nuno Gomes". Retrieved 6 April 2015.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Nuno Gomes". Sterling divers. Retrieved 6 April 2015.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 "South African Nuno Gomes now world's deepest scuba diver". CDNN.info. Archived from the original on 15 June 2005.

External links