This book provides future sidemount divers with a comprehensive foundation for all aspects of sidemount diving, and is intended to be used as both a student manual in conjunction with sidemount training, and a reference guide to further a certified sidemount divers' understandings.
Sidemount is an equipment configuration that places the cylinder(s) for SCUBA on the divers' side rather than on the back. It offers a lower profile than back-mounted cylinder configurations do, and despite its higher cost in equipment and increased complexity in both equipment management and dive planning, sidemount configurations bring with them many benefits. These can include redundancy through independent cylinders, increased safety through redundancy and the ability to easily reach and manipulate cylinders and valves, increased options for dive profiles, planning, and emergencies, nearly unlimited customizability, and increased comfortability for the diver.
Many divers desire to learn to dive using sidemount systems for a variety of reasons. Some simply want to be more comfortable in the water, others are looking at advancing into technical diving, some are already established technical divers now looking at sidemount as an alternative, some may want to use it for professional or occupational purposes, and still others may have physical limitations that sidemount could be the answer for. No matter which reason you personally may have for taking a sidemount course, you should be expected to put fourth your absolute best effort at all times, your instructor should provide a thorough and comprehensive course that exceeds the standards, that challenges you, and they should be willing to offer careful mentorship and guidance both during and after your course to help you grow into a truly competent, confident, capable, and safe sidemount diver.
Powell, A. J.: - AJ is a Christian, a retired United States Army NonCommissioned Officer who served in both the U.S. Navy and U.S. Army, and he is a world-traveled American combat veteran. During his professional career, AJ has been blessed with opportunities to work at the local, joint, and multinational levels of operations, working closely with U.S. and allied forces in conducting operations, training, development, and relations-building. He is a graduate of Pennsylvania State University, and is published academically in the fields of sociology and leadership. AJ spent 20+ years working in the fields of both aviation and diving simultaneously. He first first learned to dive in 2002, and since that time, has been blessed (or cursed) with assignments and opportunities to dive in some of the most challenging and demanding environments and conditions around the world. Today, AJ is a professional occupational surface-supplied diver to the mixed-gas level, qualified occupational dive supervisor, technical closed-circuit rebreather diver to the hypoxic-trimix level (100m), and certified NAUI and IANTD dive instructor, CCR instructor, and occupational diving instructor. AJ has been teaching professionally as a qualified educator, specialized skills trainer, and certified instructor across a multitude of expertise, for most of his career. As an instructor, he draws extensively on his career-long training and experience, both military and civilian, while incorporating many overlapping aspects from the world of aviation into the world of diving, to mentor and grow his students into highly skilled divers far above the standards. As a result, AJ has developed a reputation for teaching and training both military service members and civilians alike to become well-educated, highly competent, confident, capable, and safe divers, who are passionate about diving and growing in their diver KSA's.
