sponsors in this article: Fort Young Dive Resort, Dominica, Scuba Radio
Jeff Wraps His Four-Part Detailed Series on The Business of Rebreathers
SO YOU WANT TO BECOME a rebreather instructor? What exactly does that entail? Will my instructional agency allow it? What are the economics of teaching rebreathers? Are there different levels of certification? This article will address these issues, and more.
In the previous three articles in this series, we examined the use of rebreathers from the individual diver’s perspective (June ‘24), the diver retailer’s perspective (August ‘24), and the liveaboard and resort perspective (November ‘24). This article will build on that information.
How Do I Start? This may sound obvious, but the first step is to be certified as an instructor. There is no agency that I am aware of that will allow you to certify as a rebreather instructor without first being certified as an open circuit, open water instructor. In fact, most of them also require you to be trained as either a Nitrox or Advanced Nitrox instructor, and possibly also a Decompression Procedures instructor or equivalent.
Obviously, you must be certified on the rebreather on which you wish to train others. And just as your diver certification has a type rating, your instructor qualifications will also have a type rating.
Different types of rebreathers have different prerequisites to become an instructor. All agencies will require you to have a minimum number of hours or dives on the unit. That number may vary from as few as 10 hours, to as many as 100 hours, depending on the agency and the rebreather.
There may also be a requirement to have issued a minimum number of certifications. For example, PADI requires demonstrated experience teaching PADI open water and continuing education courses, generally interpreted as a minimum of 25 certifications issued at different levels. To advance from teaching no-decompression air diluent on a given rebreather to teaching mixed gas CCR, TDI requires that instructor candidates must have taught 15 students on the specific unit and also have one year teaching experience on the unit-specific CCR.
All of the agencies incorporate some type of evaluation of the instructor candidate prior to certifying them as a rebreather instructor. This evaluation often includes confined and open water skill evaluation, written or oral exams to assess theoretical knowledge, appraisal of teaching basics and emergency skills, evaluation of practical aspects of rebreather assembly and basic maintenance, and the ability to recognize typical student problems and demonstrate appropriate intervention. Some agencies require that instructor candidates submit videotaped evidence of their ability to perform specified skills as part of the qualification process.
Which Agency Should I Use? The obvious place to start is the agency with which you are certified to teach open water scuba. While not all agencies certify rebreather divers, most of the larger ones do. You also want to examine which rebreathers your agency supports with training programs. There is no agency of which I am aware that supports every rebreather that has ever been manufactured. Many support a large selection of rebreathers, others only support one or two. Several agencies have been established to support only a single model or manufacturer. In some cases, the training agency and the manufacturer are the same entity, or share common ownership.
If you find that your rebreather of choice is not supported by your current training agency, then you will need to cross over to another training agency if you wish to teach on that unit. Most training agencies have streamlined pathways to join their agency if you are currently qualified as an instructor with another organization. Many have prerequisites, such as having taught a minimum number of students or classes, a minimum time served as a qualified instructor, and usually having no current pending instructional or ethical violations or instances under review. Contact the agency under whose auspices you are interested in teaching directly for details on what they require for crossing over.
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Agencies which support a wide variety of rebreather manufacturers and units include: TDI, IANTD, PADI, and RAID. Others which support a more modest range of units include NAUI, SSI, and BSAC, DiveTalk Go, GUE, Akuana, and others generally only support a single or few manufacturers.
Note that in addition to being approved by your training agency, many rebreather manufacturers also mandate that you must meet their approval as instructors. They often work with the training agencies to help vet and qualify the persons that they wish to have teaching on their units. In some cases, manufacturers prefer instructors who are brand loyal to their units. Most require that the instructors own their own unit, or have unlimited access to the same, through their dive shop, as an example. Some manufacturers also limit the number of instructors in a given geographic area, helping ensure that the instructors have the ability to remain profitable without a great deal of competitive stress in attracting local students.
Instructional Economics: These few paragraphs cannot adequately explain all aspects of what you must consider when teaching rebreathers. As with open water scuba instruction, economic factors include both fixed and variable costs, multiple revenue streams, and limitations imposed by instructional channels. Rather than a comprehensive discussion on the topic, I am going to focus on a few key items.
Additional fixed costs include owning your rebreather and the associated maintenance. Rebreathers are significant investments. New units average over $10,000, and minimum annual maintenance generally involves replacing one to several sensors at about $100 each. Even used units typically run into the several thousands of dollars, on top of the general open circuit equipment that you must own.
Manufacturers (through RESA, the Rebreather Education and Sales Association) generally mandate that instructors use the exact same unit as their students during instruction. The justification provided is that they want the instructor to be able to demonstrate skills during instruction, allowing the students to see exactly what it is they are supposed to do. Unfortunately, from an economic perspective, that means that if you wish to teach on multiple platforms, you must own multiple rebreathers. Even if you are using the same rebreather, it may not be configured identically (front versus back mounted counterlungs, for example, or BOV (bailout valve) versus DSV (dive/surface valve)), meaning that you may be required to have multiple units of the same model or various configuration options to address this requirement. A future article will address this topic in more detail.
Instructional liability insurance is another concern. Not all professional liability policies will cover rebreather instruction. Some underwriters offer rebreather coverage as a supplemental policy, increasing your annual insurance cost. DAN will include rebreather instruction at no additional fee, so long as you disclose your activity and the units upon which you instruct when you apply for the policy. They then issue a rider providing such coverage. However, if you allow students to use your personally owned rebreathers, an additional insurance fee is required to cover such use.
Increased variable costs include the cost of supplies, like absorbent and oxygen fills. Batteries may represent another cost that increases directly with use. The more the rebreather is used, the higher maintenance costs are likely to be.
Income streams are similar to open circuit scuba instruction, but often magnified. As one example, tuition for a beginner scuba class may range from $99 to about $350 per student. A beginner rebreather student may pay $1,500 to $3,000, roughly ten times more than for open circuit training. Thus, a single student may offer the same income as 8-10 beginner scuba students. This is obviously an attractive proposition.
Student divers need the rebreathers they will be using. If they purchase them through the instructor, or through a dive store with the instructor’s guidance and support, the instructor often earns a commission or profit on the sale. The same may be true of open circuit gear, but with rebreathers the revenue to the instructor may exceed $1,000 per student, eclipsing the commission amount of a typical equipment sale to an entry-level open circuit student.
Due to the high purchase cost of rebreathers, some students opt to rent rather than buy units. In many cases, students will rent a rebreather for the duration of training, often paying $500 or more for the 5-7 days that training entails. This revenue stream may accrue to the dive store, the instructor, or be shared between them.
Advanced Training Opportunities and Other Income Possibilities: Some agencies differentiate their training between “recreational” and “technical” levels. Others regard all rebreather training as “technical.” Many agencies support a variety of advanced courses. These may include decompression procedures, helitrox (small percentage helium with 21% oxygen as diluent), normoxic trimix (diluent containing some fraction of oxygen and nitrogen and 16-21% oxygen), and hypoxic trimix (diluent containing increased helium fractions and oxygen fractions less than 0.16 atm). Courses may also be defined not by the diluent gas permitted, but by the maximum depth to which the student is qualified to dive (for example, PADI’s Tec 40 CCR, Tec 60 CCR, and Tec 100 CCR). These two factors are closely correlated.
Leadership training may include rebreather divemasters or instructors. Most training agencies require that you must have personally certified a minimum number of students on a given system before being allowed to teach leadership levels. And as with closed circuit instructors, some manufacturers may also need to approve the instructor trainers for their units.
Offering guided rebreather dives, rebreather refresher courses, introductory rebreather experiences, and hosting dive travel tailored to rebreather clients offer other income potential.
Staying Current: One final consideration is your personal activity level. It is far more challenging to find rebreather students than it is to find open circuit students. Almost all agencies mandate some form of currency requirements, either a minimum number of dives annually, or a minimum number of students certified over a one to two-year period. Agencies may require you to certify at least one student at your highest qualification level over the same period, or else lose your authorization to teach at that level. Being aware of and meeting these requirements is necessary to maintain your teaching status.
Conclusion: As can be seen, income opportunities with closed circuit instruction can far exceed that of open water instruction. However, the challenges can be significant, with student recruitment hurdles, increased fixed and variable costs, and the need to validate your personal skills and instructional competency by certifying students on a regular basis. Selecting a rebreather with a limited instructor pool but strong growth potential may ameliorate some of these difficulties, but that may be difficult to identify and or predict. Ultimately, many variables must be evaluated, matched with your personal development goals and objectives, and properly weighed prior to making the decision to jump into the instruction of rebreathers.
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