A Technical Diving Student’s Perspective

Gregg Stanton is celebrating one year of formal scuba training in Hawaii on rebreathers with a full class of students. What began as an invitation to teach two rebreather classes on Oahu, has grown into an extension of his Florida based Wakulla Diving Center, now with an additional location on the Big Island of Hawaii.

Gregg’s Wakulla Diving Center in Florida has been in business since 2010, providing training at the recreational and technical levels, in cave diving, trimix, rebreathers and other modern hi-tech diving techniques. Gregg grew up in Hawaii, so a return to the islands was only a matter of time. His local expansion started in January 2019 with two participants and minimal equipment but has now grown to a fully equipped diving school. His plan is to keep the retail portion of Wakulla Diving Center in Florida. The expansion involves an advanced fill station, specializing in nitrox and trimix blends. These gasses will eventually be available on-tap for immediate cascading. Wakulla Diving Center-Hawaii also rents cylinders for rebreathers as well as open circuit scuba.

With an emphasis on training, Gregg’s plan is to attract a cadre like-minded of instructors, to offer a wide range of scuba training from the basics up through deep (trimix) diving and rebreathers with NAUI leadership options. With beautiful Hawaiian reefs abundantly available from shore-based dive sites and awesome boat diving options, the training opportunities are exciting. Already folks are traveling from Florida to use this field facility for their training & vacation interests.

When not blending gasses or training, Gregg also operates a small Avocado Orchard (Kalopa Orchards), supplying Foodland with 1.5-2 pound fruits when in season. If that was not enough, Gregg returns to Florida in the summer time to help with the Wakulla Diving Center-Florida renowned Summer Internship Program. This program offers divers and non-divers the opportunity to further their dive training, learn the behind-the-scenes of how a dive shop operates, as well as train to be a certified cylinder maintenance professional, continuous gas blender, and regulator technician. This is an awesome opportunity for anyone who would like to dip their toes in the hobby of diving, or who want to further their marine science or diving careers and make connections. For more information on the internship contact the dive center and Katie will be glad to help you!

This week Gregg starts a full rebreather class, training students from Florida, Germany as well as locally from Hawaii. The platforms include Liberty and Liberty Lite, ISC Pathfinder, and JJ (lecture audit). New support facilities and staff will make this class better than last year. Bobbie Suarez (Liberty Science Diver) will serve as the Dive Master for the class.

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