National Diving Centre

[DORSETBOY]

Heard talk about the national diving centre (nr the welsh border). anone have any first hand accounts as you never really know how good a place is from it's official website!

have dived stoney and actually quite enjoyed the experience, did it on a weekend and never had to wait at all... I hear this is unusual?! how's the experience at the ndc compare?

 

[String]

Big site, a few attractions, able to go silly deep if required.

On site pot (but not always available for use), portacabin changing rooms and toilets (under construction). Usual air fills and afaik trimix.

Training platforms at 6m, access to the site is basically kit into a trailer, you climb into an ex army landrover and taken to the pontoon which is at a guess 50m long with numerous ladders for exit.

Attractions are buoyed.

The 30m area is surrounded by a raised lip making it hard to accidentally wander off into the 80m part. After the lip is a near vertical wall down to 60m or so.

IIRC attractions consist of a metal box marked "explosives", a safe, a barrel, a small cabin cruiser, a diving bell and some horizontal and vertical plastic pipes for swim throughs (maybe 5m long).

When i was there, surface temp was 14c, 6c at depth and it dropped fairly rapidly. Very dark and low vis (algae and lots of fine silt).

There are kitting up tables near the pontoon to ease getting BCs/tanks mounted on you. Post dive its back into the landrover to get back up to the car park.

From speaking to people its never very busy at all. One problem it seems to have is weekdays it shuts at 5pm and out of the water by 4pm. Not great if you want to dive or train after work when youd suspect they have most interest.

Given it was my first (and so far only) fresh water dive i cant compare it to anything really but can say getting there, getting kitted up and getting in/out/back was very easy just the actual content isnt great compared to the sea. I expected better vis too.

OK for trainees on the 6m training platforms but id have reservations taking them deeper if conditions are like when i was there, ie cold, dark, low vis - its all a bit sinister looking which may freak out beginners.

Great for more advanced training though, depth progressions etc.

They've got a few rules which make sense, no diving below 50m on air or nitrox, no diving below 30m without a torch or "adequate thermal protection" and requested to use a redundant air source below 30m.

All divers must have a whistle.

Strangely unlike stoney and others there is no accurate map of the underwater layout, all thats there is an A4 rough sketch not for scale showing very approximate locations.

Will upload a photo in a few mins

 

[DORSETBOY]

On site pot (but not always available for use), portacabin changing rooms and toilets (under construction). Usual air fills and afaik trimix.


When i was there, surface temp was 14c, 6c at depth and it dropped fairly rapidly. Very dark and low vis (algae and lots of fine silt).
Will upload a photo in a few mins

Its good to know that they've got a pot onsite, bothers me a bit that dotty still hasn't but I know that's not an 'official' dive site(!) Sounds like they're trying to put some money into the palce which is great, Im surprised like you say that they clsoe so early in the week, surely most people are up for diving in the evenings midweek, esp Summertime?

Are they planning to do anything about the viz? dont know if you can once it's filled up.. sounds good anyhow, I quite liked stoney and if it's poss to dive at the ndc without long waits then even better.

The safety rules sound sensible but a little difficult to regulate, dont know how happy I'd be if someone told me I couldn't dive deeper than 30m in a semi in such conditions, but then maybe they're right!

 

[String]

Well it says "adequate thermal protection". Doesnt say no semis although there no wa on earth youd get me in 6c water wet

Opening hours seem to be the main reason the place is near deserted. Youd expect weekdays to have more people diving or training in the evenings after work than during daytime - the place isnt open for that. You need a guaranteed minimum of 10 people to get them to extend evening opening time.

As for rules being enforced, i dont think they are really. Suffice to say i personally know of several who have flouted most of them

The onsite pot isnt all that it seems, although the pot is there a hyperbaric trained nurse isnt always there. If an incident happens when there is no cover causalties still need to be heli-evacuated to plymouth as they cant use their own pot.

Not a lot they can do about the vis, its silt and algae, neither of which are easy to cure. People from my club have dived it january/february and had great (8m) vis so maybe im just unlucky to try it in the summer where algae blooms and torrential rains stirs up and washes in silt.

Apparently there are fish in there too but i never saw them...