Editing Timeline of diving technology (section)

===Public interest in scuba diving takes off===
* 1953: ''[[National Geographic Magazine]]'' published an article about Cousteau's underwater archaeology at Grand Congloué island near Marseille. This started a massive public demand for aqualungs and diving gear, and in France and America the diving gear makers started making them as fast as they could. But in Britain [[Siebe Gorman]] and [[Heinke (diving equipment makers)|Heinke]] kept aqualungs expensive, and restrictions on exporting [[currency]] stopped people from importing them. Many British sport divers used home-made constant-flow breathing sets and ex-armed forces or ex-industrial rebreathers. In the early 1950s, [[diving regulator]]s made by [[Siebe Gorman]] cost £15, which was an average week's [[salary]].{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
** After the supply of war-surplus [[frogman]]'s [[Diving suit#Drysuits|drysuits]] ran out, free-swimming diving suits were not readily available to the general public, and as a result many scuba divers dived with their skin bare except for swimming trunks. That is why scuba diving used often to be called skindiving. Others dived in homemade drysuits, or in thick layers of ordinary clothes.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
** After the supply of war-surplus frogman's fins dried up, for a long time fins were not available to the public, and some had to resort to such things as gluing [[marine ply]] to [[plimsolls]].{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
** [[Captain Trevor Hampton]] founded the [[British Underwater Centre]] at [[Dartmouth, Devon|Dartmouth]] in [[Devon]] in England.<ref name="Divernet" />
** [[False Bay Underwater Club]] founded in Cape Town, South Africa (1950).<ref name="FBUC" /> 
** [[Rene's Sporting Goods]] shop (now owned by [[Aqua Lung/La Spirotechnique|La Spirotechnique]]) became [[U.S. Divers]], now a leading maker of diving equipment.<ref name="Gallant 3" />
** 15 October 1953: The [[British Sub-Aqua Club]] (BSAC) was founded.<ref name="BSAChxBook" /><ref name="BSAChxWeb" />
* 1954: [[USS Nautilus (SSN-571)|USS ''Nautilus'']], the first nuclear-powered submarine, was launched.<ref name="Nat Mus Am Hist" />
** The first manned dives in the bathyscaphe ''FNRS-2'' were made.<ref name="Busby" />
** The first scuba certification course in the USA was offered by the Los Angeles County Department of Parks and Recreation. The training program was created by Albert Tillman and Bev Morgan now known as LA County Scuba.<ref name="LA County" />
** In the US, [[Mine Safety Appliances|MSA]] advertised (in [[Popular Mechanics]] magazine) a two-cylinder aqualung-like open-circuit diving set using the MSA regulator.<ref name="HDT" />
** [[Underwater hockey]] (octopush) was invented by four navy sub-aqua divers in Southsea who got bored swimming up and down and wanted a fun way to keep fit.<ref name="Edmonton" />
* 1955: In Britain, "''[[Practical Mechanics]]''" magazine published an article on "Making an Aqualung".<ref name="Making an aqualung" />
** Jacques-Yves Cousteau and assistant director [[Louis Malle]], a young film maker of 23, shot ''[[The Silent World]]'', one of the first films to use [[underwater photography|underwater cinematography]] to show the ocean depths [[color photography|in color]].<ref name="All things diving 2" />
** [[Fédération Française d'Études et de Sports Sous-Marins]] (FFESSM) was formed.<ref name="ffessm" />
* 1956:
** US Navy published decompression tables that allowed for repetitive diving.<ref name="michu" />
** Around this time, some British scuba divers started making [[Diving regulator#Twin-hose, home-made|homemade diving demand regulators]] from industrial parts, including [[Calor Gas]] regulators. (Since then, Calor Gas regulators have been redesigned, and this conversion is now impossible.){{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
** Later, [[Submarine Products Ltd]] in [[Hexham]] in [[Northumberland]], England designed round the Cousteau-Gagnan patent and marketed recreational diving breathing sets at an accessible price. This forced [[Siebe Gorman]]'s and [[Heinke (diving equipment makers)|Heinke]]'s prices down and started them selling to the sport diving trade. (Siebe Gorman gave its drysuit the [[tradename]] "Frogman".) Because of this better availability of aqualungs, [[British Sub-Aqua Club|BSAC]] adopted a policy that rebreathers were unacceptable for recreational diving.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}{{Original research inline|date=February 2017}} In the US, some oxygen diving clubs developed down the years. Eventually, the term of the Cousteau-Gagnan patent [[Term of patent|expired]], and it could be legally copied.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
** ''[[The Silent World]]'' received an [[Academy Award]] for Best Documentary Feature, and the [[Palme d'Or]] award at the [[Cannes Film Festival]].<ref name="Cannes" />
* 1958:
** The U.S. [[television]] series ''[[Sea Hunt]]'' began. It introduced scuba diving to the television audience. It ran until 1961.<ref name="IMDb" />
** [[USS Nautilus (SSN-571)|USS ''Nautilus'']] completed the first ever voyage under the polar ice to the [[North Pole]] and back.<ref name="Nautilus" />
** The [[Confédération Mondiale des Activités Subaquatiques]] (CMAS) (World Underwater Federation) was founded in Brussels.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
* August 1959: [[YMCA SCUBA Program]] was founded.<ref name="Brylske" />
[[File:Odd Henrik Johnsen Scuba Diving.jpg|thumb|Norwegian diving pioneer Odd Henrik Johnsen with 1960's diving equipment.]]
* 1960: [[Jacques Piccard]] and Lieutenant [[Don Walsh]], USN, descended to the bottom of the [[Challenger Deep]], the deepest known point in the ocean (about 10900&nbsp;m or 35802&nbsp;ft, or 6.78 miles) in the [[Bathyscaphe Trieste|bathyscaphe ''Trieste'']].<ref name="Trieste" />
** [[USS Triton (SSRN-586)|USS ''Triton'']] completes the first ever underwater [[circumnavigation]] of the world.<ref name="USS Triton" />
** In Italy, sport diving oxygen rebreathers continued to be made well into the 1960s.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
* 1961<ref name="CAC" />
**The patent for the PA 61 horse-collar buoyancy compensator is filed by [[Fenzy]].
**The Italian made [[SOS analog decompression meter]] is released.
**The Mistral regulator is equipped with non-return valves in the breathing hoses.
* 1962:
** [[Robert Sténuit]] lives aboard a tiny one-man cylinder at 200 feet for over 24 hours off [[Villefranche-sur-Mer]] on the [[French Riviera]], becoming the world's first [[aquanaut]].<ref name="Ecott"/><ref name="NGM 1" /><ref name="Sténuit"/>
** Swiss diver [[Hannes Keller]] reaches over {{convert|1000|ft|m}} depth off California.<ref name="Lonsdale 2012" />
** [[Edward A. Link]]'s [[Man-in-the-Sea]] program had one man breathing helium-oxygen at 200&nbsp;fsw for 24 hours in the first practical [[saturation dive]].<ref name="Lonsdale 2012" />
* 1964: 
** In France, [[Georges Beuchat]] creates the [[Jetfins]], first vented fins.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
** The U.S. Navy's [[SEALAB (United States Navy)|Sealab 1]] [[underwater habitat]] project directed by Captain [[George F. Bond]], keeps four divers in saturation underwater at an average depth of 193 feet for 11 days.<ref name="Lonsdale 2012" /> 
* 1965: 
** Robert D. Workman of the [[United States Navy Experimental Diving Unit|U.S. Navy Experimental Diving Unit]] (NEDU) publishes an algorithm for computing decompression requirements suitable for implementing in a [[dive computer]], rather than a pre-computed table.<ref name="Workman 1965" />
** Bob Kirby and Bev Morgan formed Kirby-Morgan.<ref name="Lonsdale 2012" />
** Three teams of ten men each spent 15 days under saturation at 205 fsw in Sealab II. Astronaut [[Scott Carpenter]] stayed for 30 days.<ref name="Lonsdale 2012" />
** The action/adventure movie ''[[Thunderball (film)|Thunderball]]'', which used both sorts of open-circuit scuba, was released and helped make single-hose regulators popular.<ref name="Council 2018" />
* 1966: [[Professional Association of Diving Instructors]] (PADI) was founded by John Cronin and Ralph Erickson.<ref name="cronin" />
* 1968: An excursion dive to 1025 fsw was made from a saturation depth of 825 fsw at NEDU.<ref name="Lonsdale 2012" />
* 1969: The first known rebreather with [[Electronics|electronic]] monitoring was produced. The Electrolung, designed by Walter Starke, was subsequently bought by Beckman Instruments, but discontinued in 1970 after a number of fatalities.<ref name="Menduno 2012" />
* 1971: [[Scubapro]] introduced the Stabilization Jacket,  commonly called [[stab jacket]] in England, and Buoyancy Control (or Compensation) Device (BC or BCD) elsewhere.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
* 1972: [[Scubapro]] introduced the decompression meter (the first analog [[dive computer]]).{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
* 1976: Professor [[Albert A. Bühlmann]] published his work extending the formulae to apply to diving at altitude and with complex gas mixes.<ref name="Boni et al 1976" />
* 1978: Deeper diving techniques breathing Mixed Gas (Helium/Oxygen) rather than Air were becoming more widely used, due to the requirements of Oil and Gas industry clients in the UK North Sea and elsewhere. The first effective Helium recycling systems where breathed out Heliox diving mix was returned to the surface for CO2 scrubbing and O2 injection were deployed by KD Marine and subsequent Krasberg (Alan Krasberg, gas systems engineer) reclaim systems were used by Commercial Diving operators such as Wharton Williams, Stena Offshore, KD Marine etc. Helium recycling was regularly better than 90% efficient and brought the cost of deeper diving techniques down to a reasonable threshold.
* 1981: The "Salvage of the Century" - the recovery of 431 Gold bars from HMS Edinburgh was carried out from the DSV Stephaniturm by Wharton Williams divers from a water depth of around 800 feet. This operation and all subsequent Helium/Oxygen breathing operations by Wharton Williams used Krasberg based Helium recycling. As new diving vessels were constructed Gas Reclaim technology became a standard fitment.  
* 1983: The Orca Edge (the first commercially viable electronic [[dive computer]]) was introduced.<ref name="CHM Orca Edge" /><ref name="Kutter" />
* 1985: 
** The wreck of [[RMS Titanic|RMS ''Titanic'']] was found. [[Air India Flight 182]], a Boeing 747 aircraft, was found and salvaged off [[Cork (city)|Cork, Ireland]] during the first large scale deep water (6,200 feet) air crash investigation.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
** [[International Association of Nitrox and Technical Divers]] (IANTD) was founded<ref name="IANTD" />{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
* 1986 [[Apeks Marine Equipment]] introduced the first dry sealed 1st Stage developed by engineering designer Alan Clarke, later to house a patented electronic pressure sensor named STATUS.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
* 1989: The film ''[[The Abyss]]'' (including an as-yet-fictional deep-sea [[liquid-breathing]] set) helped to make scuba diving popular.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
** The [[Communist Bloc]] fell apart and the [[Cold War]] ended (''see [[Fall of Communism]] and [[dissolution of the Soviet Union]]''), and with it the risk of future attack by Communist Bloc forces including by their [[frogman|combat divers]]. After that, the world's armed forces had less reason to requisition rebreather [[patent]]s submitted by civilians, and sport diving automatic and semi-automatic mixture [[Diving rebreather|rebreathers]] start to appear.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
* 1990: During operations in the Campos basin of Brazil, saturation divers from the DSV Stena Marianos performed a manifold installation for [[Petrobras]] at {{convert |316 |m|ft}} depth in February 1990. When a lift bag attachment failed, the equipment was carried by the bottom currents to {{convert |328 |m|ft}} depth, and the Brazilian diver Adelson D'Araujo Santos Jr. made the recovery and installation.<ref name="ScubaRec" />
* 1994: 
** Divex and Kirby-Morgan developed the Divex UltraJewel 601 gas-reclaim system in response to rising helium costs.<ref name="Lonsdale 2012" />
** [[Technical Diving International]] was founded to focus on training beyond the contemporary scope of recreational diving.<ref name="TDI" /><ref name="What is technical diving" />
* 1995: BSAC allowed [[nitrox]] diving and introduced nitrox training.<ref name="BSAChxWeb" /><ref name="BSACnitrox" />
* 1996: PADI introduced its Enriched Air Diver Course.<ref name="PADInitrox" />
* 1997: The film [[Titanic (1997 film)|''Titanic'']] helped to make underwater trips onboard [[MIR (submersible)|MIR]] submersible vehicles popular.{{citation needed|date=February 2017}}
* 1998 August: Dives on [[RMS Titanic|RMS ''Titanic'']] were made using a Remotely Operated Vehicle controlled from the surface (Magellan 725), and the first live video broadcast was made from the ''Titanic''.<ref name="Gallant" />
* 1999 July: The ''[[Liberty Bell 7]]'' Mercury spacecraft was recovered from {{convert|16,043|ft|m}} of water in the Atlantic Ocean during the deepest commercial search and recovery operation to date.<ref name="Liberty bell" />