Some exciting news coming out of PADI’s Diving Science and Technology arm, . Some recent moves suggest the world’s largest diving agency is preparing to move even further into tech and has named a team to head its effots and started an online weblog.

Last week PADI Asia-Pacific announced that Alex Boulton has been hired a technical consultant for DSAT. According to the PADI press release:

The DSAT Technical Diving Division (TDD) is the group of experts within the PADI organisation that direct the tech diving activities undertaken by DSAT, including in particular the implementation of the highly regarded TecRec courses, Tec Deep Diver and Tec Trimix Diver.

Technical Consultants are experts in this type of diving and are appointed to provide support for the network of TecRec professionals and to represent DSAT at technical diving events or conferences.

Alex has been involved in technical diving since 1999 and has a special interest in cave diving.

Technical consultants were also named for PADI’s other regions:

• Fernando Martins, PADI Americas
• Immi Wallin, PADI Nordic
• Olle Olsson, PADI Nordic
• Pascal Dietrich, PADI Europe
• Terry Johnson, PADI International Ltd.

New appointments were also made for executives covering areas PADI / DSAT does not currently offer courses for, such as cave and rebreather diving. Named this past week are:

• Director, Rebreather Technologies: Mark Caney
• Director, Advanced Wreck Diving: James Morgan
• Director, Cave Diving: Steve Mortell
• Director, Decompression Diving: Karl Shreeves

 Led by DSAT President Drew Richardson, PADI says “this group (known in-house as the ‘Tec Exec’) is responsible for giving direction to PADI’s technical diving arm: DSAT TecRec. All are well known in the tech diving scene, and each appointment mirrors that individual’s special area of expertise.”

Tec Blog

The announcements were posted in a new blog hosted by DSAT called “DSAT Chat” and will be run by Carey. About five posts had been made as of this writing. According to the first post, the blog will “talk about technical diving in general and about DSAT TecRec especially.” No surprise there. Let’s hope the DSAT folks keep it current.