What Is DIR Diving? Doing It Right, Explained

Most divers first notice DIR divers by their gear: backplates, long hoses, very little dangling from their harness. The gear is the least interesting part. DIR is a way of thinking about risk, and the gear is just what that thinking looks like when you put it on.

Where did DIR come from?

DIR came out of the Woodville Karst Plain Project (WKPP), a team exploring long, deep cave systems in north Florida in the mid-1990s. Those dives were far beyond what most divers attempt, and the team was trying to stop the accidents that had killed divers in the same caves (Wikipedia).

Their answer was standardization. If every diver on the team carries the same equipment in the same place, uses the same gases and follows the same procedures, then teammates can communicate and respond with familiar equipment and procedures. The goal is a thinking team that understands the problem and its consequences.

The phrase "Doing It Right" is thought to have first appeared in a 1995 article by George Irvine III. Irvine and Jarrod Jablonski later formalized the approach and promoted it for all forms of diving. The equipment configuration itself is often called "Hogarthian," after William Hogarth Main, whose minimalist rig shaped it.

From there, the ideas moved into formal training:

• GUE (Global Underwater Explorers) built its curriculum on DIR. In 2007 it renamed its "DIR Fundamentals" course to "GUE Fundamentals."
• UTD (Unified Team Diving) grew from the same Hogarthian and DIR roots. In 2008 it set out to unify backmount, sidemount and rebreather diving into one consistent system and describes its ideal diver as part of a "thinking dive team" (UTD).

Gardner Underwater teaches through UTD. For a fair comparison of the agencies, see GUE vs UTD vs Hogarthian.

What are the core principles of DIR?

DIR rests on five ideas. Each one exists to solve a real problem divers have underwater.

1. The diver comes first. Buoyancy, trim, propulsion and awareness matter more than any piece of equipment. A diver who can hold position without effort has spare attention for everything else.
2. The team is your backup. The team is your backup for gas, equipment and brain; every diver still carries the required gas and equipment and shares responsibility for decisions. That only works if you stay close, stay aware and dive with people trained the same way. Plan team size and positioning for the dive, the environment and the applicable course standards.
3. Standardize everything that can be standardized. Same regulator setup, same signals, same procedures, and the same standard gases. In an emergency, nobody wastes time working out where something is. Standard gases also mean no deep air: below 100 feet, helium mixes keep narcosis in check.
4. Keep the configuration minimal. Every extra hose, clip and gadget is something to snag, fail or fumble. If it doesn't earn its place, it doesn't go.
5. Plan the gas before the dive. You know how much gas the team needs to get two divers to the surface from the worst point of the dive, and you turn the dive with that reserve intact.

Underneath all five sits an attitude: any diver can call any dive, at any time, for any reason, without argument.

How does UTD put DIR into practice?

UTD sums up its approach in ten covenants. The covenants are:

1. Unified team: the team is your backup for gas, equipment and brain.
2. Thinking team: nobody relies on one person or one piece of gear to make every decision. No "trust me" dives.
3. Rock bottom gas management: every diver carries enough gas to get two divers to the next gas source.
4. Standard gas: the desired oxygen partial pressure at the target average depth, an equivalent narcotic depth of 100 feet/30 meters or less, and no deep air.
5. Consistent, modular configuration: the same system across the team and across every kind of diving.
6. Minimalism: take only what the dive needs.
7. Holistic: every piece of equipment has a reason for what it is and where it goes.
8. Streamlined and accessible: everything stowed, everything reachable.
9. Situational awareness: equal attention to the environment, the equipment and the team.
10. Proper training and experience for the dive you're doing.

What does a DIR gear setup look like?

A DIR rig is built around a few standard pieces, each placed for a reason:

• A backplate and wing with a one-piece webbing harness, instead of a jacket BCD.
• A long hose on the primary regulator, typically 5 to 7 feet, which you breathe and donate in an out-of-air emergency.
• A backup regulator on a bungee necklace just under your chin.
• A pressure gauge on a short hose, clipped at your left hip.
• Lights and tools mounted in the same positions every dive.

The details are in DIR Gear Configuration, Piece by Piece. For why the long hose works the way it does, read Long Hose Configuration.

What DIR is not

DIR has picked up some baggage over the years. A few common misunderstandings:

• It is not a brand. No manufacturer sells "DIR gear." Many brands make equipment that fits the configuration.
• It is not only for cave divers. The skills that keep a cave team safe also make a 40-foot reef dive calmer, longer and easier on the reef.
• It is not just equipment. A diver in a perfect rig with poor buoyancy and no gas plan isn't diving DIR. A diver with excellent skills in borrowed gear is most of the way there.
• It is not about calling other divers wrong. The name hasn't helped, and some early advocates were combative. We address that directly in Is DIR Diving Elitist?

Is DIR safer?

DIR is designed to reduce the things that turn small problems into accidents: task loading, confusion, gas emergencies and lost teammates. Each practice has a clear reason behind it.

To be honest, though, there is no formal study showing that DIR divers have fewer accidents than other well-trained divers (Wikipedia). The case for DIR rests on its logic and on decades of use in demanding environments, not on outcome data. Judge it by whether the reasons make sense to you.

Do you have to be a technical diver to dive DIR?

No. Most of what DIR teaches pays off on ordinary recreational dives:

• Better trim and buoyancy mean less effort, lower gas use and no kicked-up silt. See Horizontal Trim and How to Master Scuba Buoyancy.
• A real gas plan replaces "be back on the boat with 500 psi." See Gas Management for Recreational Divers.
• Team habits mean you know where your buddy is and what they'd do if something went wrong.

Plenty of DIR-trained divers never go deeper than 100 feet or into a cave. They just dive with more control.

Build the foundations

Our Essentials of Recreational Diving course is the starting point for certified divers. Over about three days, it brings you into the UTD system: buoyancy control through breathing, horizontal trim, precise propulsion and diving as a team. You'll leave with skills you can feel on your very next dive.