Freediving is the most immediate way to practice underwater activities: in its simplest definition, it simply involves holding your breath while diving. However, freediving is a complex type of sport, which, like many Eastern arts, aims to bring body and mind into a state of higher relaxation.
Orelia Mission, 1988
Saturation diving is the technique within the field of underwater work that now allows operations to be carried out up to 520 meters below sea level. This depth was first reached by a team of six French divers operating off the coast of Marseille in 1988. Their diving bell was lowered to the seabed from the oceanographic vessel Orelia during a mission of underwater technological experimentation. The six aquanauts achieved their goal thanks to the use of a breathing mixture called Hydralloy, composed of hydrogen, helium, and oxygen. The men took turns in the external work, exiting in groups of three twice a day from the bell, to which they remained connected with umbilical hoses that supplied breathing mixture and warm water. The bell was recovered from the Orelia, but the aquanauts only exited their habitat after 18 days, at the end of the calculated decompression period. Their stay on the seabed was documented photographically and is therefore relivable to this day.
Alessia Zecchini, 3 records for the Italian mermaid
Let's start by honoring a young woman who has shown through dedication and constant training that she can enter the Olympus of these disciplines. Alessia holds the female record for constant weight freediving without equipment, set in Kas, Turkey, in 2018 at -70 meters. Additionally, during the same session, Alessia also set the female records for free immersion diving at -94 meters and for constant weight freediving with a monofin, reaching a depth of -107 meters.
Deep diving with a rebreather
In Tremosine, Luca Pedrali, a 51-year-old from Castelcovati, set the Italian record for deep diving with a rebreather, diving into Lake Garda to a depth of -264.8 meters. Luca thus surpassed the record set by Michele Geraci in 2014 in the sea off Bordighera, Liguria: -253.4 meters.
World record for underwater endurance
On September 6, 7, and 8, 2013, Danilo Bernasconi, a 33-year-old diver from the province of Como, set the world record for underwater endurance by remaining immersed for 50 hours at a depth of 10 meters.
Longest freshwater dive
Jerry Hall, a US diver, remained underwater at a depth of 3.6 meters on a submerged platform in Watauga Lake, Tennessee, USA, for 120 hours, 1 minute, and 9 seconds from August 29 to September 3, 2004, without ever surfacing.
The oldest diver ever
Herbert Kilbride, born in 1914 in Massachusetts, was a qualified PADI instructor and was still active at the time of his 90th birthday on March 8, 2004. He died three years later, remaining in the memory of enthusiasts as a role model to follow.
