Enriched Air (Nitrox)

Enriched air (Nitrox) is air enriched with oxygen to give it a higher percentage of oxygen than normal air. Increasing the oxygen percentage of the air consequently decreases the percentage of nitrogen that the diver is breathing. As allowable no decompression dive time is dependant on the amount of nitrogen the diver has been exposed to at a particular depth reducing the nitrogen percentage therefore increases the divers no stop dive time. The increase in allowable dive time can be appreciable, for example at a depth of around 30m the allowable dive time can be increased from a maximum of twenty minutes to a maximum of thirty minutes with the appropriate oxygen percentage of enriched air nitrox used by the diver.

Enriched air nitrox is available at very few dive companies in Kenya, in fact at present Buccaneer Diving is the only place you can obtain it on the Mombasa coast.
The use of Enriched air requires training and we offer the Discover Enriched Air (Nitrox) course for those who just want to experience nitrox before committing themselves the the Enriched Air Nitrox Specialty Course. This non-certification course is a supervised taster but does not qualify the diver, however, divers may then continue to the specialty which will qualify them to dive with enriched air (nitrox) independent of supervision.

PADI Enriched Air (Nitrox)

Age: 15+ Pre-requisites: Medical fitness, Open Water Diver or equivalent. Course Duration: 2 Days Open Water Dives during course: 2 (min)

This course teaches recreational divers to use air enriched with a higher percentage of oxygen, this allows greater no stop dive time around 18m-30m depths depending on the oxygen percentage used . This course provides the training required to responsibly use enriched air from 22% - 40% oxygen.

Further information on these and all other courses can be found on the PADI web site