What Depth Are Scuba Tourist Attractions Around The Globe?

Scuba diving makes the inaccessible accessible. The normally unseen becomes the seen. Anyone who dons the correct equipment can take a trip to a world not normally observed by the modern world.

There’s a true sense of freedom and exploration down beneath the surface.

Learning to dive is all about going beneath the waves in order to see the underwater world. So how deep are scuba attractions around the globe? 

The majority of scuba diving attractions around the world are between 40 and 100 feet in depth. The topography of location based attractions varies considerably with many accessible with the basic PADI open water certification. Shipwrecks tend to be over 80 feet deep so will require the advanced open water or deep diver qualifications.

We all want to see something interesting when we dive. While new locations are cool all on their own, something a little unusual or historical adds another dimension to the experience.

If you are new to scuba diving there are questions as to what depth level you should qualify yourself for. Will open water certification be enough for you or will you need the advanced option?

Surely a critical part of answering that question is what type of dive sites you want to experience.

While there is often a wide variance of diving depths even within a known tourist location site, it’s worth pondering the maximum depth of those sites.

With that I took some of the more common sites that people like to dive and tried to find the maximum depth encountered at any given site.

The Great Barrier reef has a vast array of diving depths, from relative shallows to well beyond recreational diver depths along its 1250 mile length.

Here’s a table of what I found.

Attraction	Location	Depth (ft)
The Blue Hole	Belize City, Belize	400
Great Barrier Reef	Northeast Australia	115 (average)
Bora Bora	Bora Bora, French Polynesia	80
Barracuda Point	Sipadan Island, Malaysia	80 to 130
USAT Liberty	Bali, Indonesia	100
Richelieu Rock	Andaman Sea, Thailand	115 (up to)
Yolanda / Shark Reef	Red Sea, Egypt	100 (wreck at 300)
Underwater Sculpture Park	Grenada, Caribbean	26
Lost Blue Hole	New Providence, Bahamas	200
Blue Corner Wall	Palau, Micronesia	100 (up to)
Thistlegorm	Red Sea, Egypt	100 (up to)
The Riviera Maya	Yucatán Peninsula, Mexico	20
Silfra Gap	Þingvellir National Park  Iceland	40 (average allowed)
Savusavu	Fiji	20
Wolf & Darwin Islands	Galapagos Islands	120
Truk Lagoon	Micronesia	100-130
Great White Wall	Taveuni, Fiji	130 (up to)
Darwin Arch	Galapogas	30 (up to 130)
Cannibal Rock	Komodo, Indonesia	80

Perhaps not unsurprisingly there is some correlation between the dive sites that divers like to visit and them fitting within the existing qualifications structure from the major issuers of certifications.

The Common Depth Of Diving Attractions In The United States

For many, that scuba dive regularly and not just when they are on holiday or vacation.

The following is a typical list of diving attractions within the US an their corresponding depth.

Attraction	Location	Depth (ft)
Monterey Bay	California	40 to 80
John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park	Florida	70
Lanai	Hawaii	65
Homestead Crater	Utah	65
Dry Tortugas National Park	Florida	200 (up to)
Culebra	Puerto Rico	50
Kona	Hawaii	40
South Padre Island	Texas	90
Browning Wall	Port Hardy, British Columbia	40 to 250
HMCS Yukon	San Diego, California	105
Five Caves	Makena, Maui, Hawaii	45
Strawberry Wall	Strawberry Island, Washington	140
Bonne Terre Mine	Bonne Terre, Missouri	40 to 60
Forest City	Tobermory, Ontario	150 (up to)
Dutch Springs	Bethlehem, Pennsylvania	100
USS Oriskany	Pensacola, Florida	80
USS Spiegel Grove	Key Largo, Florida	80
USNS General Hoyt S. Vandenberg	Key West, Florida	165
U-352	Cape Lookout, North Carolina	115
USTS Texas Clipper	South Padre Island, Texas	132
USCG Duane	Key Largo, Florida	120

Within the US, the depth of common diving sites seems to follow a similar pattern. Diving sites with varying topography will be easily accessible to those with the basic open water certification recommendations.

Taking the advanced open water will open up a few more, but deep water diver might be a good course to take for the more inaccessible wrecks.

Which Certification Is Best For Tourist Attraction Scuba Dives?

Many people assess their own level of diving comfort when deciding how deep to go so this may be a moot point.

The PADI Open Water Diver course will take a beginner diver and train them to learn down to 60 feet in depth.

The Advanced Open Water expands on the open water certification and will give you expereince on diving to 100 feet depths.

The PADI Deep Diver course would take you to 130 feet deep waters.

Most sites will have visually appealing attractions that are appropriate to the basic open water qualification, while some will require the advanced open water to perhaps get the very best out of the depths.

You perhaps shouldn’t be visiting the USNS General Hoyt S. Vandenberg with just an open water certification for example.

Final Thoughts – Parting Waves

Scuba diving is odd in many ways. The attraction you are visiting isn’t just  a location, but involved a depth. 

Not every attraction is like the Great Barrier reef with diving depths between surface and 2km where you pick a location that suits you.

Some attractions are at a specific depth.

And their is an allure with that depth, all levels of comfort notwithstanding. It’s a chance to explore and the depths seem more mysterious somehow. While the shallows can be fascinating, for many visiting a wreck that few actually see will always have it’s attractions.

You should probably take the PADI recommendations as a guide to what experience you may need.

• PADI open water (to 60 feet)
• PADI advanced open water (to 100 feet)
• PADI deep diver (to 130 feet)

Whatever you choose as the allure to picking a depth to qualify for, if it’s around 130 feet then the PADI deep diver seems like a good course to go for.