20 days of basic electrical and engineering courses). Upon completion of the training, candidates will go to Naval Diving and Salvage Training Center (NDSTC) in Panama City, Florida, for Second Class Dive School, which is 70 training days long. The center has 22 different courses of instruction for roughly 1300 students annually. On average, there are 300 students in training at any given time. The training center conducts approximately ten thousand dives each year. The NDSTC is divided into Fleet and specialized sections. Regardless of their section, all candidates receive instruction in: Basic gas laws as they relate to diving. Diving medicine Decompression chamber operations Scuba gas planning Diving physics Salvage operations Surface-supplied diving systems Use of all diving apparatus: Open- and closed-circuit rigs Underwater mechanics and tools, and underwater cutting and welding Fleet Training Upon completion of Second Class Dive School service personnel are assigned to one of the Navy Diver Units to develop their diving and salvage skills. Underwater ship repair, salvage, or construction can be done using either SCUBA equipment or a surface-supplied diving system. Training for Diving Medical Officers and diving medical technicians is also part of Fleet training. Advanced Training Many experienced divers return to NDSTC for further course work so they can qualify as First Class divers or as Master divers. The first-class dive school is approximately 12 weeks in length. During training, students are subjected to numerous drills and tests. Some of the subjects include: Hyperbaric Chamber, SCUBA, MK-16 Rebreather, Surface Supplied Air, and Mixed Gas Supervisor. Students are taught how to diagnose diving-related illnesses as well as handling system emergencies. While attending First Class Dive School students are put through Master Diver Evaluations. The evaluations consist of a number of challenging scenarios. Only a select few will qualify. Master diver is a qualification that is difficult to achieve. Specialized Training A Navy diver gets specialized training in demolition and mixed-gas diving. Navy divers work in extreme conditions, performing various underwater tasks ranging from underwater ship repair, underwater salvage and special operations/special warfare type diving. Because their area of operations are so varied, they can be required to utilize any type of diving equipment for use in any depth or temperature in any part of the world. Certain diving qualification allows NDs to live and work at extreme depths for days or weeks at a time, a discipline known as saturation diving. Navy