Are you traveling to Wadi Rum, Petra or Amman after diving?
There has always been a problem in what to recommend to divers when traveling to
altitude after diving to continue with their holiday plans and see as much of
Jordan as they can while they are here. In the past dive centres have all varied
in their response on this either erring on the more conservative approach and
quoting flying after diving rules or going the other way and saying it doesn't
matter if you are not flying. We at Dive Aqaba take this seriously and have come
up with some guidelines based on National Oceanographic & Atmospheric
Association tables. Logically it will be different depending on the dives you
have done this is the first time a sensible variable recommendation has been
made in Aqaba. Let's take the worst case scenario for recreational diving, using the PADI RDP you end up in pressure group Z - one hour from surfacing you are in pressure group K which means you can travel to Petra, Amman or Wadi Rum with no problem. Ergo it takes 1 hour to return to Aqaba harbour by boat - so no problem!
| Ending pressure group on the PADI RDP after the last dive | K | P | R | U | W | Y | Z |
| Time to stay in Aqaba after diving before going to Wadi Rum (900m) | 0 hrs 0mins |
0 hrs 0mins |
1 hr 31 mins |
3 hrs 20 mins |
4 hrs 57 mins |
6 hrs 25 mins |
7 hrs 46 mins |
| Time to stay in Aqaba after diving before going to Petra or Amman (1200m) | 0 hrs 0mins |
1 hrs 23mins |
3 hrs 26 mins |
5 hrs 15 mins |
6 hrs 52 mins |
8 hrs 20 mins |
9 hrs 41 mins |
These times are based on NOAA recommendations (based on US
Navy Tables, pressure groups have been recalculated for the RDP). Using Nitrox and high Oxygen mixes on decompression dives also lessens the problem. Dive Aqaba recommends a minimum wait of 18 hours before flying after diving.
