Freedive for free at Blue Abyss

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Go Freediving are thrilled to exclusively announce that Blue Abyss, the world’s deepest pool will be FREE for freedivers to use. Find out why founder and CEO, John Vickers has decided that you can freedive for free at Blue Abyss and what freediving means to him.

So what is Blue Abyss?

Sited at the University of Essex, Blue Abyss will be the world’s deepest pool at 50m long x 40m wide and 50m deep. It will be a state of the art aquatic research, training and development facility. It will include a lecture theatre and six classrooms, hyperbaric suite, and an adjacent 120-bed, three-star hotel.

Blue Abyss will be the UK and Europe’s premier marine and space research facility. As well as catering for tech, scuba and freediving. Costing upwards of a million pounds for every metre of depth, the incredible gift has been made to the freediving community of being able to freedive for free at Blue Abyss.

What will freediving be like at Blue Abyss?

The pool will have several entrance areas; stepped, sloped, via lift or deep drop in. Various depth levels from hip-high (perfect for static apnea) to 3m leading to a 6m area, which is ideal for training beginner freediving students.

There will also be other levels at 10, 12, 15, 18, 20 and 25m, which also leads to the 50m shaft which has an 8m diameter. Lines for diving down will be able to be set for training and teaching, and there will be extensive safety measures in place.

So why are freedivers being allowed to freedive for free at Blue Abyss?

I’ve been working with John Vickers, the founder and CEO of Blue Abyss since February 2015 on the project as their freediving consultant. He is passionate about the underwater world and pushing the boundaries of science and human potential. And he is also passionate about freediving.

I asked him why he decided to make this extraordinary gesture to the freediving community.

‘I wanted to make Blue Abyss free for all freedivers, in order to repay Emma for all that she’s given and because from the outset, the freediving community has been very supportive. I also wanted people to freedive for free at Blue Abyss in recognition that in order to encourage more people to become both aware of, and involved in our oceans. the easiest way for them to do it is to become a freediver, the very purest form of diving.

I was brought up in Bahrain, in the Middle East, which was famous for its pearl divers and I was always aware of the history. My spiritual home is Bahrain and I learnt at 18 months old how to swim there.

I remember vividly being on a beach, about five years old, and watching these silver suited skin divers coming out of the water and that was the first real recognition that I really wanted to do that one day. 

You can just go out with your friends, with your kids, to the beach, and take a gulp of air and go beneath the waves. And for me, everything gets left behind, all the anxiety, the day-to-day challenges. When you freedive, you’re just in a different realm.

Just with one breath of air you can transcend from one medium to another and you are genuinely exploring and pushing boundaries of a whole new world. 

So you will be able to freedive for free at Blue Abyss as a gesture to Emma and the freedivjng community for the support and the goodwill they’ve shown me and the project.’

So I can just show up and freedive for free at Blue Abyss?

We understand just how popular Blue Abyss will be to freedivers and if you can freedive for free at Blue Abyss, it is likely to be become over-crowded, particularly at the weekends.

When the facility opens, there will be a booking system in place to ensure that everyone gets a chance to freedive for free at Blue Abyss and enjoy this incredible facility for themselves.

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