In a field heavily dominated by white men, Karron Cain is changing the face of commercial diving.
Not to be confused with scuba diving, his work as a commercial diver involves keeping the general public safe by handling repairs on infrastructure and bridge inspections while submerged under water.
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You may have heard of commercial diving as an occupation, but Cain says he’s not surprised if you have never met a black diver.
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“Blacks in this industry only make-up less than 1 percent,” he stated.
Cain travels around the US and across waters around the world as a commercial diver and wants to inspire others that look like him to do the same.
Travel Noire spoke to Cain to hear more about his experience:
Travel Noire: What inspired you to wake up one day and say, “I want to be a commercial diver”?
Cain: I always wanted to be a marine biologist but one day I saw this career path on tv and started to pursue it. I went to school in Jacksonville, Florida for 21 weeks straight Monday through Friday.
TN: Tell us more about your day-to-day life as a commercial diver
Cain: I work with pipelines, which is basically underwater welding. Welding is about five percent of the job.
Depending on your specialty, you travel a lot for this job. Once you get your schematics and what you’re going to build underwater, then off you go. You are typically at least 1000 feet under water for more than 20 straight days.
You are sleeping in a saturation tank and you’re breathing makes air through helium.
It takes a week to get back to the surface once your assignment is over because you have to sleep at different depths to decompress properly.
TN: What’s the best part about your job?
Cain: Swimming with wildlife. I love swimming with the manatees or when you go in the water and a whale swims behind you making noise.
It’s a whole different world. They’re not causing any trouble and just worried about surviving.
TN: What would you tell our readers who are interested in commercial diving?
Cain: That I love this job. The sky is the limit and while this job is dangerous and I wouldn’t recommend it to those who are claustrophobic, it’s been an amazing experience plus you can travel.
You can connect with Cain on Facebook, where he communicates with those who are interested in the commercial diving industry.
