TOM STEINER VAN DEN OUWEELEN

Teaching diving for me is more than a lifestyle; it's my passion and it's a part of me.

“One important key to extreme diving is self-confidence. An important key to self-confidence is training and to never overestimate your self-confidence...”

                                                                                                                                                                                 — Tom Steiner

Tom Steiner van den Ouweelen is a Technical and Recreational Course Director Instructor Trainer and Examinator living on Gozo, Malta. His passion is teaching technical diving and cave diving either in backmount or sidemount configurations. After 45 years in the water, Tom's extensive 36 years experience as a full time professional will provide you with the most interesting and demanding courses that you could possibly ask for. The training is tough but through this, you will become a very good diver.

Tom was born in 1965, in Switzerland, 1 km from Bulle (which means Bubble in French!). He speaks and writes seven languages fluently (EN, F, D, SP, NL, I & HUNG) and also has good knowledge of Arabic. Tom started diving during a holiday in 1979 with his first course in Barbados. After returning to Switzerland, he continued his diving education in Lake Geneva, (Montreux). 90% of all of Tom's diving education took place in the cold, dark Swiss lakes with the other 10% in the Mediterranean Sea. He started with CMAS adding additional agency certifications with PADI, TDI, SDI, EDA, NRC, IANTD, BSAC, PROTEC, ISE, and ANDI Instructor.

After over 36 years of professional diving, Tom has now completed over 17’000 dives and a total of 2,500 hours on rebreathers. He has worked in the diving industry all over the world and has also presented seminars on technical diving at a number of international dive shows and events. He was an EDA Examiner, CMAS *** Instructor Course Director & Examiner, TDI, SDI, PADI TECREC Course Director Instructor Trainer, INNERSPACE Explorers Instructor Trainer, PADI Master Scuba Instructor, Master Freediving Instructor and finally a BSAC, ANDI & IANTD Instructor.

Tom has trained instructors all over the planet and is one of the most experienced and highest-profile Technical Diving Instructor Trainers in the world. Tom has also trained Astronauts at the European Space Agency and performed rebreather training for the Greek Navy and Coast Guard.

In addition to his work as a technical diving instructor, Tom has been involved in providing dive safety at a number of high profile events. In 2000, he organized the AIDA Freediving World Championship at Lake Geneva where his team was responsible for the safety of 48 freedivers. During this event his team had to endure four hours non-stop underwater at a temperature of 4 degrees Celsius. Tom has personally acted as safety diver for world-renown freedivers Loic Leferme, Fred Buyle, Şahika Ercümen and Sarah Campbell. He has also provided safety diver services to Pascal Bernabe (former world deepest dive record holder at 330 meters), assisting him during his training sessions and deep trimix courses and dives.

Tom has been involved in a number of prominent marine movie projects including "330 Metres Below the Sea" and "22 minutes". He has written and translated books on Rebreather and Nitrox Diving and developed the first Tec Sidemount course in the diving industry. He has also build the first fresh water reefball project in Lake Leman Switzerland. He moved to Gozo in February 2012 after having spent 16 years diving and working in Sinai, Egypt. 

In Egypt, he was the Manager of Dahab Divers Lodge and then the owner of two dive centers; Fantaseatec and Dahab Divers Technical. 

Tom is now located on Gozo, Malta, from March to end October and teaches technical diving courses around the world during the winter in the northern and southern hemisphere.

Total number of dives: +17,000
Rebreather hours: 2,500 (Inspiration, SF1, Draeger, OMG "Azimuth", Voyager)
Cave dives: +4,500 (Spain, France, Mexico, Malta, Egypt)
Dives between 40 to 100 meters: +6,000
Dives between 100-150 meters: +250
Dives between 150-200 meters: 5
First dive: 1979
Training agencies : TDI/SDI

PHILIPP OTTO BREICHA

Scubadiving is like space traveling. you are in fascinating but quixotic surroundings – completely depending on your equipment. and if you can manage it – you are totally weightless

Philipp was born in 1966 in Austria and raised in Vienna. Since his childhood, he was fascinated by the underwater world but, due to a perforated eardrum he was not allowed to dive. During his time, he spent endless hours exploring the shallow waters and the shorelines during his family vacations in Croatia. 

As soon as he got the medical go ahead, he started training and became addicted to diving. In 2007, he became a Divemaster and in 2008 he reached the Assistant Instructor rating. 

In 2010 he became a partner of Under Pressure at the Attersee in Austria and became an Instructor in 2011  after finishing his IDC with Ben Walzinger and the IE by Dive Asia in Phuket. Since 2012, he spends his time on the fascinating island of Gozo. In 2018 he got the opportunity to become part of Gozo Diving, leading recreational diving activities. He now spends two months in spring and two months in autumn on Gozo.

Total number of dives: +2000
First dive: 2006
Training agency: SDI/PADI

Dr. THOMAS LOUVRADOUX

“Learn, Practice and Master. Put the ego on the side and become the best diver you can be!”

Thomas is a Technical Diving Instructor and co-owner of Gozo Technical Diving. Originally from France, he combines a scientific background with a passion for exploration, training, and technical diving.

Holding a PhD in Quantum Physics, Thomas brings a methodical, analytical approach to diving education. His teaching philosophy is simple: understand the theory, master the skills, and build confident, capable divers through structured and high-quality training.

Thomas is an active technical diver with extensive experience in deep open-circuit and closed-circuit diving. He is qualified as a Full Trimix Diver and Full Cave Diver and regularly dives both open-circuit and rebreather systems.

His current rebreather qualifications include:

• TDI Mixed Gas CCR MOD 3 on the Triton CCR

• TDI Mixed Gas CCR MOD 3 on the JJ-CCR

• TDI Mixed Gas CCR MOD 2 on the Divesoft Liberty Sidemount CCR

As an instructor, Thomas teaches:

• TDI Open Circuit Technical Diving up to Full Trimix

• TDI Full Cave Diving

• Triton CCR Rebreather Courses

Having spent years training with some of the industry's most respected instructors, Thomas remains committed to continuous development, both as a diver and educator. Whether teaching a diver's first technical course or guiding experienced divers towards advanced cave or trimix qualifications, his focus remains the same: safety, precision, and building long-term competence.

Qualifications & Experience

• PhD in Quantum Physics

• TDI Full Trimix Diver

• TDI Full Cave Diver

• TDI Mixed Gas CCR MOD 3 (Triton CCR)

• TDI Mixed Gas CCR MOD 3 (JJ-CCR)

• TDI Mixed Gas CCR MOD 2 (Divesoft Liberty Sidemount CCR)

• TDI Open Circuit Trimix Instructor

• TDI Full Cave Instructor

• Triton CCR Instructor

Diving Statistics

• 2,000+ dives logged

• Extensive experience between 40m and 100m

• Training Agency: SDI / TDI

• First Dive: 2005

MATT JEVON

“Don’t train until you get it right, train until you can’t get it wrong”

Diving since 1989 Matt is qualified and experienced in diving and teaching new starters to CCR, through to full hypoxic mixed gas courses to 100m+ and he wrote the bailout CCR course for TDI. Primary Units are the JJ-CCR and Divesoft Liberty Sidemount

Matt engages in as much expedition and fun diving as he does teaching. You get to learn from Matt’s experiences as well as the course standards. Matt teaches for TDI and ANDI through GOZOTECHNICALDIVING and his own 5 star TDI dive centre and ANDI facility in Kinsale, Ireland, South West Technical Diving (www.swt.ie). 

Matt teaches in some amazing dive centres around the world on request, but has a special place in his heart for Gozotechnicaldiving. He authors a Facebook page, Psychological skills for diving and works outside of diving in high performance sport and business. A qualified sports psychologist and performance expert, Matt brings these expereinces to his diving teaching.  A certified Deco nerd, you can be certain of access to the very latest in safe and best decompression practice. Trained and assessed as a diver and instructor by some of the world’s best, Matt aims in his teaching to pass on these experiences in diving and high performance environments, into your CCR training. 

Matt’s personal diving has included cave exploration in the Philippines, wreck projects in Croatia and Ireland as well as running expeditions to Truk, Bikini and more. 

Dives: 8000+

Dives 40m to 145m – 3500+

Agencies SDITDI, ANDI, PADI

Qualifications: TDI Advanced Mixed Gas Instructor CCR, ANDI Expedition Level 5 Hypoxic Gas Instructor, TDI Full Cave Instructor, ANDI L5 CCR Cave Instructor. Hypoxic Trimix instructor OC. Cave and Tech DPV instructor. Bailout CCR instructor. SDI Course Director