Just last week, Apple’s new event featured the Apple Watch Ultra, an oversized watch that focuses on professional sports and extreme outdoor scenarios, and is the first time Apple has launched an Ultra version of its smartwatch. Unlike the flagship series, the Apple Watch Ultra is capable of lasting up to 60 hours in extreme mode to meet the needs of sports professionals.
When it comes to his opinion of the product, veteran diver Haje Jan Kamps said, “I would trust my life to the Apple Watch Ultra.”
So, how does the Apple Watch Ultra look from a professional diver’s perspective? And what can it do in this scenario? We tried to find the answer.
Aiming for the biggest dive scenarios, more versatile than professional equipment
Apple Watch Ultra is designed for recreational scuba diving at depths of around 40 meters, which is where the most frequent diving scenarios occur below 30 meters.
Oceanic + records the visibility, currents and other dive note that matter most to divers during a dive. In addition, the app alerts divers at the right time not to stay too deep for too long and warns them when they surface too quickly, two important aspects of safety during a dive.
As a professional diver, Haje Jan Kamps says, “I’m looking forward to diving with a smartwatch that has a digital crown.” Because most of the recording devices currently used by divers have bulky buttons and are more difficult to operate when they wear diving gloves.
The advantage of the Apple Watch Ultra over high-end dive logging devices is that it is not designed specifically for diving, making it more versatile.
However, underwater, the watch loses its signal, but when one returns to the surface, these functions work normally, which is something that ordinary dive watches cannot provide.
- Fear of life-threatening diving in the incorrect way
Why is a dive watch so important? Let’s start with the dangers that people may encounter when diving.
Have you ever heard of diving decompression sickness? In layman’s terms, it is when you stay underwater for a certain period of time and return to the surface due to the extreme change in pressure, resulting in the dissolved gas in the muscle not being able to be expelled with breathing, and the formation of air bubbles in the tissues and blood. The decompression sickness can be serious enough to cause hemiplegia, coma, or even life-threatening.
▲ Haje Jan Kamps wearing the equipment during the dive
Previously, such diseases were usually seen in people working in caves, astronauts, etc. Now, these symptoms are often seen in diving activities.
More visually, the air we breathe is about 78% nitrogen, 21% oxygen and 1% other gases. But when you breathe pure oxygen at the bottom of the ocean, it becomes toxic and can even cause people to have seizures.
Therefore, to ensure that humans stay underwater for long periods of time, divers carry compressed air, which is usually 78% to 65% nitrogen in scuba cylinders, which is then converted into a gas that the human lungs can breathe directly to ensure normal movement in the water column.
This gas is also the “culprit” for the risk of decompression sickness in divers.
Like soda, when you tighten the cap, you will not see very obvious bubbles in the bottle, but when you shake the bottle vigorously and then open a large amount of liquid will be ejected. Likewise, you have gas in your blood, which doesn’t have an effect when you’re at rest, but when you swim quickly from the deep to the surface, the bubbles in your blood bubble up quickly.
A dive watch is what monitors the level of nitrogen in your body and warns people when they surface too quickly or stay in the deep sea for a longer period of time to keep them safe.
- Cooperate with well-known dive manufacturers for timely warning information of nitrogen level in your body
Specifically, when you dive, the smart watch can do several things like this, through the pressure gauge and clock to record your dive in a specific depth of stay time, some devices will record once every 10 seconds, some 30 seconds, this record frequency is not critical, more important is that it can help you record.
Typically, a smartwatch will record your dive at a depth of 10 meters for 20 minutes and then help you calculate the duration of your next dive. Ideally, a smartwatch for diving would keep detailed records of your dives at different depths, but so far, many dive watches don’t do that perfectly.
So, conservatively, divers will have to dive less often and spend a lot of time sitting on the dive boat waiting for the nitrogen to escape, neither of which is the best solution to this dilemma.
Haje Jan Kamps believes that a better approach is to improve the smartwatch.
Many would argue that Apple’s smartwatch can’t do the same, but Haje Jan Kamps says, “Apple’s smartwatch is already very good at recording steps, heart rate, exercise, etc.”
However, these features for recording are not the key, the top priority of this puzzle is the algorithm for calculating the nitrogen level in the human body.
The difficulty of this matter is that since all human bodies are not built the same, and different human tissues absorb and release nitrogen faster and slower, resulting in the accuracy of its recording will be affected.
Therefore, it is very difficult for Apple to design its own diving algorithm. Apple partnered with Oceanic, a well-known diving equipment manufacturer, to develop an application, Oceanic+, that displays information about a diver’s dive depth, time in the water, and water temperature, using Bühlmann’s algorithm to determine how nitrogen changes in the human body.
- Conclusion: Recognized by professionals, see the product on the ground
Apple Watch Ultra, one of the major new products at this event, is a product specifically designed for high-risk, high-intensity professional athletes, and it is the first time Apple has added an Ultra version to the Apple Watch product line.
The product has already been recognized by divers in professional sports scenarios before it was officially shipped. Its performance and design maintain Apple’s usual style, and coupled with the linkage to Apple phones and other devices, it may enhance the buying tendency of professionals.
When consumers actually get their hands on the Apple Watch Ultra, it may spark a new round of discussion about the product.
