decompression chamber

Two United States Navy sailors inside a decompression chamber about to undergo training

One person chamber

A decompression chamber is a pressure vessel used in surface supplied diving to allow the divers to complete their decompression stops at the end of a dive on the surface rather than underwater. This eliminates many of the risks of long decompressions underwater, in cold or dangerous conditions.

Often the terms "decompression chamber", "recompression chamber" and "hyperbaric oxygen therapy chamber" are used interchangeably. The names reflect the different purposes that the chambers are designed for, rather than their capability. Each is capable of operating in the others' role:

• a recompression chamber is used to treat divers suffering from certain diving disorders such as decompression sickness
• a hyperbaric oxygen therapy chamber is used in a hospital or sporting context to treat patients whose condition might benefit from hyperbaric oxygen treatment, including divers.

Popular Culture

A decompression chamber is used in various films. Most notable was the movie Licence to Kill as Krest was decompressed and expanded to messy effect. Decompression chambers are also used in the game Unreal Tournament where players or bots would enter and enemies would push a button which decompressed them to a pulp.

In the Tom Clancy novel Without Remorse, protagonist John Kelly uses a Navy-standard decompression chamber for extreme interrogation, with fatal results.

See also

• Hyperbaric medicine
• Diving chamber
• Byford Dolphin (decompression accident)

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