John Bennett (7 March 1959 – 15 March 2004) was a Britishscuba diver who set a world record by becoming the first person todeep dive below a depth of 300 m (1,000 ft) onself-contained breathing apparatus on 6 November 2001.[1][2][3]
Bennett first broke the record in 1999 when he reached 200 m (660 ft) accompanied by Chuck Driver. In 2000 Bennett set a new record of 254 m (833 ft), before his final record-breaking dive to 308 m (1,010 ft) in 2001. Having founded Atlantis Dive in thePhilippines in the late 1990s, Bennett and his world record breaking team, including Ron Loos, Mark Cox and Targa Mann went on to establish Tech Dive Academy in Port Douglas, Australia.[4]
In the early 2000s, Bennett and Loos made the first dives to theMV Princess of the Orient wreck site, which is located offFortune Island, outside and to the south ofManila Bay.[5][6] In 2001, he located the wreck of theImperial Japanese NavydreadnoughtYamashiro in theSurigao Strait (between the Philippine islands ofLeyte andDinagat) through sound scans, but could not confirm it before his death. Confirmation was not made until 2017.
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John Bennett went missing on 15 March 2004 in acommercial diving incident inKorea.[7] He was declared legally dead in 2006, but his body has never been recovered.[8] Bennett was survived by his wife Gabby and their two children, Joshua and Katie.[9][10]
