[SMHarman]

^ as he said, my policy states...

when the Beneficiary is engaging in the following sports and activities the Excess is increased to GBP 200 (and use of a Form E111 does not negate this increased excess: abseiling; American football; baseball; bungee
jumping; canoeing; clay pigeon shooting; deep sea fishing; fell running; go-karting; hang gliding; hockey; horse riding; hot air ballooning; jet biking and jet skiing; martial arts; microlighting; mountain biking off tarmac; mountaineering; parachuting; paragliding; parascending; polo; potholing; quad biking; rock climbing; rugby; skidoo; scuba diving deeper than 30 metres; tour operator safari (where You or any other tourists will be carrying guns); trekking; war games/paint ball; white water canoeing and rafting; yachting more than 20 nautical miles from the nearest coastline, bob-sleigh, heli-skiing, ice hockey, luge, paraskiing, skeleton, ski-jumping, ski-stunting.

†œSpecial Sportsââ‚Ã⠀šÃ‚¬Ãƒâ€šÃ‚ÂÂ� means boxing; cave diving; horse jumping; hunting and hunting on horseback; professional sports; solo canyoning; solo caving; solo diving; solo mountain-climbing; steeple chasing; any form of motor racing, speed, performance or endurance tests.

and excludes

Participation in extreme sports where special equipment, training and preparation are required.

Infact last time I dived (in Sharm, well Sharks Bay with Camel actually) I planned to do my Advanced Open Water while I was over there and specifically contacted my insurers before I went as part of the course involved going down to 40m and getting narked (while under the supervision of your divemaster) to understand the effects and how it affects you.
This was insured as it was supervised etc.
You are also insured as a rec. diver if on accident you end up below 30m. This guy planned this dive, did it solo? and didn't read his insurance policy, despite knowing that AOW limits you to 30m depth. Your training makes that quite clear.

If you buy 3rd Party car insurance and have your claim denied for a replacement car when you write yours off you don't go winging to the papers, he bought rec. diving insurance and did "Special Sports" diving off the back of it and as such is not covered.

Originally Posted by Xaccers

At 30m you can see the air pressure needle move (you're taking in 4 lungfulls with every breath unless my calculations are wrong, think it's 1atm extra for every 10m)

and at 50m... Thats 6 ATM, you've already compressed the air in the tank down to a 6th of what is was at sea level.

I wonder what was down at 50m that he wanted to see or was he just going for a personal depth record (a stupid thing IMHO), at that depth you air lasts minutes or parts of minutes and your dive computer will be telling you that you have seconds before you need to start your ascent, it's cold and dark too, there are some deep wrecks there but around 40m, not 50.