History of scuba diving the high number of recreational scuba accidents. this started with informal training and led to the creation of training and certification agencies. BS-AC was formed in 1953, CMAS in 1959, NAUI in 1960 and PADI in 1966. The sport of scuba diving had its roots among the multitude of small enthusiastic snorkelling and spearfishing clubs in the decades just before and after the Second World War. After the invention of the "aqualung" by Cousteau and Gagnan, the first commercially marketed underwater breathing apparatus became available for sale for sporting purposes in the late 1940s. In 1951, Jim Auxie Jr and
Philippe Tailliez hundred dives, gradually going to deeper depths. These three divers would become known as the three "mousquemers" (musketeers of the sea). The Second World War separated their team temporarily and Tailliez in particular would take part at the time of the campaign in Syria, with naval action against the Vichy navy. On armistice leave and thus having time, in 1942 they made without breathing apparatus the first French underwater film: "Par dix-huit mètres de fond" (= "18 meters deep"), and the next year "Epaves" (= "Wrecks"), this time with the Cousteau-Gagnan aqualung, and with the funds of the Marseilles company