Who is ERDI?
ERDI is the Public Safety Diving (PSD) agency that trains police, fire and other public safety organizations in search and rescue techniques in just about every submerged environment known. ERDI trains departments on how to make and maintain their own PSD teams along with being the only public safety diving training agency that has their own insurance and endorses it’s own standards. All ERDI programs are OSHA and NFPA compliant. In fact, some of the largest successful and renown departments use ERDI Programs to conduct their training.
Each and every day public safety divers face the challenges of swift water, black water and a myriad of other potentially harmful situations as part of their job. ERDI offers training to help teams accomplish these missions with the best possible training available.
Many of the ERDI programs can be taught at several levels in accordance with National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) guidelines. The level of participation in the practical portion of the course will determine the final level of certification. The classification levels are: Awareness, Operations and Technician. All ERDI programs are available to public safety professionals regardless of their position within a department.
Awareness – The Awareness level can be completed simply by doing the online academics for the ERDI course of interest. Upon completion of any of the online ERDI Academy courses, an individual will receive an awareness level certificate. For additional insight and understanding of the course, the individual can audit the practical session.
Operations – The Operations level course requires the participant to complete the online academics and also participate in the non-diving segments of the Operations level course taught by an ERDI Instructor. Depending on the program and individual is completing, this portion of the training shows how to properly perform and/or supervise non-diving emergency response duties.
Technician – The Technician level is the final step and requires the participant to complete the required number of practical training sessions under the supervision of an ERDI Instructor. Here the individual will apply what they have learned during the awareness and skill-development sessions, while learning practical lessons that can only be gained.