Patriot Diving

A veteran-run shop built around adaptive diving

Some of you might know Patriot Diving from Patriot Scuba. Roger Shields was the Store Manager, and Allie Bernardo had been diving with the shop for years while volunteering with Patriots for Disabled Divers events. In early 2023, when Jeff and Merial decided to leave the retail dive business, Roger and Allie chose to carry on the tradition of a veteran-run PADI 5 Star IDC scuba shop in Washington D.C.

Adaptive diving is the specialty here, and the team works with anyone who comes looking for the mental and physical benefits the sport can offer. The waterfront base keeps an Adaptive Services Facility alongside an onsite classroom, retail shop, free Wi-Fi, food and drinks, air conditioning and parking. Air fills, equipment sales and rental — including kids' gear and scooter (DPV) rental — round out the services, with 32 PADI Instructors and English, Spanish and Filipino spoken.

The course list runs from Try Scuba for the first time with PADI Discover Scuba Diving, from USD 100 over roughly three hours, through the PADI Open Water Diver Course and PADI Advanced Open Water Diver, plus Enriched Air, referral options and a Scuba Refresher for anyone getting back in the water. Dives take place at Lake Phoenix, where freshwater fish, turtles, eels and echinoderms, molluscs and crustaceans are among the life on show. Whether you want to become an ambassador for the oceans or climb the professional ratings from Dive Master toward the PADI CDTC, this is a shop set up to take you there.