Special Forces Combat Diver Qualification Course | SFCDQC

Special Forces soldiers helocast into the water from a U.S. Army MH-47 Chinook helicopter while on the Special Forces Combat Diver Qualification Course (SFCDQC).

The SFCDQC is a 7-week course run by the Special Forces Underwater Operations School at Key West, Florida.

Special Forces ODAs that specialize in SCUBA and other amphibious infiltration techniques are known as SCUBA Teams or Combat Diver Teams.

Green Berets newly assigned to a Combat Diver position in a SCUBA ODA will first undergo a 2-week pre-SCUBA training with their Special Forces Group before reporting for the SFCDQC.

The Scope of the SFCDQC is as follows: General subjects (dangerous marine life, specialized physical conditioning for combat divers, cardiopulmonary resuscitation, the dive reporting system); waterborne operations; pool training; open-circuit diving; closed-circuit diving; diving physics; physiology and injuries; U.S. Navy diving tables; small-boat operations; surface infiltration; and a course culmination situational training exercise.

Course Description: In January 2010, the SFCDQC implemented a number of changes designed to transform it into a more tactical dive course that better meets the needs of the force.

The changes were the result of a critical-task site-selection board conducted in October 2009.

The board recommended that the course remain five weeks long, but that pool training be reduced from three weeks to one week.

The savings in training time allowed the course to implement the board's other recommendations: SFCDQC has added 12 more closed-circuit dives, including turtle-back dives (combining surface swimming on the swimmer's back with underwater closed-circuit swimming), team dives with equipment, dives with the MK48 rebreather, dives using the new communication system manufactured by OTS, dives using the diver-propulsion device and working or search dives.

SFCDQC has also added four days of training with combat rubber raiding craft and one day of kayak training.

Teams now plan and conduct a double-duck operation (deploying, by parachute, two rubber boats bundled together) and helocast into a turtle-back dive and a beach landing site.

Company C, 2nd Battalion, 1st Special Forces Training Group, runs the Special Forces Underwater Operations School as part of Fort Bragg's U.S. Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School.