30m dive pool plan for Bedford

Britain could be about to get its own Nemo 33-style diving facility, if the owners of a Bedfordshire activity centre get their way.

Twinwoods Adventure centre in Bedford (about 50 miles north of London) already caters for adrenalin junkies with its indoor skydiving, climbing, shooting and racing (and BASE jump simulator, no less.) But the owners now plan to add scuba diving to the menu.

sounds very similar to Nemo 33

They’ve released details of a proposed 30-metre deep pool to be built on the existing site. 20 metres would be dug out, with the remaining 10 above ground level.

It will be filled with 4.4 million litres of thermal water (does that mean ‘warm? – Ed). The considerable power needed to run the pool will be excess energy drawn from the skydive chamber.

The pool will have glass windows looking from the on-site restaurant into the water.

The proposal sounds very similar to Nemo 33, which is a dedicated diver training and leisure pool on the outskirts of Brussels, Belgium. A similar 40-metre deep pool attached to a hotel in Italy called Y-40 opened last year.

Plans for these kinds of pools here have been announced before, although none has come to fruition in the UK. There’s currently a crowdfunded plan for a 50-metre deep pool in Essex, albeit with an eyewatering £25m pricetag. At time of writing, pledges  had only reached about £13k…

Twinwoods Adventure says its pool will cost £3.6m, take two years to build and generate 20 new jobs. There’s no indication what stage they’ve reached in the development process, but let’s hope this 30-metre deep indoor scuba diving facility becomes reality.