←Back to ND Navy Diver — overview, pay, training, civilian translation, reviews
NDE6
Navy Diver
E-6 (Staff Sergeant) · Navy
HEADS UP
ND1 is the LPO rank. The First Class Diver NEC is the gate that closes the Chief board packet — without it, the board reads the gap before it reads anything else. If you do not have it, make closing it the single professional priority of this tour. Everything else is secondary.
The Honest MOS Read
Navy Diver First Class (ND1, E-6) is the de facto section chief on the deck, the person the DIVO names by default when the commanding officer asks who is running the next major evolution. The ND2 was evaluated on whether the dive plan was clean and the section's gear was on schedule. The ND1 is evaluated on whether the section can sustain operations without the DIVO having to manage it.
The operational work at ND1 is at the complex end of the spectrum. You plan and brief major ship husbandry and salvage operations — dual-diver surface-supplied evolutions, night diving, limited-visibility conditions, simultaneous working and standby rotations. The dive package for a major UWILD or a salvage operation has your name on the supervisor line and the commanding officer sees it before the evolution begins. The DIVO's signature on that package depends on your brief being airtight — the hazard assessment real, the decompression profile defensible to the third-order decision, the abort criteria explicit enough that every diver and every tender knows exactly what happens at each contingency.
The LPO function at ND1 means running a section of 6-12 divers — accountability, gear maintenance, training schedules, PQS advancement, physical and medical readiness — and reporting the posture to the LCPO in a format the LCPO can brief to the department head. The ND2s under you are building their Chief board profiles off the eEVALs you write. An eEVAL that does not pick is an eEVAL that fails the ND2 — and the Chief board can tell the difference between a defensible ranking and a courtesy ranking. The ND2 who comes to you for an honest read on their board profile before the submission deadline is the ND2 you serve well; the ND2 who finds out after the board what was missing is the ND2 you failed.
The First Class Diver NEC is either on your record or the professional conversation the NDC is having with you every quarter. Without it, the Chief board packet does not close properly — the board reads the absence of the community's primary professional qualification as a signal about commitment and competency that no evaluation write-up overcomes. If the qualification is incomplete at ND1, it becomes the single professional priority of the tour, not a background task.
The Chief board is the horizon and it is not abstract at this rank. The LCPO is building your record or giving you feedback on why it is not ready. Every operational evolution you supervise is a leadership evaluation — the ND2s and the DIVO are watching whether you run it tight. The goat locker knows who the candidates are before the board results post.
The Master Diver qualification also enters the conversation at ND1 for the serious candidates. Master Diver is the most prestigious qualification in the Navy diving community — earned by fewer than 1% of designated Navy Divers — and the NEC requires demonstrated mastery across all diving systems, procedures, and medical knowledge. The NDC who made Master Diver is the professional model; the ND1 who is not asking about the pathway by ND1 is the NDC who arrives at the Master Diver conversation late.
Career Arc
- 01ND1 pin-on and LPO designation — first section readiness report written and briefed to the LCPO within 30 days.
- 02First Class Diver NEC: either complete it or make completing it the documented first professional priority of the tour — the LCPO and the Chief board both read the timeline.
- 03Complex dive evolution supervisory record built — UWILD reports, salvage evolution post-action reports, multi-diver SSD packages — documented and maintained for the Chief board eEVAL narrative.
- 04eEVAL profile construction — track your own accomplishments with measurable outcomes; brief the input to the NDC before the submission window.
- 05ND2 eEVAL writing begins — your assessment of ND2 performance drives their Chief board timeline; write it with the detail and honesty the board requires.
- 06Chief Petty Officer selection board preparation with the LCPO — record posture, warfare device status, community engagement, and First Class Diver gate.
- 07Master Diver qualification pathway discussion with the NDC — timeline, log requirements, practical evaluation coordination with NDSTC.
Common Screwups
- ×Briefing a complex dive evolution without a written dive plan because 'we covered it verbally.' The commanding officer can request the dive package at any point — on the pier, after the evolution, or in a JAGMAN discovery request. A verbal brief with no paper trail is a paper trail that says the ND1 did not produce one.
- ×Going around the LCPO to the DIVO or XO when the chain has not been exhausted. The chiefs talk. The Chief board sees the pattern. The goat locker knows the name of the petty officer who bypasses the chain before the wardroom does.
- ×Writing an eEVAL that does not honestly represent the ND2's performance because the relationship makes it uncomfortable. The ND2 you over-ranked is the ND2 the board does not select and the ND2 who comes back wondering what happened. The honest eEVAL is the one that serves the sailor.
- ×Treating the post-dive medical screening as optional for experienced divers. The ND1 sets the section culture — if the LPO blows off the screening, so does every ND3 in the section. The first serious DCS presentation that was not caught early is on the LPO's record.
- ×Stopping personal physical maintenance because the leadership responsibilities are heavy. The ND community's professional identity is built on physical capability at every rank. An ND1 who is not at the top of the section's fitness profile is visible for the wrong reason in a community where the senior divers benchmark physical performance as a proxy for professional seriousness.
A Day in the Life
- 0530-0630PT formation. Set or lead the section's PT standard — runs, pool sessions, calisthenics. The LPO who is physically in front of the section is the LPO who earns the right to hold it to physical standards.
- 0630-0730Shower, chow, transit to the dive locker. Morning quarters — accountability, plan of the day, section status brief to the LCPO. Overnight issues surfaced before the workday starts.
- 0730-0900Complex dive plan preparation — for major evolutions, the plan requires a day or more. For routine evolutions, the ND1's plan writing window is the morning before the brief. Dive package complete before the DIVO brief begins.
- 0900-0930Pre-dive brief to the DIVO and dive team — walkthrough of the plan, standby diver confirmed, abort criteria verbalized by the team, DIVO signature obtained.
- 0930-1200Dive evolution — complex evolutions may require the ND1 as the working diver or supervising from the surface. Post-dive log entry and team debrief completed before any other task.
- 1200-1300Chow. Brief admin review — eEVAL input notes, PQS tracker check, any personnel actions pending.
- 1300-1530Afternoon work: ND2/ND3 training evolutions under ND1 supervision, gear maintenance oversight, equipment account review, eEVAL drafting, or LCPO sync preparation.
- 1530-1700Post-evolution gear check, dive log final review, section tracker update. The LCPO sync prep begins here — what does the LCPO need to know for tomorrow's department head meeting?
- 1700-1800Admin and professional development — Chief board prep, Master Diver pathway research, professional reading in the dive manual or relevant technical publications.
- 1800-2100Chow, personal time. The ND1 who is preparing for the Chief board is spending part of this window on professional reading, not just recovery.
- 2100-2200Rack maintenance. Pre-plan for tomorrow's complex evolution if one is scheduled — the dive package that takes two hours to write the next morning could have been outlined tonight.
Weekly Cadence
The ND1 week runs on three simultaneous tracks: the unit's operational schedule, the section's administrative and maintenance posture, and the ND1's own professional qualification build. Monday is the heaviest planning and administrative day — plan of the week briefed, section tracker reviewed and updated, any previous week's gear or log discrepancies closed. Tuesday through Thursday carry the bulk of dive operations and training evolutions. Fridays are post-week close-out and preparation for the following week's complex evolutions.
The section's health reads through how the week runs. A section that functions smoothly — divers show up on time, gear is staged before the brief, the log entries are current, the ND3s know their PQS status — reflects an ND1 who has built the systems. A section that is constantly reactive — gear discrepancies surfaced at the pier, divers who cannot answer basic PQS questions, log entries that need correction — reflects an ND1 who is managing events rather than managing the section.
Chief board preparation is not a separate track — it is woven into the work. The eEVAL accomplishments the board reads are the ones documented throughout the year. The ND1 who tracks their own performance with the same rigor they track the section's maintenance schedule is the one who arrives at the board with a complete, defensible record.
Key Skills — How to Drill Each
- 01Plan, brief, and supervise complex multi-diver salvage or ship husbandry operations — dual-diver SSD, simultaneous working/standby rotations, night diving, limited-visibility conditions.The complex dive plan requires a risk assessment proportionate to the complexity — dual-diver SSD has specific communications and umbilical management requirements distinct from single-diver ops; night and limited-visibility diving changes the abort criteria and the tending protocol. Brief each variable explicitly and have the team verbalize the abort criteria back to you before entry. The DIVO's confidence in the brief is built before the brief starts — by how the package was assembled and whether it anticipated the second-order questions.
- 02Run a section of 6-12 divers — accountability, gear maintenance, training schedules, PQS advancement, physical and medical readiness.The section readiness report the LCPO briefs at department head sync is built from what you track. Run a section-level tracker (accountability, gear status, dive currency, medical exam dates, PQS milestones, PRT scores) and review it weekly. The LCPO should never have to ask for information the ND1's tracker already shows. Accountability and gear maintenance are the table stakes; PQS advancement and eval profile are the leadership indicators.
- 03Manage the section's diving equipment account — inventory, maintenance records, out-of-service tracking, parts requisition.Every item in the section's account has a maintenance schedule and a service record. Run the account like an auditor, not like a user. Discrepancies go to the DIVO before the DIVO finds them — the ND1 who reports a deficiency proactively is the LPO building credibility; the one who has it discovered is the LPO explaining it. Parts requisitions go in when the maintenance window opens, not when the item is already out of service.
- 04Write eEVAL bullets for ND2s and ND3s that the Chief can defend at a wardroom ranking board.The eEVAL bullet has four components: what the sailor did (specific), what the outcome was (measurable), what the impact was (scope), and the recommendation (forward-looking and honest). 'Supervised X dives without incident' is not a bullet — it is a description of the minimum. 'Supervised 14 ship husbandry evolutions across two deployments, produced UWILD reports cited by NAVSEA as the divisional standard, recommended for promotion ahead of peers' is a bullet. Collect the numbers throughout the evaluation period; do not reconstruct them at the end.
- 05Execute First Class Diver-level qualifications — deep air to 190 feet, supervisor-level practical factors.The First Class Diver PQS has a depth requirement, a log requirement, and practical factors evaluated at NDSTC or unit level. The depth requirement requires access to open-water sites with the right bottom profile; coordinate with the unit's training schedule to get the dives on the calendar. The practical factors are evaluated by a senior diver or NDSTC representative — request the evaluation early; the waitlist for senior evaluators is real in a small community.
- 06Mentor ND2s through NEC qualification packets — saturation diver, Master Diver program entry — and be honest about the ADSO, sea requirements, and physical cost.The honest mentoring conversation is about fit, not just eligibility. The saturation diver NEC requires specific physiology, specific assignment access, and a real willingness to operate in a high-pressure environment for extended periods. The Master Diver pathway requires years of sustained performance and documented mastery. The ND1 who tells the ND2 what they want to hear about a NEC pathway is the ND1 who sends an underprepared candidate into a selection process. Be honest about both the path and the candidate.
Manuals & References — What Chapters Matter
- NAVSEA SS521-AG-PRO-010 — U.S. Navy Diving Manual.Full reference familiarity at LPO level — you are the person the DIVO consults when the procedure is non-standard or the situation is not in the book. Own the entire manual, with deep knowledge of the chapters your unit operates against most frequently.
- OPNAVINST 3150.27 — Navy Diving Program.LPO-level knowledge includes the unit certification audit requirements, the log audit procedures, the diving medical officer relationship, and the command program inspection criteria. The ND1 who knows this instruction well enough to conduct a self-assessment before the NAVSEA surveyor arrives is the ND1 who produces a clean inspection report.
- NAVSEA S9522-AA-HBK-010 — Diver's Handbook of Oceanography.Environmental planning at LPO level includes the ability to assess a non-standard dive site without established baseline data. Current tables, tidal prediction, and thermocline identification are the ND1's planning tools for sites the unit has not operated before.
- MILPERSMAN 1220-410 — ND service obligations, Master Diver eligibility, saturation diver pipeline.The Master Diver program entry requirements and the saturation diver NEC prerequisites are in this reference. The ND1 who is mentoring ND2s toward these qualifications needs to know the current requirements from the source, not from memory of a prior cycle.
- NAVPERS 18068 Vol II — NEC catalog for the diving community.Source-rating requirements for the saturation and Master Diver NECs are in the catalog. Verify the current requirements before advising ND2s — NEC award criteria change and an outdated recommendation costs the sailor time.
- CPO 365 / Chief Petty Officer Induction Program materials.The Chief board packet conversation is active at ND1. The LCPO is reading your evaluation profile and your warfare device posture. CPO 365 is the program that shapes the professional development of the chief-select; understanding it before selection is the ND1 who arrives to the induction program already knowing the language.
Standards — How to Hit Each
- First Class Diver NEC — complete it or document a timeline the LCPO and Chief board can read as credible.If the NEC is incomplete at ND1 pin-on, create a written qualification completion plan with milestone dates and brief it to the LCPO in the first 30 days. The plan shows the board that the absence is a timeline issue, not a commitment issue. The qualification itself requires scheduling — request the deep-air dives through the unit's training calendar, not through informal requests.
- Chief Petty Officer selection board packet under construction with the LCPO reviewing it.Ask the LCPO to read the evaluation profile as if they were on the board — what is the narrative, what is missing, and what is weak. The LCPO's read before the submission window is more useful than any post-board analysis. Give the LCPO the information to brief up accurately by tracking your own accomplishments throughout the evaluation period.
- Section gear maintenance, dive log audit, and medical readiness clean — every cycle.Review the gear status, log audit, and medical readiness tracker before every weekly LCPO sync. If there are open items, have the disposition plan ready before the sync — not the problem, the plan. The ND1 who walks into the LCPO meeting with a problem and a plan is the LPO building trust. The ND1 who walks in with only the problem is the LPO the LCPO manages.
- PRT at Excellent or better — the physical standard for a section chief in a physically defined community.Train year-round for the PRT categories; do not peak and valley. In the ND community, the LPO who is not at the top of the section's physical performance is sending a signal the senior divers and junior divers both read. The community has seen ND1s who ran their sections brilliantly on paper and showed up undertrained physically — the combination does not read as credible.
- eEVAL submissions for ND2s and ND3s that pick at the board level — measured by actual selection outcomes.The evaluation is the product. Review every bullet for specificity, measurability, and forward recommendation before submission. The ND1 who tracks their section's selection outcomes over multiple board cycles has evidence of whether the eEVAL writing is producing results — and the LCPO has the same data.
Technical Mistakes — Concrete Consequences
- Briefing a complex dive evolution without a complete written dive package.The JAGMAN that follows a diving casualty begins with the dive plan. A verbal brief with no supporting documentation is a document that says the supervisor did not produce one. The commanding officer can ask for the package at any time — during the evolution, at the post-action review, or in a legal proceeding. The written package protects the ND1 and the unit; its absence does the opposite.
- Letting a gear discrepancy stay on the tracker without a disposition plan because parts are on order and the ship is underway.The DIVO needs to know and the commanding officer needs to know — specifically the equipment status, the workaround plan, and the expected resolution timeline. An undocumented discrepancy on an out-of-service piece of diving equipment is a readiness problem and a safety risk simultaneously; the ND1 who surfaces it proactively is not creating a problem, they are managing one.
- Writing an eEVAL recommendation the ND2's record does not support.The Chief board reads the entire record alongside the evaluation narrative. An evaluation that recommends promotion ahead of peers for a sailor whose record is thin looks like advocacy rather than assessment — and the board reads it that way. The ND2 does not advance, wonders why, and the ND1's credibility with the LCPO drops when the post-board debrief happens.
- Bypassing the LCPO to go directly to the DIVO or XO on a personnel or equipment issue.The chiefs talk and the chain of command is not optional in the goat locker culture. The petty officer who runs around the LCPO is the petty officer the Chief board sees as someone who will run around the Chief. The ND1 who builds the habit of chain exhaustion first — and only escalates after — is the one who is trusted with more authority as a Chief.
- Treating the post-dive medical screening as optional for the senior divers in the section.The ND1 sets the section's medical screening culture. If the LPO skips the screening because 'he knows his body,' the ND3s adopt the same logic — and the first DCS presentation that went unreported produces a treatment delay that converts a manageable hit into a neurological event. The ND1's name is on the dive plan and the section's culture is attributed to the LPO.
Career Decisions at This Rank
- First Class Diver NEC — close it this tour or it follows you to the Chief board as a gap.The First Class Diver NEC is the community's primary professional qualification. The Chief board reads its absence before anything else in the record. The ND1 who has not completed the qualification by the time the board selection window opens is at a material disadvantage that no evaluation write-up fully overcomes. If the qualification is incomplete, make it the explicit first priority of the ND1 tour — request the deep-air dives through the training calendar, get on the practical evaluation waitlist at NDSTC, and brief the completion timeline to the LCPO.
- Chief board timing — submit when ready vs stretch for an early board.The Chief board packet is read as a whole — evaluation marks, warfare device, qualifications, community involvement, and the narrative the LCPO builds from all of it. Submitting before the First Class Diver NEC is complete or before the evaluation profile reflects LPO-level performance weakens the packet the board sees. The honest LCPO conversation about board readiness is the most valuable thing an ND1 can have before the submission window.
- Master Diver pathway — begin the serious preparation now or after Chief.The Master Diver qualification requires years of sustained performance, log accumulation, and demonstrated mastery across all Navy diving systems. The ND1 who begins building toward it intentionally — understanding the PQS requirements, accumulating the right log profile, building the NDC relationship that produces a credible endorsement — is materially ahead of the NDC who begins the conversation at E-7. Most Master Divers began planning the qualification at ND1 or earlier. Ask the NDC what the pathway looks like from here and start building the prerequisites.
- Sea duty vs shore duty at ND1 — what the Chief board actually weights.Sea duty at MDSU or UCT during the ND1 years produces the evaluation marks and operational experience the Chief board rewards. Shore duty (NDSTC instructor, NAVFAC, recruiting) offers stability and career broadening but a different evaluation narrative. For the Chief board, the operational LPO who supervised complex evolutions and ran a section is a stronger candidate profile than the instructor who was excellent at the schoolhouse. If personal circumstances (family, health, timing) make the shore duty request necessary, make it — but understand the trade-off clearly before the request goes in.
- eEVAL advocacy — how to influence your own evaluation narrative.The evaluation the NDC writes reflects what the NDC knows. The ND1 who documents measurable accomplishments throughout the evaluation period — dive evolutions supervised, survey reports cited by higher authority, ND2s who advanced, equipment discrepancies caught and resolved — and briefs those accomplishments to the NDC before the submission window is the ND1 who controls the board narrative. The ND1 who relies on the NDC to remember the year's performance is the ND1 who finds gaps in the record after the board.
How the Seat Varies by Unit Type
- MDSU 1 or 2 — LPO in an operational salvage and ship husbandry unitND1 at an MDSU is the highest-tempo version of the LPO role — real operational callouts, complex evolutions with external stakeholders (ship's force, NAVSEA, geographic combatant commanders), and evaluation marks that reflect performance in challenging conditions. First Class Diver log accumulation is fastest here. The Chief board reads MDSU LPO experience as the most directly relevant to NDC duties.
- UCT 1 or 2 — LPO in an underwater construction unitND1 at a UCT manages a section through sustained project work rather than response operations. The leadership profile is real but the evaluation narrative reads differently — project completion, quality metrics, and NAVFAC customer satisfaction rather than emergency response. The First Class Diver log accumulation is achievable; the technical complexity of construction diving produces a different competency profile than salvage.
- NDSTC instructor duty — ND1 in a schoolhouse leadership roleAn ND1 on instructor duty at NDSTC has visibility with the schoolhouse chain, builds training expertise, and contributes directly to the community's professional pipeline. The evaluation marks from an NDSTC billet reflect different competencies than an MDSU LPO billet. The First Class Diver log accumulation slows; the instructor who is not actively requesting operational dives through the NDSTC program will arrive at the Chief board with a log profile that is thinner than MDSU/UCT peers.
- Ship's diving locker senior diverThe ND1 at a ship's diving locker is often the most senior diver aboard and the DIVO's direct technical advisor. The section is smaller and the administrative weight is real. Operational dive frequency is lower than MDSU/UCT and First Class Diver log accumulation is harder. The evaluation marks reflect the ND1's technical authority on a platform where divers are a small, specialized community — a strong evaluation from a ship's CO reads well but the operational experience narrative is thinner.
What Good Looks Like at This Rank
The good ND1 is the LPO the DIVO names in the operational brief without pausing — because the dive package was complete before the brief was called, the section's gear has no open discrepancies that were not already flagged, and the ND2 eEVALs pick above expectation at the board. The commanding officer of the ship they UWILD quotes the survey report when briefing the maintenance cycle to the type commander.
The good ND1's First Class Diver NEC is either on the record or the subject of a documented timeline the LCPO briefs as credible. The Master Diver conversation has been had with the NDC and the pathway is understood, even if the qualification is years out. The Chief board preparation is active — the LCPO has read the record and the ND1 knows what the gaps are.
The concrete observable when the unit gets an unannounced NAVSEA diving program review: the ND1's section logs are current, the gear account has a maintenance tracker that covers every item, and the ND1 can answer every program inspection question from memory. The NAVSEA surveyor does not find a discrepancy the ND1 did not already know about.
Preview — The Next Rank
NDC (Chief Petty Officer, E-7) is where the job description, the cultural identity, and the institutional weight all shift at the same time. The anchors mean the goat locker is yours, the deckplate reads the command's standard off how you stand at quarters, and the professional horizon becomes the Master Diver qualification and the command master chief pipeline.
The ND1 supervised the section. The NDC runs it — the LCPO function, the Chief's Mess membership, the department head sync as the senior enlisted diving voice, and the wardroom relationship that the ND1 observed but did not own. The evaluation marks the NDC writes pick or do not pick the ND1s and ND2s below them; the professional consequences of the eval are real and visible to everyone in the section.
The Master Diver qualification is the community's most visible professional standard and it belongs to the NDC tier. Fewer than 1% of designated Navy Divers ever earn it. The NDC who is actively pursuing it — building the PQS, accumulating the log, maintaining the physical standard — is the one the MDSU or UCT commanding officer cites in the operational brief. The NDC who is not pursuing it is visible to the Chief's Mess, to NDSTC, and to the next selection board in ways that do not help the career.
FAQ
ND E6 — Frequently Asked Questions
Q01What does a E6 ND (Navy Diver) actually do?
As ND1 you are the de facto section chief on the deck, the dive supervisor for complex evolutions, and the LPO for your section of divers.
Q02What's the most important thing to know as a E6 ND?
ND1 is the LPO rank.
Q03What does a typical day look like for a E6 ND?
Time-blocked day at the E6 ND rank tier: 0530-0630 PT formation. Set or lead the section's PT standard — runs, pool sessions, calisthenics. The LPO who is physically in front of the section is the LPO who earns the right to hold it to physical standards, 0630-0730 Shower, chow, transit to the dive locker. Morning quarters — accountability, plan of the day, section status brief to the LCPO. Overnight issues surfaced before the workday starts, 0730-0900 Complex dive plan preparation — for major evolutions, the plan requires a day or more. For routine evolutions,…
Q04What mistakes get E6 ND soldiers fired or relieved?
Briefing a complex dive evolution without a written dive plan because 'we covered it verbally.' The commanding officer can request the dive package at any point — on the pier, after the evolution, or in a JAGMAN discovery request. A verbal brief with no paper trail is a paper trail that says the ND1 did not produce one; Going around the LCPO to the DIVO or XO when the chain has not been exhausted. The chiefs talk. The Chief board sees the pattern.…
Q05What career decisions matter most at the E6 ND rank tier?
First Class Diver NEC — close it this tour or it follows you to the Chief board as a gap — The First Class Diver NEC is the community's primary professional qualification. The Chief board reads its absence before anything else in the record. The ND1 who has not completed the qualification by the time the board selection window opens is at a material disadvantage that no evaluation write-up fully overcomes. If the qualification is incomplete, make it the explicit first priority of the ND1 tour — request the deep-air dives through the training calendar,…
Q06What's next after E6 for a ND (Navy Diver) in the Navy?
NDC (Chief Petty Officer, E-7) is where the job description, the cultural identity, and the institutional weight all shift at the same time.
Q07What manuals and regulations does a E6 ND need to know cold?
NAVSEA SS521-AG-PRO-010 — U.S. Navy Diving Manual (full reference familiarity; you are the expert the DIVO comes to with the policy question during a non-standard evolution).; OPNAVINST 3150.27 — Navy Diving Program (LPO-level knowledge: unit certification audits, log review requirements, diving medical officer support requirements, and command program inspections).; NAVSEA S9522-AA-HBK-010 — Diver's Handbook of Oceanography (environmental planning reference at supervisor/LPO level).
This playbook has no tips yet. Be the first to share what you know.
Published by the Honest MOS Editorial DeskVerified against DoD/.gov sourcesUpdated May 2026Editorial standards