What is Marla?
Marla calculates the underwater visibility and shows the diving conditions for popular dive spots for scuba-divers, freedivers, swimmers, snorkelers and spearfishers.
About the forecast
The underwater visibility forecast is calculated by analysing satellite images, sea, weather conditions and diver reports.
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Forecasts are provided with a resolution of:
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300m - The British coast
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300m - The Irish coast
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4km - The Australian coast
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The forecast is for the vertical visibility in the water as seen from the sea surface. In future, we aim to use diver reports to also forecast horizontal visibility.
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The visibility forecast doesn’t take into account safe diving conditions, so please check the conditions before you go.
Our Story
Variable undersea visibility is an important consideration for planning diving activities in certain countries, like the UK or Australia. Without putting your head under the water, it's difficult to estimate current underwater visibility. Forecasting future conditions is even harder. Seasoned divers have learnt some of the factors that influence visibility in their local dive spots - but they’re still caught out.
UK Scuba diver: “I’m experienced at predicting visibility, but that doesn't mean I’m good at it”.
UK Scuba-diver: “Last week I dived off a boat and had 25m of viz, the best I’ve ever seen! The next morning, the same spot was 8m. I have no idea why it changed!”
Marla (trading as Ocean AI Ltd) co-founder and freediver Dima Karamshuk, moved from London to Devon. With the sea on his doorstep, he started diving more and more. The variable and seemingly unpredictable visibility was really impacting his enjoyment and safety of freediving. Finding no tool that could do the job already, and seeing other divers on social media have the same problem, Dima wondered if there was a way of predicting the visibility using machine learning. Holding a PhD in applied artificial intelligence, Dima held the perfect set of skills to try and solve this problem for divers.
Recognized for its groundbreaking potential, Marla secured its initial funding from Innovate UK in April 2023 as part of the prestigious UK Smart Grants program. 1 year on, Marla leverages cutting-edge machine learning models, satellite data, weather forecasts, and real-time diver reports to craft a state-of-the-art underwater visibility forecasting algorithm. Marla is able to forecast next day conditions with an error of less than a few metres. Marla has researched, designed and developed a software-as-a-service platform, allowing divers to check the forecasted underwater visibility anywhere around the UK coast. Marla’s ambition is global and Marla has already started experimenting with diving visibility forecasts in Australia.
Marla was awarded a second round of funding from Innovate UK & Marine and Maritime Launchpad in the Great South West in May 2024. Marla is planning to use this new IUK funding to continue improving Marla’s forecasts and creating a valuable tool for 26 million divers around the world.
Forecasting undersea visibility is tough , but we’re up for the challenge. With every divers’ valuable input, we believe in our collective ability to map the undersea conditions across the world’s oceans.
This is just the beginning of our journey!
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