Diver for Passion and Work: Nikolai Jokinen

Nikolai Jokinen (40) is a commercial diver who combines his love for adventure with his background in construction. Here’s a story from Nikolai:

“I grew up in Finland, although I was actually born in Sweden. My path to becoming a diver wasn’t exactly straightforward. In 2005, right after the army, I started working as a plumber in Helsinki, where I worked on all sorts of pipes — anything from construction projects to private homes. I was doing fine, but after a year of plumbing, I started feeling an itch: I needed something more.

First Encounter with Diving

I ended up taking a holiday to Vietnam in 2005, and that’s when I first tried diving. It was supposed to be fun entertainment and a chance to learn something new, but it didn’t go well at first. I hated it. My first diving course was three days long, and after the second day, I was ready to quit. But since I’d already paid, I forced myself to go back for that last day. I’m glad I did, though at the time, I just wanted to get it over with, as I didn’t enjoy diving.

Finding the Passion

Next, I stayed near a diving school, and I kept seeing all these divers. They were so enthusiastic, always encouraging me to give it another shot, to try more courses. So I did. I began the next course, and it felt just as bad at first. After the first day, I thought, “No way, I’m not going back.” But something drew me in, and when I returned for the second day, I was the only one in the class. I got all the instructor’s attention, and suddenly everything clicked.

I realized that before, I had felt fear — the claustrophobia I’d experienced underwater — but suddenly it started to fade. By the last day of the course, I found myself loving diving.

Path to Commercial Diving

When the holiday ended, I returned to Finland and went back to plumbing work. But the diving bug had bitten me. One day, after arguing with a friend about underwater welding, I got curious and Googled it. That’s when I stumbled upon a commercial diving school in Finland. I suddenly realized: I could combine my experience in construction with diving. I enrolled in the school in 2006.

The training was intense — a year-long program split into different stages. I did the light diver course first, then went on to the heavy diver course. The heavy diver course taught me how to build underwater, how to handle construction work beneath the surface. It all wrapped up in May 2007.

From there, I found work with a Finnish company specializing in underwater pipelines — gas and water pipes that could stretch for kilometers. I feel so natural underwater that sometimes I’d get so absorbed in the task that I’d forget I was even underwater.

The reality of commercial diving is tough. I have been working all year long, but mostly the jobs are seasonal, from early May through November. Even during summer, diving is slow work, and in winter it can be much slower. In Finland, most of the dives are relatively shallow, around 10 meters deep, but even at that depth, the pressure doubles. Around 20 meters depth something called nitrogen-narcosis starts to kick in, and by the time you hit 50 meters, it’s like being completely drunk — then concentration becomes everything. During the season, I worked most of the weeks 84 hours a week, 7 days straight from 7 am to 7 pm. With only a few off days.

After each season, it would take me months to recover, and basically my schedule looked like working seasonally in Finland underwater and then traveling to different parts of the world.

The Challenges That Keep Me Going

One of my most memorable dives was in Finland, in the middle of January. Everything was frozen, and we had to make a hole in the ice to access a cooling pipe. We went 20 meters down, then made a hole in the pipe that was about 2,5 meters in diameter, and I actually went horizontally through the pipe for 15 meters. It was a very special moment — just me and the water. In a way, it was terrifying, but at the same time, I loved it.

That’s the kind of person I am — I like extreme things, whether it’s skydiving, snowboarding, or diving. Nowadays, I’m into freeride snowboarding, going to unmarked places, and pushing myself just like I did with diving. It scares me, but that’s why I keep going.”