Capt. Michael R. Ange, Ph.D.
Expert Witness | Forensic Consultant | Certified Mediator | Dive Professional | Author
A Career Built on Expertise. A Reputation Built on Results
For more than three decades, Michael R. Ange has operated at the highest levels of the diving and maritime industries — as an entrepreneur, executive, author, international trainer, and forensic consultant. Whether retained as an expert witness in complex litigation, engaged as a business consultant by major manufacturers, or sought as a speaker by professional organizations from Portugal to Singapore, Mike brings an uncommon combination of operational experience, academic credentials, and real-world results to every engagement.
Professional Services
Expert Witness & Forensic Consulting
Capt. Ange has served as expert witness and forensic consultant in diving and maritime litigation for plaintiff and defense counsel alike, from Massachusetts to California and internationally. With nearly three decades of active case work, in-house forensic inspection facilities, and credentials that span operations, training standards, equipment design, and maritime law, he is among the most comprehensively qualified diving and maritime expert witnesses available to retained counsel.
→ Learn more about Expert Witness & Forensic Consulting
Business Consulting & Program Development
Through TDE, Inc., established in 1996, Capt. Ange has provided risk management, marketing, product development, and program design services to major companies in the diving and maritime industries for nearly three decades. His client list includes Dräger Safety, Poseidon Diving Systems, Waterproof Diving International, SCUBA Schools International, and others. He has managed the North and South American operations for Dräger Dive Americas, the North American division of Waterproof Diving International, and served as Global Brand Manager for BARE, the exposure suit division of Huish Outdoors, one of the diving industry’s largest equipment groups globally.
When Capt. Ange’s regional sales results for Dräger caught the attention of senior management — a 600% increase in the Southeast U.S. — he was recruited to lead the Americas division. The challenge was significant: Dräger’s technically superior diving equipment was losing market share because the brand felt too industrial for a largely recreational market. His solution was to reframe the entire positioning — replacing lab coats with Hawaiian shirts, stark trade show booths with Tiki Huts, and technology posters with pin-up calendars, while maintaining the technical credibility senior management required. The result was a 300% sales increase across the Americas division and the DEMA Best Brand Representation Award.
“Capt. Ange accepts a limited number of consulting engagements annually for organizations seeking executive-level marketing, risk management, and product or program development expertise in the diving and maritime industries. To discuss your project Contact Mike.
Dive Instruction & Travel
Capt. Ange offers a limited schedule of private and small group instruction across recreational, technical, and public safety diving disciplines through SDI, TDI, and ERDI. All programs are custom scheduled. For course information and scheduling visit SEAduction.com — his dedicated dive instruction and travel site.
→ Visit Training with Mike OR SEAduction.com
Publications, Speaking & Seminars
Author of Diver Down: Real World SCUBA Accidents and How to Avoid Them (McGraw-Hill, 2005) and nine diving training and instructional texts, Capt. Ange has published more than 250 articles in major diving journals and magazines worldwide. As Contributing Technical Editor and Training Editor at Scuba Diving Magazine from 2001–2009, his Lessons for Life column was the publication’s top-ranked column for years. He remains an active speaker and seminar presenter for professional, academic, and industry audiences internationally.
→ View Books, Publications & Seminars
Career Highlights
Capt. Ange’s career traces an arc that few professionals in any industry can match — from founding SEAduction Dive Center in Dunn, North Carolina in 1991, one of the first full technical diving operations in the United States, running charters into the Graveyard of the Atlantic and drawing students from across the U.S., Europe, and Latin America, to managing executive-level operations across three continents, writing the training standards that became the global benchmark for public safety diving, and serving as an expert witness in cases from Boston to Los Angeles.
He served as International Training Director for ERDI — the world’s largest public safety diver certification agency — and as Global Training Director for the Technical Division of SCUBA Schools International, the world’s second largest diver certification agency. He has trained members of the Portuguese National Fire Service and National Police, Force Protection personnel in Thailand, and emergency services professionals across three continents. He has logged more than 6,000 dives across four continents and the South Pacific, including expeditions to the USS Monitor and serving as technical clearance and explosive ordnance recovery dive team leader for the sinking of the USNS Vandenberg.
Prior to his diving career he served in the U.S. military and as a law enforcement officer and criminal investigator, with training from the U.S. Army Criminal Investigations School and the FBI Law Enforcement Officers Training School. He holds a U.S. Coast Guard Merchant Marine Master License and is a Florida Supreme Court Certified Mediator. He has given sworn testimony before U.S. Congress and Presidential Advisory panels, contributing to the legislative recognition of Gulf War Illness.
He graduated with honors from Appalachian State University, pursued graduate study in law at a top-ranked U.S. law school and in admiralty law in the United Kingdom, and holds a Ph.D. in Adult Educational Psychology.
Outside the Office
Mike is an avid reader, long-distance motorcyclist, and off-road enthusiast — and when possible, still prefers to be underwater on a deep wreck of historical significance.
Connect Across the Brand
Expert Witness & Forensic Consulting: mikeange.net ← you are here
Dive Instruction & Travel www.seaduction.com
M.R Ange, Author: Current Fiction Project www.mikeange.com
Contact
For expert witness, forensic consulting, mediation, or business consulting inquiries:
Safe Diving,
Mike A