Breathe

A Master Diver's Survival Tales

By: Rick Bettua, Rob MacGregor

Narrated by: Daniel Grimes

Rick Bettua should be dead. Many times over. The retired US Navy master diver suffered a devastating attack by a 12-foot bull shark that shredded his thigh from his knee to his hip. By the time he reached the shore 90 minutes later, he’d bled out, he had no pulse, and wasn’t breathing. Yet, emergency medical workers didn’t give up. His miraculous recovery in late 2020 was just the most recent of his numerous underwater life-and-death experiences.

Breathe is Rick Bettua’s survival/adventure story. It’s also a story about perseverance against great odds, and his impressive skills to solve problems—and even save lives—under extreme conditions. It begins and ends with the shark attack and his recovery that defied the odds.

In between are 15 other stories in which Bettua narrowly escaped death during his remarkable 32-year Navy career. In one instance, in a search for a lost piece of a ship’s propeller, he was buried alive 70 feet below the surface and under 20 feet of mud when a tunnel collapsed. When he finally worked his way free after two hours, he then completed the task, so no other divers would be endangered.

The first-person narration takes the listener through Rick Bettua’s evolution as a diver from a kid spear-fishing to one of the elite Navy master divers. He never wasted time to achieve a goal. He started spearfishing when he was just 10 years old, then entered the Navy when he was 17.

Because he loved diving and it was also his hobby, he moved ahead rapidly in his career. He became a master diver only one year after becoming a chief petty officer. He achieved the highest rank possible for an enlisted sailor, master chief, at age 33, one of the youngest ever to attain that rank.

But Bettua’s promotions never kept him out of the water—or out of perilous circumstances. His skills, his fearlessness, and his perseverance helped him survive time and time again throughout his career and beyond it.

©2022 Rick Bettua (P)2023 David N. Wilson

Go Navy

I served in the U.S. Navy, so I am familiar with shipboard life. The stories rendered here are excellent. The narration was very good, with a few mispronunciations - bosun, Commandant.
Really enjoyed this audio version. Well done!

Awesome first person narrative

Great story, great storytelling. My only criticism is that someone should have caught the mispronunciation of Commandant of the Marine Corps.

Fantastic adventures and very well written!

Excellent read or listen and highly recommended for any avid non-fiction adventure reader. Full of knowledge and information as well.

Awesome stories!

This is better than any fictional work about diving. You will laugh, cringe and cry. Probably one of the bios I have ever read.

Wish I could give BREATHE a 10-star review

I read (and/or) listen to 5 books a month and BREATHE, Master Chief Bettua’s memoir is now in my all-time top 10 books ever. I would put it up there with titles such as: A Perfect Storm, Into Thin Air and Shadow Divers.

USN Master Diver Rick Bettua’s story is one of courage, determination, perseverance and the Navy’s Can-Do spirit. He epitomizes the concept of servant leadership, leading his Sailors and Marines from the front and (while never compromising the mission) looking out for their welfare.

Any Naval career spanning 30 years will have a plethora of “Sea Stories” However, Master Chief/Master Diver Bettua’s adventures have spanned the gamut of military diving and seafaring: From the job of ship’s husbandry, towing nuclear subs to combat diving with Force Marine Recon. And when the Master Chief goes on liberty or leave, he takes his speargun, mask and fins and free dives in search of huge pelagics. Rick Bettua’s love of the sea is inspiring.

Master Chief/ Master Diver Rick Bettua is an example of a “Life Well Lived”

Now for the reason why I gave the performance a one-star rating……

The audio mix/recording quality was good and narrator Daniel Grimes voice was OK. However the multitude of mispronounced words and military terms clearly shows that the producer of this audio book did NOT do his/her job. The mispronunciations were so bad and numerous that while listening in my car, that every time the narrator said; BOSS-SON I would scream BOW-SUN

I work in television and audio production. When approaching a project like this, in the pre-production, and pre-reading of the script, you go over any words, phrase or concepts that are not common knowledge and clarify them before you go into the studio. During the actual audio recording, the producer should have gone over correct pronunciation and in post-production have an SME (subject matter expert) take a listen for both production and content

While I counted over dozen mispronunciations, the most glaring where for: Bosun (Boatswain), Coxwain, Commandant and Forecastle. The narrator even mispronounced archipelago and Muay Thai.

This clearly shows an audio producer who was lazy and just pushing this project out the door. If I was the publisher, I would send this back to whomever produced the audio version of this book for a re-edit.

ALL THIS SAID. In spite of the audio production errors (which really bother me because that is my field). I highly recommend this book. In fact, I just ordered the print version for my Library.

Incredible experiences!!

This was a very enjoyable listen. What an incredible life and amazing person. I learned a lot from this book. Thank you for your amazing service to the United States and the world.

Great career adventure

Great Navy career full of adventure.

The only problem I had was that the narrator could not pronounce "Commandant" and it jars you out of the narrative every time.

A great story

Great story....the narrator is good, he just need to learn how to pronounce military ranks and positions properly.

The story was amazing! Narration needed work

I loved this story start to finish. From the perspective as a new diver it was informative. From a former service member perspective it was extremely relatable and I loved that. I only wish the narrator had done his homework with pronunciation. It was like nails on a chalkboard to hear him mispronounce Commandant (cah- men- dant) numerous times. Regardless, if you love adventure and military stories you'll love this book.

Great book!

Fascinating to hear about the training and missions of a Master Diver as well as the sidebar fun of Freediving and enjoying the water.