SALVAS

Around 1933, several artisans which produced helmets and different deep diving equipment for the Italian Navy grouped in SIAS - Società Italiana Apparecchi di Salvataggio (Italian company of rescue apparatus) which patented in Italy, the oxygen rebreather produced by English Siebe, Gorman & Co, on behalf of Sir Robert Henry Davis.
Later becoming SALVAS - Società Anonima Lavorazioni Varie Apparecchi di Salvataggio (Anonymous company manufacturer of different rescue apparatus), at the beginning of the Second World Was began designing and manufacturing oxygen rebreathers for the Italian Navy, in its headquarter in Rome, that will continue to do, also for the professional diving sector.

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Its production was also the oxygen rebreather prototype made from an idea of the Alliata of Villafranca Prince, used for the diving shots of the “Vulcan" movie in 1949, performed by Anna Magnani and Rossano Brazzi. In 1950, the "Universal" oxygen rebreather is launched, with two tanks and full-face mask, also supplied to the Italian Navy while, ten years later, a special regulator is born which soon became famous, the Acquasprint, followed in 1964, by the just as much famous "S1" spear fishing gun with compressed air.
In the same year, the company buys Maggi shoes of Castelnuovo Scrivia, Alessandria province, specialized in rubber manufacture. Production is transferred here and, from this moment, all diving equipment from diving suits to fishing guns to regulators will bear the Salvas Sub brand name. Later, the brand changes again to Salvas Shark.

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