father, son dead testing Christmas gifts on Christmas day

Henning said:
If you want training, look up Jarrod Jablonski, or GUE diving.

What makes it dangerous... Many things. First and foremost, if you have an emergency, you can't just surface. If you lose light, you can't see your way out, if you are careless about your fin strokes or hands, you will silt out the cave and not be able to see your way out. If you go too far, you will not have the gas to get out. If you turn around at the half gas +500 point and you parner has a gas problem, you both won't have enough gas to get out. If you have an equipment failure without redundant gear, you may not get out. If your gear is rigged like a cluster ****, it can get you hung in a squeeze point and you may not get out. Any problem you have has a limited time to fix, and even if you fix it, if you didn't do so quickly and calmly enough, you won't get out.

Starting to understand? This is why we call this stuff 'technical diving' and we do it with teams of people, not just a buddy. You have buddy pairs but they function as part of a team. Everybody has a plan, and if you aren't at a planned point on time, somebody comes after you following your lines and markers right then, and they are carrying spare gas.
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Not a diver, but thinking about taking up the hobby since the backcountry skiing on the south carolina cost sucks :). But I always figured that crazy currents (i.e. one way in, no way out) was the issue. I used to drink beer and stare at women uhh swim at Vortex Springs in Ponce de Leon FL and they had a gate locking out the divers from the caves. I dunno much about diving but when I heard the news report on the radio driving home from Christmas, it sounded like Darwin at work.
 
I have never understood cave diving. Just seemed like way to many things to go wrong with no way out. Very technical and honestly very little to gain. I feel sorry for the ones left behind.
 
bartmc said:
Not a diver, but thinking about taking up the hobby since the backcountry skiing on the south carolina cost sucks :). But I always figured that crazy currents (i.e. one way in, no way out) was the issue. I used to drink beer and stare at women uhh swim at Vortex Springs in Ponce de Leon FL and they had a gate locking out the divers from the caves. I dunno much about diving but when I heard the news report on the radio driving home from Christmas, it sounded like Darwin at work.
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The thing about cave diving and currents, is that the currents are actually a hedge since they typically flow out, so if you follow the rule of thirds, (one third of your gas in, on third of your gas out, one third for your buddy to get out, you adjust the thirds to whomever uses the most gas of the pair) you'll use less gas going out than coming in. When you get into deco schedules, you stage deco tanks on your way in to pick up on your way out. Darwin is alive and well in the caves of Florida.
 
N2124v said:
I have never understood cave diving. Just seemed like way to many things to go wrong with no way out. Very technical and honestly very little to gain. I feel sorry for the ones left behind.
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Florida caves bore me, but they have done some interesting stuff mapping out the WKPP, it seems that those caves likely link all the way to Mammoth Caverns in Tennessee. I've dove a few of the caves here, but much prefer the wrecks.
 
PPC1052 said:
No, more like the equivalent of taking off VFR into cumulonimbus clouds in formation with your 15 year old son flying the other plane who isn't a licensed pilot.
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I dunno, the real problem was just that they went into something they should have turned around and gone out of, because they thought they could do it.
 
N2124v said:
Very technical and honestly very little to gain.
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It depends. Again, it doesn't have to be very technical if you want to tag along as a "tourist" rather than play underwater Christopher Columbus, if you happen to get a good local, certified guide and do a simple cenote dive for example in the Playa Del Carmen area. And the dive like I said could be absolutely breathtaking and since you are already diving in the area (presumably Cozumel), plenty of great reef diving day after day so a simple change of venue for a day to do 2 cavern dives ads immensely to the overall dive vacation. If I solve some technical problems I may show some underwater photos of me and my son going through Cenote Dos Ojos in the Tulum area. Again, these are relatively simple guided cavern dives, very non-technical, but of course at least you have to be an Open Water diver to qualify. Hundreds (thousands?) of non-technical divers do it safely every year. I have done close to 800 reef dives but only 4 cenote dives and those four stand out as something very special.
 
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http://youtu.be/PVmqK5YZuxM



I suppose there is a way to insert this video a little better than the link. If anyone has a chance to go anywhere near a cave with scuba tanks and not complete training in cave diving I recommend that you watch this video.
 
I don't know much of anything about diving...but reading Shadow Divers, the previously mentioned book about diving on a WWII U Boat, was a real eye opener.

The father and son that died on the wreck suffered horribly...they made very poor decisions, lost their SA, panicked, and surfaced without decompressing.

It's plain to see that diving in a confined space is not for the casual diver.
 
weilke said:
Well, we don't usually see that comment with aviation accidents:

"The sad thing is, I told him, 'One night they’re going to call me to come get you,"' Brooks, who worked in their recovery effort, said.
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I've heard it said once by someone in the SAR community to a pilot they were really worried about.
 
Mason said:
I don't know anything about this stuff. What is it about caves that makes them more dangerous?
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While Henning did a better job(Post #38), in summary:

When in open water (nothing between you and surface), the number of hazards and risks are less and you have the opportunity to return directly to the surface and breathable air.

When in an overhead environment (cave, cavern, inside a wreck), the number of hazards and problems that can/will occur are significantly greater. If a problem occurs, you cannot go directly to the surface.
 
Mason said:
I don't know anything about this stuff. What is it about caves that makes them more dangerous?
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In many cases, you are navigating a 3D complicated maze--very easy to get lost. You can swim one direction, turn around to go back exactly the way you came from, and be completely disoriented, and wrong about which is the way back out. You don't feel the effects of gravity like you do on land, and you are turning in 3D, which can be very disorienting, much like IFR with no artificial horizon. (Bubbles from your regulator help to know which way is up, but its just not the same.) To combat this, cave divers will use a cable/rope that they unreel as the go along that they can then follow back out. But that is an added complication, and something else you can get hung up on. Better hope it doesn't break, either.

No light-- complete darkness if your lighting fails. The lighting you do have doesn't shine very far before it is absorbed by the water. So, you can't really see very far. Better hope the light doesn't fail. Be sure to hold on tight and not drop it. Of course, that is why you carry a spare. And probably a spare for the spare.

Potential zero visibility, even if your lighting doesn't fail, if you stir up the silt/or other debris. Literally, you cannot see your hand in front of your face. This is easy to do if you aren't careful as the fins you wear on your feet are fairly long.

Limited supply of air. The more you exert, the less time you have. The more you panic, the less time you have. The deeper you go, the less time you have. Any problem you have is life threatening, with the clock ticking down for you to fix it or you die. And you know you will die. Maybe not there at that spot. You might fix the problem, only to see that you now lack enough air to make it out alive. The looming threat of death adds pressure to every problem you encounter. Can you keep a cool head, or will you panic? Will your partner/team mates panic?

Potential for equipment entaglement/hang up/ damage from the surroundings, including that reel of cable/rope.

Unlike in an open dive, if you have an equipment failure, you can't just go up. So, if you notice you have much less air than you thought, you can't just cut the dive short and head for the surface. You have to go back the way you came, even if that means it will take longer than you have enough air for. Want to move more quickly? You will over-exert yourself, and breath more quickly, meaning less distance for the same quantity of O2. Meanwhile, you know you can't make it back without dying. Try not to panic though. That won't help.

This is over and above the other issues with open water diving, such as nitrogen narcosis, environmental effects (cold, and fatigue, etc.), decompression requirements, ect.

So tell me again why anyone would take a 15 year old boy that isn't even certified for the dangers of open water diving with them into a cave? I don't have a clue, myself.
 
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I remember back in the early 80s, I got a new 3 gauge set. I was all excited cause now I had a compass - woohoo! As a pilot, now I could navigate underwater. Yeah - babeee!!!!

I went down with my dive buddy off the coast of SoCal, and we set a stake maybe 60' depth, and I was testing my compass out. We swam off a way, I checked the compass dutifully, and then we did a course reversal and swam back to the stake. Not. We weren't even close. Drift currents, course alignment error, and swim arc(left leg stronger than right) made it impossible to use the compass for more than a gross guess at 'uh - North is kinda that direction'. I realized quickly that my compass wouldn't be getting me out of any kind of crap I got into while in the open, much less in any closed space. A real wake-up.
 
Henning said:
Here's how it goes wrong for real, this is on a recovery to top it all off....

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mF4iFJ-G74o
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...and it is all so subtle...

It should be pointed out to those not in the know that there are cavern certs that you earn LONG before you earn a cave cert...

The guy that is the subject of this thread is as big of an idiot as I have ever witnessed...worse than Hoss or Hogg, the guy who hopped into the helicoptor and quickly tore it to shreds...MUCH worse..


This where he was diving...this place is 30 minutes off the road...he had to really make an attempt to put himself and the boy in such peril...


Look at the resources tab...

http://caveatlas.com/systems/system.asp?ID=26&co=US
 
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Kelvin said:
Look at the resources tab...

http://caveatlas.com/systems/system.asp?ID=26&co=US
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They were found at 67' and 127'. They didn't even get out of the Entrance Room. That, or they just made it back to that room when they died.

This is also a pretty deep dive for most folks. 60 feet is kind of the cut off of basic open water diving. (Which the boy didn't even have.)

Note also that there is an upstream and a downstream tunnel. Go into the downstream tunnel, and you will be fighting the current on the way back out.
 
dans2992 said:
I read the book. Awesome read. I learned a lot about diving.

His last dive didn't work out so well, but man, 900+ ft deep in a cave... One hell of a challenge.
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He should have bailed at the first sign of HPNS, it got Sheck Exsley as well. That's the problem with going deep fast on trimix, you have to balance your gas mix so you're narced enough to not get an HPNS hit while not being so narced you're out of control. Most guys aim for an END of around 300', and that's significantly ****ed up. I wouldn't go that deep unless I was on NeOx. It's expensive but you really cut down on your risk factors and deco time and allows for a slower descent. The only time I went below 427' I was in a WASP suit.
 
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PPC1052 said:
60 feet is kind of the cut off of basic open water diving.
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A tad shallow and there aren't really any fixed rules like that.
My second dive after basic certification was a group dive to 85'. A couple more dives and I reached 120'. 130'-140' is a theoretical limit for a recreation diver.
 
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PPC1052 said:
They were found at 67' and 127'. They didn't even get out of the Entrance Room. That, or they just made it back to that room when they died.

This is also a pretty deep dive for most folks. 60 feet is kind of the cut off of basic open water diving. (Which the boy didn't even have.)

Note also that there is an upstream and a downstream tunnel. Go into the downstream tunnel, and you will be fighting the current on the way back out.
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Most everybody goes to 120' on one of their OW certification dives.
 
olasek said:
A tad shallow and there aren't really any fixed rules like that.
My second dive after basic certification was a group dive to 85'. A couple more dives and I reached 120'. 130'-140' is a theoretical limit for a recreation diver.
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Padi's basic open water dive certification has a nominal limit of 60 feet. It's certainly not mandatory, I grant you. (Hence my hedging with the words "kind of") But that is what I am refering to.

http://www.padi.com/scuba/scuba-diving-guide/start-scuba-diving/scuba-certification-faq/

"Q: How deep do you go?
A: With the necessary training and experience, the limit for recreational scuba diving is 40 metres/130 feet. Beginning scuba divers stay shallower than about 18 metres/60 feet. Although these are the limits, some of the most popular diving is no deeper than 12 metres/40 feet where the water’s warmer and the colors are brighter."

The italicised part is what I am refering to. The course materials are pretty clear that they want you to get more advanced training for more than 60'.
 
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Henning said:
Most everybody goes to 120' on one of their OW certification dives.
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Not for the basic. At least not back when I did it. It wasn't until the advanced level that they take you that deep.
 
PPC1052 said:
They were found at 67' and 127'. They didn't even get out of the Entrance Room. That, or they just made it back to that room when they died.
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Information I have seen around the net in several places says they were diving on air and their computers showed a much deeper dive...
 
Henning said:
Most everybody goes to 120' on one of their OW certification dives.
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Kinda difficult to get that deep around the Dallas area during your OW cert dive. unless you bring your shovel. :rolleyes:

So modify to "Most everybody around the coast or deeper lakes around the country..." and that works :)
 
PPC1052 said:
Looks like they do it a little different now.
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I am not sure if anything changed but at least those Master Divers I dealt with on my numerous live-aboard dive trips didn't care if you were 'Deep Diver' or 'Advanced Diver' or none of the above. With the basic PADI Open Water diver they considered you certified and capable reaching 130 ft. Very soon after certification in 1989 I purchased a live-aboard trip to Fiji and on the second day we had a dive to 130' - to see white coral required going that deep at that wall. Same with my teenage son, he got certified say 5 years ago and soon both of us went to Belize for another live-aboard trip and a couple days later we all were diving to 140' in the Blue Hole, regardless whether you had the advanced rating or not and how rookie you were.
 
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I owned and operated a scuba operation for 16 years until 2007 ....we were a PADI,NAUI certified teaching and diving operation. My friend and next door neighbour was one of the top cave divers in the world, Rob Palmer ......l think I know whereof I speak.....if the information about these two guys experience and qualifications are accurate then I can only say one word about their actions....STUPIDITY! Ok.....2 more words as far as the father....criminally negligent!
The father wasn't cave or even cavern trained? :mad2: So he had a death wish...and succeeded! The son wasn't certified? Unless his father had at least an open-water assistant-instructors certification the son shouldn't even have been in the wayer geared-up.

Darwin strikes again and culls the gene-pool.
 
I've been following this whole mess on scubaboard.com (sort of the POA of that world).
These guys are real clowns. Not only was this not their first foray into cave diving without a speck of proper training, and nobody said what exactly "new equipment" they decided to test on this dive, they didn't even have the stuff to do this dive. This dive required at a minimum something like 130 feet and the post mortem on their dive computers show they made it to 227. Not only did they not make it back to their staged tanks, even if they did, they didn't have anywhere near enough gas to make the necessary decompression stops on the staged air (it would have taken over an hour). This is not the depths to be diving on compressed air alone.


Let me put it this way:

Joe Bob, whose been flying for six years, private pilot, no instrument rating gets a new GPS for Xmas. He goes out and fires up his Bonanza and his son, a student pilot who hasn't actually achieved a solo sign off but flies with his dad on a number of occasions, hops into a sky hawk. Now Ace Wingspan, CFI warns Joe that the ceiling is only 800 feet and the visibility is only a mile. It's a class E surface area, but Joe says he'll stay in the pattern, besides they've both flown in worse before. In addition, neither plane has been refueled recently and each only has 30 minutes of fuel on board. Joe and son hop into the planes, climb off into the clag bound to the barbecue place at the airport 25 miles away. The wreckage of both planes are found in respective smoking pits about ten miles from the airport.
 
PPC1052 said:
Note also that there is an upstream and a downstream tunnel. Go into the downstream tunnel, and you will be fighting the current on the way back out.
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A lesson that I learned in a canoe, on a date with a lady who took weekly advantage of her private dock on a river.

"Downstream is only for when you're meeting someone with a car."

You don't realize how much work it's going to be.
 
Here's my intro for my kids to scuba. In 2009 they both graduated from HS. We were going to take a last family big vacation to Australia and one of the things that looked interesting was scuba diving on the reef. They knew I was just OW cert with wreck and asked if I would teach them. Of course, I said 'no'.

After saying no, I got out the equip and we went in the back yard to the pool. I took them one at a time through the paces of equip prep, mounting up, and safety check. Then we went in the swimming pool at a depth of about 4 feet so we could simulate breathing, clearing, and emer procedures. We did buddy breathing, mask removal, and a few other basic steps to get the comfy with the process. After that, we would walk down to the deep end at 9' with full BC, belts with release and I taught them a few more basics.

Once we got to Australia, I had them reading the PADI dive intro books so that they were ready for the instructor. They both got certified while we were there and I had no hand in the process, complete hands off by my and the dive inst did the whole thing.

There is just no way I can understand anyone taking their un-cert kid into a cave situation like that. It boggles the mind. RIP, but really - Darwin strikes.
 
The greater the adventure, the greater the preparation required, including training and test "flights" At some point the adventure exceeds my willingness to do preparation. I stopped at snorkeling.

Sad when something like this happens.
 
flyingron said:
and the post mortem on their dive computers show they made it to 227.
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If this is true this is absolutely amazing piece of information. The cave environment aside, an otherwise certified (and experienced) diver would venture into such depth breathing regular air and taking uncertified diver along.
 
olasek said:
If this is true this is absolutely amazing piece of information. The cave environment aside, an otherwise certified (and experienced) diver would venture into such depth breathing regular air and taking uncertified diver along.
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I've done 220-240 on air many times.
 
What does being a certified diver do for you? Am I not able to go load up on several thousand bucks worth of gear and go cave diving with no experience if I so chose?
 
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