It's comforting to believe that Ben was a careless, reckless, lock picking, daredevil, because it makes you believe this could never happen to you. Just like you, just like the pioneers of cave diving, Ben was out exploring, having fun and felt comfortable with the risk he was taking. Who can be sure that things would have been different if he had a few more certs stuck on his wall? Who's sure that, had he had a buddy, the outcome would have been different? (Recall and incident with a diver stuck in a cave a no amount of buddies could change the outcome). But it is comforting to believe this could never happen to me because, I leave my cert card at the shop, I dive with buddies, I have every cert card in the book, I am just ,.. oh so superior!
It wasn't the lack of certs that got him in trouble ... it was his casual attitude toward a dive that was anything but casual. It IS easy to believe that Ben was a careless, reckless, lock picking daredevil ... because that's just about what it would take to put yourself into a situation like that in the first place. The only other possibility is that he was suicidal.
We have a somewhat experienced diver without the formal or extensive training needed making a dive that from what I hear is way above his skill and knowledge. That I can understand - sadly, it happens.
I can't understand it at all. The fact that he made it as far as he did in planning and setting up this dive tells me he was a very intelligent young man. But I will never understand what drives someone like that to take the risks he did without proper training and preparation. Sadly, it does happen ... and the people it happens to usually become casualties of their own poor judgment.
What I don't understand is how he can get himself so far back into a VERY restricted area that is SO bad, the people with the skill, knowledge, and planning can't get to. I understand the whole drysuit/wetsuit issue - but it still confuses me how he can get in such a tight spot, that deep and that far back.
Because people with the skill, knowledge and planning understand the risks that going there involve ... and because they have the skill, knowledge and planning, they are able to make a rational decision that the risk isn't worth the potential reward of going there.
That's really rather the point.
"Mondays 8 tank deep penetration solo dive. I will post something on it later. To sum it up... 4 stage, 2 bottom, and 2 deco bottles for a 232 minute 148 ft deep cave dive with a total penetration to the end of system at aprox. 810 ft!!!!"
Hopefully this will help provide some info. Though I have neve been into the cave, I'm told his numbers were not correct.
With no cave training, no extended range training, no deco training, and a completely inappropriate choice of breathing gas for that depth and environment, that dive plan is a classic recipe for disaster.
First of all, since a cave like Vortex is well known and open to the public, why not do more to insure it can be dived safely? Why not install, for example, (1) a minimal system of underwater lights and/or (2) emergency air (breathing gas) stations at key jumps and/or (3) some emergency signaling device and/or (4) highly reliable (not breakable) lines, in a highly public cave.
Sure ... why not penalize everybody else over one man's irrational choices. Sounds perfectly reasonable.
Except for the fact that it would just encourage others to attempt the same thing that got this fellow in trouble.
But you don't KNOW that he was narced. Could he have been? Yes. Was he? We don't and will never know. You could make multiple, seemingly idential dives to say 120ft, and only get narced on one dive, or not get narced on one dive, and no one really knows why this is. A friend of mine has been (briefly) to 157' on air (I saw he log from his dive computer and yes, it was deeper than he should have gone
) and did not get narced, but has at shallower depths. You can't simply say someone was narced because they where on air and deep because it doesn't affect every one every time.
Nonsense ... anyone who goes to those depths on air is narced. They might be able to function within reason at that depth ... as long as nothing goes wrong. But they're no different than the drunk who drives home every night with an elevated blood alcohol level. Some folks can handle it better than others ... and as long as nothing goes wrong they can function reasonably well. But their ability to recognize and respond to something out of the ordinary is impaired ... and if they have a problem they will most definitely have a harder time dealing with it because of their impairment.
It troubles me that some in this conversation appear to want to hold the site employees somehow responsible for this death ... or have the expectation that modifying the site or the policies of the site would somehow mitigate the potentialf for it to happen again. It won't ... because no matter what you do, someone sufficiently determined to take risks will get themselves in a bad way ... and their surviving family and friends will seek someone else to blame for it. This was a very preventable accident ... all it would've taken is some reasonably responsible decisions on the part of the deceased. I have to believe this young man knew he was doing something he shouldn't be doing, and he chose to do it anyway. He chose the risks, he paid the price ... nobody else should have to pay it for him.
I'm sorry for the loss he's caused his family and friends ... but it's all squarely on his shoulders. Humans are generally pretty good at overestimating their abilities ... and I don't doubt that had something to do with what occurred. But to make SO MANY bad choices on a single dive displays such a complete lack of regard for his own safety that I have to believe that the outcome was inevitable ... if not on this dive, then on a subsequent one.
The sad reality is that there is nothing to be learned from this young man's death ... because anybody who would be willing to take heed and learn from this incident would never consider doing what he did in the first place ... and anybody who would consider it won't listen, no matter what anybody says.
And therein lies the real tragedy ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
