The direction this thread has taken causes me a bit of concern. One thing that DOES NOT bother me is John’s account of his Mexico cave experience, which I think is as ‘real world’ as it gets. I will come back to that, but will first explain what bothers me.
1. Bennno’s comment, asking John if he thought it was a well-planned dive, was legitimate, but it clearly suggested a poster bias that it was NOT.
2. Pete’s post, which I understand now, but which could have been interpreted to be a criticism of Bennno’s post (and that was my initial take, quite frankly).
3. Bennno’s reply, that he felt like he was being called an ‘a-hole’ (never stated in any previous post, by anyone), and that Pete was somehow simply posting to ‘defend your buddy’ simply escalated the issue, and appeared to be, for the most part, a bit reactionary.
4. John’s reply, was also a bit peevish at the end (the 'piling on' part, and seemed, at least to me, to be out of character.
So, where did communication fail? Hard to define a turning point. I am very pleased that John posted his experience. Honestly, I have been in similar situations before, and I have lived to tell about them. And, I have learned things from them that I might not have learned otherwise. And everyone – new diver, new cave diver, experienced diver and caver - can learn from that post.
Perhaps, the better question for John would be, ‘What did YOU learn from the experience that you would apply in the future?’ And, if John returns to thread after his next week away, I would love for him to post a reply.
From my perspective – and I was not there, I wasn’t involved in the planning, I have never dived with John, or met him (and can hardly consider him a ‘buddy’ who I should defend) - it sounds like a great deal of planning DID go into the dive. I could be wrong, and may be reading more into his description than is justified. I base my presumption on both his description, as it appears to relate to situations that I have encountered, and a presumption about John – based on his many thoughtful, insightful, and informative posts, I have come to see him as an experienced, moderately conservative diver, who thinks through things carefully. As I noted, I could be wrong, and he might be a careless, out-of-control, redneck cowboy diver. But, I don’t think so. So, when he says he planned the dive, I presume a lot of thought went into that process.
Taking this outside of diving, when ‘I wore a younger man’s clothes’ (to paraphrase a popular song), my climbing partner and I did a number of serious, multi-pitch routes, that we had never been on before, and where we planned our climb – gear needed, time to summit, descent route, etc. – on extensive reading of available climbing guides, discussions with other climbers who had done the route before, and a realistic (aka usually conservative) assessment of our own abilities and skills. It simply wasn’t possible to do every route first with another climber who had done it before (and, downclimbing a route was, in not a few cases, not as easy an option as simply turning a dive and retreating to the entrance). And, yes, we had a few stories of our own, where things didn’t go as planned, where we were faced with considerable uncertainty about whether we were on or off route, and anxiety about what to do, where we avoided catastrophe primarily by reasoned decision-making (and, maybe even by a bit of good fortune in a few cases) and lived to tell the story. I even used one of those stories as a case study basis for a seminar on decision-making (in patient care) that i conducted for health care professionals in my former life as an academic.
If someone chooses not to dive a cave circuit without first doing it ‘live’ with a diver who has done it before, that is great. Sound, conservative judgement. If someone chooses to abide by the rule of thirds, without apparent exception, that is great. Sound, conservative judgement. But, for me the most valuable lesson is how John and his buddy handled their
anxiety, when they thought they were on route, but doubt began to creep in, and anxiety increased. That is, unfortunately, one of the OP's questions that was not fully answered in John's post.
Personally, I think it would be great if more divers, newer divers, cavers, etc., read his post. It doesn’t set a bad example; if anything it sets a good one, about how one may deal with anxiety. It does not suggest that he and his buddy ‘got away with’ anything, including poor preparation. Rather, it was a real world lesson, that sometimes you encounter the unexpected, where all available information is not consistent, and you may need to make a tough decision. I would like to better understand how John and his buddy made their decision to continue when they reached their first third, NOT simply imply criticism of what they did, without knowing more. I may, or may not, have done exactly what he did. But, there was nothing in his post that suggested poor planning. What he didn’t have during the dive was line marker data (presumably expected) to easily confirm the fact that they were on plan, which as it turned out, they apparently were. But, I presume they had other visual data (unique features, turns, etc.) to offset the absence of line marker data. I think the better question is the follow-up to one that was poised:
sebach:
are you telling us that you went farther than your thirds on a circuit, without personal recent knowledge of the end of the circuit, relying of the (un)present markers and your recollection of the topography based only on your preparation?
I suspect there were data available, beyond line markers. If divers never proceeded beyond existing line markers, we would have a lot fewer routes available for others.
I have done dives where I planned them thoroughly, and things just didn’t go as planned. In some cases I retreated. In other cases I didn’t. In most cases, anxiety crept into my thinking (John’s actual point) and I was forced to deal with it. And, that was a key point in the very first post in this thread.
