Given the recent events regarding fatalities of divers in caves I thought I would post this in a forum where it would gather the attention of many divers and not just those interested in accidents and incidents or cave diving.
Today I was working with a student finishing up a class in Paradise Springs. At the bottom of Paradise is a small cave were the depth gets to be about 148 ft. My student and I had planned to dive just down to the Grim Reaper sign at 100 ft and multi level our way back up. In comes another team of divers and Yes you guessed it they were not cavern certified. My student who had not yet hit his turn pressure had hit his planned bottom time and still had 8 minutes NDL remaining so we held to our plan and started to head up. At this moment in a blur of silt comes the other team straight down the slope and after pausing momentarily to look at the Grim Reaper sign they continue down and go straight into the cave passage silting as they go and no guidelines running.
I am able to get to the second diver before he can penetrate the cave opening. This team of divers have only two lights between them. I write on my slate asking this diver if he is cavern cert and to no surprise I learn he is not. I have this diver and my student move to the yellow rope, I tell my student to watch him and for them to both hold the line, 5 min NDL remaining second dive of the day and I still have 2500 psi in my doubles after both dives. I look back at the cave opening and wait a good minute to see if the first diver would come out. NOPE not happening! - ok 4 min NDL a quick prayer GOD AMEN and I tie off a safety reel to the yellow rope and into the silt cloud I go. At 145 ft I come accross the diver thanks to the glow of his hand held light, his only light. The diver is waving his hand trying to, I believe read the "TOMBSTONE" only adding yet more silt. Everything is already a whiteout, now you think that would have been enough to tell him to stop! I get to him and his big eyed expression and inability to acknowledge me tells me this guy is NARCED! He quickly turns and decides to go deeper into the silt pit, I grab his tank valve and the guy just stops. I assume this was the work of GOD here because I was able to turn this guy in any direction. HE was frozen!
Somehow holding this guy and taking up my reel I manage to exit the cave passage and get back to the divers on the rope. I notice my diver has about 600 psi and the second diver about 800 psi and we are still at 100 ft. Suddenly at this point my diver signals his buddy and starts to swim away up the rope like nothing was wrong here. Stopping him I show him the message that I had written for his buddy " Are you a cavern trained diver?"Answer: NO and away they happily swim. My student and I look at each other (in major disbelief) and follow them up the slope in the silt trail.(It seems my recent days of diving at Paradise have ended with silt outs, would you not agree Fred; Simon?) NDL remaining 1 minute. My student and I do a 2 min deep stop at 40 ft and a 5 min safety stop at 20ft then we pull our primary line. At the end of the dive I still have 2000 psi and my student 1000 psi (HP 80). I can thank GOD that the day ended well.
But you know when I talked to this dive team about what happened, the second diver (the one who stayed with my student) admitted he could see the potential risks, the first diver (my "el narco") said he just wanted to take a peek inside. neither one of them believed they did anything wrong and cited that diving has risks :dork: I thought "THICK real THICK" But at least I did what I should have done, especially as an instructor, a full cave instructor.
I hope that one day if I should meet these two divers again that we can still talk at the end of the day.........
Today I was working with a student finishing up a class in Paradise Springs. At the bottom of Paradise is a small cave were the depth gets to be about 148 ft. My student and I had planned to dive just down to the Grim Reaper sign at 100 ft and multi level our way back up. In comes another team of divers and Yes you guessed it they were not cavern certified. My student who had not yet hit his turn pressure had hit his planned bottom time and still had 8 minutes NDL remaining so we held to our plan and started to head up. At this moment in a blur of silt comes the other team straight down the slope and after pausing momentarily to look at the Grim Reaper sign they continue down and go straight into the cave passage silting as they go and no guidelines running.
I am able to get to the second diver before he can penetrate the cave opening. This team of divers have only two lights between them. I write on my slate asking this diver if he is cavern cert and to no surprise I learn he is not. I have this diver and my student move to the yellow rope, I tell my student to watch him and for them to both hold the line, 5 min NDL remaining second dive of the day and I still have 2500 psi in my doubles after both dives. I look back at the cave opening and wait a good minute to see if the first diver would come out. NOPE not happening! - ok 4 min NDL a quick prayer GOD AMEN and I tie off a safety reel to the yellow rope and into the silt cloud I go. At 145 ft I come accross the diver thanks to the glow of his hand held light, his only light. The diver is waving his hand trying to, I believe read the "TOMBSTONE" only adding yet more silt. Everything is already a whiteout, now you think that would have been enough to tell him to stop! I get to him and his big eyed expression and inability to acknowledge me tells me this guy is NARCED! He quickly turns and decides to go deeper into the silt pit, I grab his tank valve and the guy just stops. I assume this was the work of GOD here because I was able to turn this guy in any direction. HE was frozen!
Somehow holding this guy and taking up my reel I manage to exit the cave passage and get back to the divers on the rope. I notice my diver has about 600 psi and the second diver about 800 psi and we are still at 100 ft. Suddenly at this point my diver signals his buddy and starts to swim away up the rope like nothing was wrong here. Stopping him I show him the message that I had written for his buddy " Are you a cavern trained diver?"Answer: NO and away they happily swim. My student and I look at each other (in major disbelief) and follow them up the slope in the silt trail.(It seems my recent days of diving at Paradise have ended with silt outs, would you not agree Fred; Simon?) NDL remaining 1 minute. My student and I do a 2 min deep stop at 40 ft and a 5 min safety stop at 20ft then we pull our primary line. At the end of the dive I still have 2000 psi and my student 1000 psi (HP 80). I can thank GOD that the day ended well.
But you know when I talked to this dive team about what happened, the second diver (the one who stayed with my student) admitted he could see the potential risks, the first diver (my "el narco") said he just wanted to take a peek inside. neither one of them believed they did anything wrong and cited that diving has risks :dork: I thought "THICK real THICK" But at least I did what I should have done, especially as an instructor, a full cave instructor.
I hope that one day if I should meet these two divers again that we can still talk at the end of the day.........
