Underground diving for 12 yo

I am not a diver (claustrophobic) but am the wife and mother of divers.

Hubby has been diving since childhood and our son got certified last summer. Now they want to dive at Bonne Terre.

I am concerned that you are already 100 feet underground before you hit the water and my 12yo is a little skinny kid (70lb+/-).

What are the potential risks - aside from the usual?

TIA, Mazie

I expect that you will get more answers from people with experience at Bonne Terre - I only know it is an old mine. Presumably therefore this is an overhead environment - possibly even classified as cave? If it is then IMO opinion I wouldn't let a newly certified OW diver near it - and most certainly not a 12 year old who presumably only holds a junior certification.
Like I said though - I'm not sure what kind of a dive we are talking about here - I hope others will know a lot more about it.

I have just searched around a bit about Bonne Terre. Apparantly it can just be an Open Water dive. If that is the case then there is probably nothing wrong with your son diving within his certification limits, and presumably Dad has enough experience to know what he is doing!

mazie:

I am not a diver (claustrophobic) but am the wife and mother of divers.
Hubby has been diving since childhood and our son got certified last summer. Now they want to dive at Bonne Terre.
I am concerned that you are already 100 feet underground before you hit the water and my 12yo is a little skinny kid (70lb+/-).
What are the potential risks - aside from the usual?
TIA, Mazie

Click to expand...

Bonne Terre has plenty of "open water" area - that is, where there is air rather than rock at the surface, so from that standpoint it's just open water. But at a constant 58 F, it's pretty cold - and that would be my main concern for a "skinny kid."
Rick

I don't know the site and my math may be wrong but if you aren't comfortable with this nix the idea. There are so many places to dive hopefully someone can recommend an alternative. Seems a tad advanced for a 12 yo but that is just my 2 pennies worth.

Diving Bonne Terre really isn't that different from diving in a quarry or lake other than you have to walk down the donkey trail to get to the water. I should preface that's for the first few trails. The trails are numbered as to progressive difficulty. One must dive trail 1 and 2 before moving to 3 and 4 and so on. The operators check each diver's log book for the Bonne Terre stamp they use each time you visit. If it's been a few years since your last visit they may make you repeat trails before progressing to higher difficulty ones.

A diver must first show proficiency in buoyancy and mask clearing before being taken on a dive. The first couple of dives are entirely open water, i.e. there's always air directly above the water. If the divers handle this well then there might be a very short tunnel that would only take a few kicks to get to open water.

My sister dove Bonne Terre with us when she was 12 or 13 with absolutely no hesitation or difficulty. She was probably wearing a 1/4" wetsuit and was used to Great Lakes wreck diving. If your kid can handle diving, he can handle Bonne Terre.

I couldn't find Bonne Terre's website but here's a website with some pretty good information. www.heartoftheparkland.stpaulfarmington.com/btmine.htm

Paula

Found the link to West End Diving / Bonne Terre....

http://www.2dive.com/