Ginnie Springs diver missing - Florida

[KevinNM]

Well there are certainly awful instructors in FL (although Mexico has plenty of terrible divers as well they mostly end up as cavern guides not actually teaching cave diving)

And these kinds of accidents keep happening in FL and not in other places to the same degree

And there is a persistent "circle the wagons" attitude which is preventing any reliable reporting on cave diving accidents in general and FL incidents are especially bad at this.

I guess we will never know if there's a pattern here worth uncovering

Mexico is notorious for a lack of transparency about bad things that happen to tourists. And bad things happen to tourists in Mexico even when they are not cave diving. Even to tourists that never leave the resort.

 

[Norwegian Cave Diver]

I dive Mexico caves (Tulum area) 2-3 times per year. Most of the sites I dive don't require a guide. There are the tourist caves (no disrespect intended) that require a Cave Cert card and some that require a card and a guide, then there are others that don't ever ask for a cert card. Those caves can be small puddles in the ground.

As for a full report after a death in a cave...
Last year there were two german guys who passed away in a cave near Tulum. Lots of speculation on here and on cavediver.net. I understand that we (cave divers and others) want to understand what happened. It took about 1 year for a full report to be published and it was a very good detailed report. I took that report and printed it off - laid it out on my desk - and scrutinized it. Highlighted portions - marked up the maps that were part of the report, and tried to understand why it happened. As a stage cave diver (like the guys that passed away) it was important to me to learn how this could happen to someone who is trained to my same level. Was it equipment failure - no. Heart attack or something equivalent - no. That leaves navigation error(s) and/or gas management error(s) and/or complacency. I am not commenting on why they passed away - you can go find that report and read it for yourselves. My point is - a highly detailed and respectful report helps us cave divers understand what can happen and how we need to think to stay alive in a cave.

 

[Ayisha]

I’ve been on two iucrr-related recoveries.

one had a thorough report issued. One was “stfu” and no report issued...

And then I think the reports were stopped altogether.

I imagine it's difficult to skip high profile ones and then re-start reports on the lesser known incidents.

 

[Vicko]

I do blame your training. It's ridiculous the amount of full cave divers coming from Florida who dove only in mapped caves with easy or no restrictions and believe that just because they can look good while laying a line they can explore 1km+ into caves.
I had the misfortune of diving with a group of Floridians this year and they almost killed me so I am a tad subjective but they did set my mind that half of your divers are overweight, panicky and have no business doing anything harder than walking up a flight of stairs.
Caves in the Med or central Europe get the same amount of traffic as the ones in Fl, yet we barely have any certified cave divers dieing, and close to 0 from medical issues.

 

[The Chairman]

Not trying to be difficult, and asking (sincerely) for information: who is/are 'they'?

It hasn't been released publicly yet. We don't post names until we can read it elsewhere.

 

[rjack321]

Mexico is notorious for a lack of transparency about bad things that happen to tourists. And bad things happen to tourists in Mexico even when they are not cave diving. Even to tourists that never leave the resort.

Diving fatalities are usually reported in the MX press, even if the details are usually terribly inaccurate.

Compared to the number of divers and dives being done, the mortality rate seems low in MX. Probably due to shallow depths, difficulties importing scooters (or renting them) and generally conservative tourist type diving for the majority. And the minority that are really "out there" 10K feet into the systems etc. are not weekend warriors who just finished full cave a week ago doing a zero to hero class in the first 1,000ft of Ginnie.

I do blame your training. It's ridiculous the amount of full cave divers coming from Florida who dove only in mapped caves with easy or no restrictions and believe that just because they can look good while laying a line they can explore 1km+ into caves.
I had the misfortune of diving with a group of Floridians this year and they almost killed me so I am a tad subjective but they did set my mind that half of your divers are overweight, panicky and have no business doing anything harder than walking up a flight of stairs.
Caves in the Med or central Europe get the same amount of traffic as the ones in Fl, yet we barely have any certified cave divers dieing, and close to 0 from medical issues.

This has been my suspicion for a long time.

 

[The Chairman]

perhaps the energy would be better directed at asking why FL has so many cave diving fatalities in the first place.

That's the point. You can't understand why if you never get the details.

Mexican caves are unique. Many are "guide only" until you dive it enough. Many have zillions of exits, are low flow, and are shallow as hell. This whole idea that some cavers are more dangerous than others is ludicrous. I dive both in Mexico and in Florida: how do you classify me? Add to the fact that this was on a rebreather and it's hard to peg this as just a cave death. I don't see nearly as many breathers in Mexico as I do in Florida.

 

[rjack321]

I don't see nearly as many breathers in Mexico as I do in Florida.

Maybe you're onto something here...

 

[diverlee]

Wow. This topic really got off topic quickly!

 

[Vicko]

I would say that Florida is the only place in the world where it's possible to walk into a dive store in January buy a rebreather, get fully rebreather certified in February, put an add on facebook for a buddy in March and go do a 5+ hour dive.

Not saying that happened here, just my 2 cents on why it's happening quite often.