Cave diver drowns - Jackson Blue Springs, Florida

[bamafan]

Most people are risk averse/cautious enough to not put themselves in this type of situation in the first place. I love to dive but would not consider (even for a split second) diving in a situation where you have to squeeze yourself through a restriction - to see what? more rocks? No thanks, not for me!

Different strokes for different folks, but I’m not surprised when I read about these incidents as this type of diving is inherently much higher risk vs open water diving.

The problem you have is that people brag about oh I can take my Sidewinder through 18" high restrictions. They also tell the newbies things such as you are doing really good diving. I wouldn't normally do this but since you are doing so good I will do xxx. I have heard this and in my opinion the reason it is done is to stroke the ego of the person so they open up their checkbook.
So I agree many people are risk adverse but what's tight to one person isn't tight to others. Encouraging people to make dives overly complex is insane too.

 

[bamafan]

I usually stay off social media but, I had met the diver and his buddy in the past. I dive in JB a lot, and have also done just about every one of the jumps in the first couple of thousand feet. Some are quite nasty, silty and tight. I have seen video from two close friends both smaller than I and one of them got hung up in the actual restriction I am assuming the accident victim got stuck at. The line was placed by one instructor and several people have suggested it needed to come out, but we all know that would start a fecal storm. I also have been in that passage and got to a point where I decided it was not the best place for me to be, and I do like to dive in tight passages. I ended up backing out of it, you aren’t turning around. And it was definetly a no viz exit back out into the main passage.

There is not really a line committee but a few of us have been repairing the gold line (and some other lines that have needed attention) over the last year. And we have been talking about re-laying some of the jump lines in other areas. The suggestion was made that we should put some cookies on the gold line at prominent jumps, avalanche, king’s, deloaches/source jump. The comment was made that if we are a full cave diver and doing those kind of dives we should know where we are in the cave. I initially disagreed thinking it’s easier to look at a road map with street names. But the more I have been in that particular cave the more I agree with the no road maps. If you are a cave diver you need to look at every aspect of your dive and decide if any passage or any navigational decision you are making is the correct decision.

I have to agree with Chris and say that passing through tight restrictions does need to be learned under the guidance of someone that knows how to properly do them and can get to you from both sides. I was -laying around in the beanie tunnel and stuck myself pretty good in that restriction. Again referencing back to the street signs with levels, I think it would be too much of a challenge for some people to try the advanced sm/bottle off restriction passage just because there is a sign marking what could have otherwise been a more difficult jump to find.

Well the one instructor who has been in the area longer than Edd said that line was in before he got there. So the excuse that pulling it will cause a problem is bs. I think it's more deflection but that is pure speculation on my part. By the way Edd has had no problem pulling other lines. This I have personally witnessed.

 

[The Chairman]

these people thump their chests and claim they are all about safety and are so self righteous yet they continually choose a buck over safety.

No chest thumping was involved. The deceased was not a maniacal villain trying to subvert society as we know it. As long as this the thought process, there is no way to increase cave safety. While vilifying instructors and or other cavers might give you a smug sense of superiority, it does absolutely nothing to aid in our understanding. In fact, such displays of acrimony could be construed as chest thumping by itself. Just saying.

Most people who insist on being brutally honest are more intent on just being brutal. There's no need to assign nefarious motives to people making a mistake, especially when that results in their demise. Let's ratchet down the blame casting in favor of understanding the issue and problem solving.

 

[The Chairman]

Additionally, if dives are taking less full tanks (2400psi vs 3600) for “comfort” that’s a practice that needs scrutiny too.

Cave fills are a long-standing tradition in cave country. If you don't like the practice drag more tanks. In any event, the amount of gas taken determines how far you can bail out from, in the case of CC. While it is comforting to dive within that limit, diver safety is the paramount concern.

 

[Biotech Diver]

To help educate myself and form a better mental picture of where this tragic accident happened (maybe not the exact cave?), I found this video of diving the (one of the?) caves at Jackson Blue Springs. It helped me get a better idea of what a side mounted CCR looks like and a better idea of what some of the experienced cave divers in this thread are talking about. Just watching the divers in this video go into some of those tight places gives me anxiety, but I'm glad there are people who can do it, film it, and talk about it.

If this post is inappropriate for this thread, mods please delete it.

 

[bamafan]

No chest thumping was involved. The deceased was not a maniacal villain trying to subvert society as we know it. As long as this the thought process, there is no way to increase cave safety. While vilifying instructors and or other cavers might give you a smug sense of superiority, it does absolutely nothing to aid in our understanding. In fact, such displays of acrimony could be construed as chest thumping by itself. Just saying.

Most people who insist on being brutally honest are more intent on just being brutal. There's no need to assign nefarious motives to people making a mistake, especially when that results in their demise. Let's ratchet down the blame casting in favor of understanding the issue and problem solving.

You can look at anyway you want but my comment you quoted wasn't aimed at the deceased. The problem is this is a recurring incident and the shop owners and dive agencies blame everyone else but themselves. There have been two fatalities in that general area and in my opinion the divers were supported and even encouraged to dive beyond their training and experience level. The first one was not Eve cave certified but was scootering in JB. He was getting his fills from Edd and diving with his tank monkey on the faithful dive. You can make any excuses you want but I think any root cause analysis where you keep asking why comes down to the guy wasn't experienced enough. People new and sold him complicated gear anyway that wasn't required to do the dive he was doing. I don't have a dog in this fight but I keep seeing the same thing over and over again and nobody keeps asking why.

 

[The Chairman]

but my comment you quoted wasn't aimed at the deceased.

You painted with an overly broad brush. It would appear that it was aimed at nigh near everyone. It might not be what you intended, but it's how it comes across.

Cave politics are baffling to me. We want freedom to dive how we want to dive, but some also demand a nanny state. It's like blaming the car dealer for selling the guy the car that just ran into you, because he clearly didn't know how to drive. I know a number of non-cavers that love their scooters. They're great to hunt with and the Gulf is right there. If you don't like or trust someone, you can assign blame to them all day long. Unfortunately, that solves nothing. Blame casting only silts out the discussion and stops us from determining actionable issues to address. Certainly, we can do better than to use this occasion to air our personal grievances towards someone or even the industry as a whole.

 

[tbone1004]

To help educate myself and form a better mental picture of where this tragic accident happened (maybe not the exact cave?), I found this video of diving the (one of the?) caves at Jackson Blue Springs. It helped me get a better idea of what a side mounted CCR looks like and a better idea of what some of the experienced cave divers in this thread are talking about. Just watching the divers in this video go into some of those tight places gives me anxiety, but I'm glad there are people who can do it, film it, and talk about it.

If this post is inappropriate for this thread, mods please delete it.

skimming the video with sound off. You can see "Chicken Head Rock" at 13:30 on the timestamp, this is generally where the incident occurred.
The video is just the main passage in the cave and not anything that I would call "tight"

this is also in the same cave, and while smaller than the passage in question is much more in-line with the general vibe of how small this is. Think trying to dive through the windshield of a sports car where you could drive said sports car pretty much everywhere in the video you posted.

 

[bamafan]

You painted with an overly broad brush. It would appear that it was aimed at nigh near everyone. It might not be what you intended, but it's how it comes across.

Cave politics are baffling to me. We want freedom to dive how we want to dive, but some also demand a nanny state. It's like blaming the car dealer for selling the guy the car that just ran into you, because he clearly didn't know how to drive. I know a number of non-cavers that love their scooters. They're great to hunt with and the Gulf is right there. If you don't like or trust someone, you can assign blame to them all day long. Unfortunately, that solves nothing. Blame casting only silts out the discussion and stops us from determining actionable issues to address. Certainly, we can do better than to use this occasion to air our personal grievances towards someone or even the industry as a whole.

I would love to see your root cause analysis of this incident. If you don't know how to do one you essentially keep asking why. When you can no longer answer that question you have arrived at the root cause. As far as comparing it to a car dealer I have never seen a car dealer walk around thumping their chest about how safety conscious they are. They certainly don't post on Facebook just a few days prior to this how they refused selling a car to an individual because they weren't experienced enough to handle the horsepower. The industry is supposed to be self regulating yet when you have the same people involved in incidents with the same root cause it's anything but the common denominator that was the problem. Carry on blaming gold line T's. Whoever put the line in etc. Hell why not blame Biden or Trump. That would make as much sense as what you are claiming.

Here is a video to help you out.

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A ScubaBoard Staff Message...

At this point, I think the Mods are going to tighten up enforcement on this thread. The discussion has been interesting, if frequently a bit too accusatory.
To remind you all, this is a discussion of a specific incident, intended to help us all imagine improvements that might improve dive safety. This is not the Cave Forum, nor the Instructor's Forum. To the extent that line placement or experience or Instructor action may have been contributory, continued speculation is reasonable.
Too much of the rest is now Off Topic for this thread, and will be deleted.

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[Biotech Diver]

skimming the video with sound off. You can see "Chicken Head Rock" at 13:30 on the timestamp, this is generally where the incident occurred.
The video is just the main passage in the cave and not anything that I would call "tight"

this is also in the same cave, and while smaller than the passage in question is much more in-line with the general vibe of how small this is. Think trying to dive through the windshield of a sports car where you could drive said sports car pretty much everywhere in the video you posted.

At 14:45 of the video I posted Ed goes down what the narrator describes is a "a very small restriction", but that's nothing compared to the restriction in the video you posted.

So did this incident happen at one of the side tunnels near Chicken Head Rock? I take it most of these side tunnels in this area also have guidelines?