Easy Penetration Dives

[dkerr]

without the proper training. I have about 100 dives so far, but still consider myself a novice. I have no training in wreck diving but have been to numerous wrecks. Went to one in Curacao that was 100ft (Superior Producere?) and the DMs said it was fine to penetrate if you wanted. I was deffinately interested, but well aware of my ignorance so I just hung around the outside.
I would like to learn and get certified, but for now am content with playing around the outside!

 

[WetDane]

I have to say that I strongly discourage anyone from penetrating - I know of several peopel who will routinely penetrate and leave their buddies behind outside - only to later tell a tale of how they managed to silt out a room and had to feel their way out...

What did Darwin say?

However, I dive with a group of peopel who are very serious about trainign and being prepared for just about anything we can think of - this means that more than half of our dives ar training dives - most of the people do more than 4 dives a week and they are not teaching classes here.
Skills include but is not limited to: Laying line, survey techniques, OOA drills, no mask swim and communication, team work, simulated entaglements... the list goes on.
All though none of the people in this group has a wreck certification - and most hold only basic "plastic" certifications, there is a number of people I am completely comfortable penetrating with.

That said - if you do not train like that and if you do not fully understand timing and gas issues when penetrating - don't do it.

The SEALs have this little saying - don't bring a knife to a gun fight - I was never a SEAL but I have a lot of respect for the brass balls those guys have and I think that line of thinking is what will make one survive. If you are not trained for penetration - well - you might just as well sign your will before you go down...

Anyway - just my thoughts.

Btw - could "penetration" simply be considered overhead - so that we understand that anything that implies a ceiling is counted - this would then include deco dives and I think most novices stay far away from those things?

Cheer,
Big T

 

[Tekdiver]

I hate to break up the party here but what don't some of you get? DON'T GO IN AN OVERHEAD ENVIRONMENT WITHOUT PROPER TRAINING _AND_ EXPERIENCE!!!!!!!

Texas Tek-Diver and tombiowami have it right. How many times do you have to be told not to put your hand in a fire?

To quote TomVyles "where do you draw the line" - DON'T DIVE BEYOND YOUR EXPERIENCE AND TRAINING (notice I put experience first). What don't you guys understand here? And just because you have a card doesn't mean you have the experience! Start slow and work up to your level of mental and physical ability. Don't exceed what YOU KNOW YOU CAN DO... TODAY. AND if you were up for it yesterday and don't feel up to it today THEN CALL IT OFF! To paraphrase the NACD "There's nothing worth dying for in this cave [wreck]. Don't go beyond this point."

Again, to quote Mr. Vyles, "I'll start with a question of liability". What do you care about liability when you're dead? Except if you're planning it... who get's your stuff. As a new diver along with TexasMike, you are taking the standard thought process to get somewhere you don't need to be yet. (Tom, I'm not picking on you, just trying to make a point.... particularly to TexasMike).

Please let me paraphrase TomVyles from an earlier message in this thread from an experienced diver's point of view. "OK, let's say I go in an overhead environment in the bus at Athens after being told NOT to and I'm dumb enough to do it at night and I'm with a bunch of other new divers who have NO BUDDY AWARENESS and an OW instructor (even a good OW instructor) who's probably ill qualified to address the problem anyway and probably over-tasked... who's going to come rescue me?". The answer is NOBODY, you'll be dead and we're back to the question of who's going to get your stuff. You're irrelevant at that point. DON'T YOU GUYS UNDERSTAND? YOU ARE DEAD.

ronbo makes a statement about "take responsibility for your actions" and he is quite right. That seems to be lost in our 21st century society. But it is very true in any type of advanced diving and SHOULD BE in recreational diving as well. Let's make a distinction here:

Basic RECREATIONAL diving (any agency):
Jr. open water
Open water
Rescue diver
Medic First-aid
Master Diver
Dive Master
Asst. Instructor
OW Instructor
Any specialty to this level

Surprised? RECREATIONAL IS THE OPERATIVE WORD. You have not been trained (and more than likely neither has your instructor in advanced diving and it's techniques) to get you IN AND OUT of any problems you might face.

More often than not, egos get in the way of true education and experience. Just because you take a class from the best instructor in the world, doesn't make you equal to his/her experience, just blessed that you gained insight into their experiences. YOU MUST GAIN EXPERIENCE ON YOUR OWN. IT CANNOT BE GIVEN TO YOU IN ANY WAY!!!

What many of the gear nuts (and I are one :^) ) and neophytes miss in their quest for diving "fame, fortune and glory" is what I've come to term the "IN AND OUT"(tm) theory.

There is a point in any divers career when things change. Most divers don't spend enough time diving to ever get past the "IN" side of the equation; further, deeper, farther, more cameras, video mentality. Gas mix, staging, reels, lines, pre-brief, maps, "S" drills, bubble checks, not to mention pre-planning and logistics to the site.

The "OUT" side of the equation is what every RECREATIONAL diver seems to miss. “I’ll just follow the dive master…or dive my computer…”. Thanks to most of the RECREATIONAL training agency’s teaching the fear (and respect) out of diving, “diving’s for everyone” and everybody's a tech-diver if you can afford the gear. Nothing can be farther from the truth. We are talking about real diving and not the marketing side here aren’t we? The OUT side of this equation is the most important side of ANY diving equation.

To make a long story longer...

Guys/gals… most of you can do ANY dive if there are no problems. I could (hypothetically) take a new open water diver to 300' for 20min on mix, have staged bottles on them and all they have to do is the gas switch right. Now without getting into details, do you do a deep switch or a shallow switch? Has this person ever had a reg out of their mouth in saltwater? By the way… did I check out that they had the right stage gas? See how it gets more complex? Now we have 30 minutes at 20 feet. The seas are 6 feet we have a bunch of open water divers coming across the granny line pulling it up to 5 or 10 feet because they can’t get their buoyancy right from the get-go let alone in this chop. (sound familiar Mike?) And at this point NOTHING HAS GONE WRONG. Just imagine what could happen then. Particularly if you (read real diver want to be) is in charge! Now we can talk about liability. No matter what card you hold.

Many more experienced divers than most of you have lost their lives diving beyond their ability. Look at the 13-16 divers lost off of the Wahoo and Seeker diving the Doria in the last couple of years and the Florida cave deaths that BR has had to pull out. One buddy team was certified in the morning as open water divers and died in a cave that afternoon. AFTER THEY WERE TOLD NOT TO GO IN!

Until one of you figure out how to grow gills and/or change the laws of physics, we all play by the same rules in this “game” and NOBODY has an edge without knowledge first followed by experience… are you listening Mike?

To the few experienced divers here that are not part of an agency “marching group” I applaud you. Thank you for your insight. I am not affiliated with anyone in the commercial dive industry and have 30 years diving experience in recreational, commercial and technical diving. I am not trying to advance myself, just keep the idiots alive. And the gov’t regulators out.

“People as individuals are the most amazing thing in God’s creation. People as a group are cattle.” – Marc Thompson - 1996

Thanks everyone for your time.

Everyone goes by handles here so if you have any beef with me, here I am:

Marc Thompson
SCUBADILLO DIVE CLUB
Vice President 98-02
mbt@ticnet.com
(972)484-1812
(800)938-5400

PS. I have been in Athens & caves w/ Texas Tek-Diver and would recommend listening to his comments. He is far more positive than I am and an excellent cave diver.

Kind regards,
Marc

(back to lurk mode)
THERE'S A REASON THEY SAY "KEEP MARC AWAY FROM THE OPEN WATER STUDENTS" :^)

 

[DiveRite-SW]

Let's be even more clear (and very selfish) about all this. I think we're beginning to gravitate to a common ground, but let's make sure we drive the point home, just in case.

I'd bet the majority of cave-divers personally don't care one little tiny iota about whether you survive an overhead-dive and live to brag about it or not. (It is dangerous, no question about it. And that's not the issue here).

What we are concerned about is the bad reputation YOU will bring to OUR sport when you give it a bad name. Most people/divers hold the entire idea of cave/overhead diving right up there with trying to pet a rabid-shark (mixed metaphors, I know). They KNOW it's a stupid idea, and it proves their point that ALL divers are stupid. So let's not make it easier for them, ok? You die, under whatever circumstances, and we all suffer for it. There's a lot of really nice divespots that have been closed because of the fear of what we crazy divers are gonna do next.

And just to show that we are not uncaring, we (and obviously not you, or you wouldn't be doing - or contemplating - this) are also concerned for your loved-ones who have been left behind. Ever been part of a recovery-mission? Ever seen a body that has been in the water for several hours, or even days? Do you have a family? Do you have friends? Do you care about how they're going to feel?

(note: I am not singling-out anyone here by saying "you", it is a generic figure-of-speech. No reflection on anyone in particular).

 

[Lost Yooper]

This reminds me of one of the most heroic rescues to ever to be made in the Great Lakes. A few years ago, a couple divers decided they wanted to explore one of the most advanced wrecks penetrations in the Great Lakes – the Cedarville. The Cedarville is a 588’ ore freighter that sunk in 1965 in the Straits of Mackinaw in 110’ of water. The wreck is just shy of being upside down and inside is very silty. Though the most popular wreck in the Straits preserve, it is an exceptionally advanced penetration dive that has claimed divers lives in the past.

The divers were ill equipped and basically clueless regarding wreck penetrations. It is my understanding they were diving wet, with single tanks, no line, and basic lights. They managed to get lost, but one of them made it out to tell the boat that his buddy was still in the wreck. So, someone on the boat dove into the water with a couple bottles (in his swimming trunks no less! – 50F bottom temp or so) and managed to find the lost diver’s hand sticking out of a porthole, within minutes of the lost diver running out of air. The rescuer passed him a bottle and came up.

It just so happened, that another group of very experienced divers equipped for this type of diving showed up to dive the wreck. They were briefed as to the whereabouts of the lost diver, and they dropped down and got him out. After a lengthy deco and probably half frozen, the diver managed to live through it.

The sun was shining bright for that diver that day, but one could safely bet against such a rescue from occurring again.

Take care.

Mike

 

[wvrotorhead]

As one not yet OW certified, my opinion may not mean much, but I see it like this.

When Billy Bob got his drivers license at 16, a LONG time ago, he felt that this meant he was "Superdriver" go any where drive anything at any speed. MOST of the time, this worked out pretty darn well. Darting in and out of traffic at 80 miles per hour - HEY, I can handle it, I'm SUPERDRIVER. Then one day, mom's brand new Caprice Classic with like 1600 miles on it didn't handle exactly the way the old car did, and it wound up on it's top, squirted into this really big ditch. The luck had run out.

The moral of this story is: Just because you get by with doing something that you are not prepared for once, or even a dozen times doeesn't mean that your luck isn't going to run out eventually. So, just because someone gets by with simple penetration dives one or twice doesn't mean he isn't going to get either more brave and try harder stuff, or get stupid and get in a potentially deadly situation. So, my opinion, get the training before you need it, cause you ain't gonna get it when you need it.

And if I had just taken that darn driving class, I wouldn't have totaled the ol' Caprice and might still be in Mom's will!


Billy

 

[devilfish]

Every penetration dive is easy, its the exit that is a problem should a stressful situation occur. Too many untrained divers made it, most came out.
OW means exactly that, open water, direct access to the surface. A wreck, a cavern, inside of an attraction such as a bus or a small boat has no direct access to the surface. Proper training, problem solving is key to any overhead entry. Should it be a 20 ft or 200 ft swim to the exit, it can be a trap without proper training. One of many problems can be loss of visibility which can happen quickly. In a 1 ft vis a 20 ft swim to the exit is pretty far away while searching bouncing off the walls.

 

[MSilvia]

I saw "common sense" mentioned several times in this thread, and thought it was worth mentioning that as I see it, the only common sense that applies to specialty diving situations is, as ronbo said, "DON’T DO IT WITHOUT PROPER TRAINING".

The things that make these dives hazardous aren't always in the domain of common knowledge, and you can't make yourself safer if you aren't even aware of the risks. If you want to swim through an arch, that's one thing, but for your own sake don't go entering enclosed overhead environments without training. Take the class, or at the very least read the book, but in any case make sure you know what you're getting yourself into, and make equally sure that you can get yourself out... BEFORE YOU DO IT.

These are not risks you want to find out about through trial and error.

 

[rustyscubatool]

That recent comment about common sence reminds me of an incident that happened to me just a little while ago.

See, there I was. I had just left the local watering-hole and had a cool one (for the road, you know) nestled in the armrest. And then I blew past one of our Local Finest at a semi-reasonable rate of speed. Can you believe it? She gave me not just one but multiple citations! But why?

Ok, so I had been drinking, but it was only "A Couple Beers". And maybe the container was still in my posession, but it was "Almost Empty". And I didn't give her "Too Much Of A Hard Time" for my attitude. Even that was only because she cited me because I was driving "Only Several Miles Over The Speed Limit". Not to mention that I was "Almost Home When It Happened".

All because we have a strict policy of Zero-Tolerence in our province.

See the point here? I couldn't argue my way out of anything that I WAS DOING UNSAFELY. Same goes for all this discussion about th untrained going into overhead cave diving. Put bluntly: "Eiher You Is, Or You Ain't".

Ironic thing about the entire ordeal is that, after she confiscated my beer, she gave me back the now-empty coozie (or whatever you call the beercan wetsuit thingy) and I took my first serious look at what it said on it:
"IF SENCE IS SO COMMON, HOW COME YOU AIN'T GOT ANY?"

You know, that says it all here.

 

[TwoBitTxn]

Marc,

You don't know me from adam. You have never met me nor dove with me. Don't assume you do.

I agree with all of you. Don't go into a situation you are not trained to deal with. This point has been beaten to death. I agree with all of you totally. You still have answered none of my questions.

I had a long post set up but, I'm not sure its worth it.

Tom