Orlando diver lost - Silver Glen Springs Caves, Florida

[DandyDon]

I don't know why I can't copy and past text here...??

Search ends for missing diver Alexander James McKeeman

 

[boulderjohn]

The only information I can add from other sources is that this does not appear to be a true diving accident, at least a cave diving accident. The cave is not open for non-scientific diving. My sources are not official (just comments on another forum), but the information I have is that this was more of a swimming incident than a diving incident, which make the inability to locate a body in this amount of time even more puzzling.

 

[Johnoly]

Just my opinion & speculation, but I've been to Silver Glen many times (non diving) and it has a strong flow even in the channel out to the lake. Back in the 1990's it was a huge weekend party place with hundreds of boats parked & lined up on both sides of the channel. Now all that has been shut down and it's very quiet there during the week days.The water in the channel is so clear, you can read a newspaper headline on the bottom, so he would be easily spotted. It would be very easy for a non-buddy-diver with SWB to be carried by the flow out towards Lk George and no one notice at all. Once outside the channel in the lake there is not much population right next to the shoreline on both lake sides of the channel. It's a huge no vis lake, and with currents and wind, he could be anywhere on it to search and get him back. Again, just my own opinion from frequent visits there several years ago.

 

[bluejaykaren]

He was seen entering the water in scuba gear. That would make it a scuba accident. There is a big cave system there with only a tiny entrance. I talked to a guy who was up there on a boat at the time. He said that his wife mentioned seeing him and said he had two small tanks. I asked the guy questions like where they side mount but he said that was all she had said about it so he didn't know and his wife wasn't with him at the time.

 

[boulderjohn]

He was seen entering the water in scuba gear. That would make it a scuba accident. There is a big cave system there with only a tiny entrance. I talked to a guy who was up there on a boat at the time. He said that his wife mentioned seeing him and said he had two small tanks. I asked the guy questions like where they side mount but he said that was all she had said about it so he didn't know and his wife wasn't with him at the time.

There is a curious lack of even basic information about this. The only information I had said they thought he was a freediver, but I have no idea where that person got the information.

 

[WetRocks]

He was seen entering the water in scuba gear. ...

The Marion County Sheriff's Department, on their facebook page, when asked directly responded by saying he was freediving, not scuba. If you look at his instagram, he has many videos of himself freediving into springs/caves but no mention of scuba that I can tell.

 

[bluejaykaren]

I was surprised that there is so little info. I work at a Marina on the St. Johns and I had a boater come in and said that there was a diver missing. He and his wife are ocean divers and not familiar with cave diver gear. He said that his wife mentioned to him that she saw a scuba diver enter the water and she thought there wasn't any scuba allowed there and that he had 2 small tanks. The next day I had another house boater, who spent the night there,come in and he said FWC was going along and banging on peoples boats and asking them their names and if they had seen a diver. I kept checking the news and scuba board for any mention of it and only saw the same article that said they had given up looking for him. I just am curious about the 2 small tank remark. It is so odd to go to such a public place, not get stopped by someone who works there. He would have to carry gear for a ways. And to go alone. Its just crazy.

 

[bluejaykaren]

In that case I suspect she saw a diver looking for the guy instead of the lost one.

 

[TracyN]

I was one of the divers on the dive team. I was with the two original explorers of the cave system so they knew where to look. The cavern area is very small and tight with a lot of nooks and crannies. We looked everywhere that was humanly possible to fit. We even made our way back to the EOL. There was no body. The guy was a free diver and we searched way beyond what would be feasible for a free diver to attempt. What happened to him is a mystery right now but it was definitely not a cave diving accident.

 

[Jared0425]

Hopefully this doesn't turn into another McDaniel case then....