I didn't realize you needed specific instruction or a guide to dive caverns. Do you specifically require cavern instruction? What about wreck certification?
PADI Cavern Specialty
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I didn't realize you needed specific instruction or a guide to dive caverns. Do you specifically require cavern instruction? What about wreck certification?
In general, it is inadvisable to dive any but the most benign caverns without specific training. (When I say benign caverns, I'm thinking of things like the Cathedrals off Lanai, where the bottom is sand, and there are multiple places admitting light, and easy exits.) There are lots of places where no one checks your cards (particularly in MX) but that doesn't mean that it's a good idea to dive there, without a guide or training. You can get very lost, even in the cavern zone, and you can blow the viz in some caverns pretty easily, too. Overhead environments are a really different kind of diving, and there is a reason that the certifications exist.
Lynn is so correct. I have been in some caverns that confused the hell out of me. Spooky stuff. A cavern can kill you just as easily as a cave. Best to take it quite seriously.
A cavern certification is required to dive caverns without a guide. In general, wreck certifications aren't going to teach you what you need to know about caverns. And vice versa. Two different animals.
A cavern certification is required to dive caverns without a guide. In general, wreck certifications aren't going to teach you what you need to know about caverns. And vice versa. Two different animals.
I am not sure what you mean by your last question. Are you asking if there wreck certification is needed to dive wrecks, or are you asking if wreck certification is OK for caverns, too?
If you are asking about comparing wrecks to caverns, there is an important difference that will be hard for me to explain. (I know because I have been thinking for a while about how to explain it!)
Both "caves" and "wrecks" have a broad range possibilities. At the easiest extreme of each, we have very short swim throughs and wide open wrecks which might better be called "wreckage." Both are just fine for beginning divers to enjoy. At the other extreme are complex caves and deep, dark, silty wrecks, both of which demand great skill and training.
With wrecks there is no clear and accepted delineation of what constitutes the dividing line between something that requires certification. There are also different levels of wreck certification. The PADI wreck certification card is primarily designed to make you understand that dividing line. It is similar to the Cavern certification in that regard. Other agencies have certifications. Other agencies have wreck certifications that prepare you to go beyond that line.
With "caves," you have a more clear dividing line in the definition of a cavern. Although different agencies have different definitions, they are pretty close to each other. In some cases, the cavern is short, shallow, well lighted, and with no opportunity to go beyond its limits. Those are pretty safe. In most cases, though, the cavern is the opening section of a cave, and good, safe diving technique is critical. That is true not just for you, but potentially for everyone.
Last year I was the first of a number of divers exiting a cave in Florida. As I rose up a steep incline into the cavern section, where we had left our deco bottles, my path was blocked by an OW diver who was standing on the floor of the cavern. He was startled by my emergence. As I tried to swim past him to get my deco bottle, and as other divers emerged from the cave behind me, he walked around, trying to get out of my way. Other OW divers were coming in behind him. Soon the room was full of divers. Some were cave divers trying to get to their deco bottles, and some were OW divers crashing along the floor, trying to get out of the way.
Fortunately, the floor was coarse sand, and it was a high flow system that quickly blew the stirred up sand away. If it had been a silty floor in a low flow system, then we would have all been in total darkness, our vision completely obscured by the stirred up silt. Even though we were in the cavern zone, the exit would not have been visible to any of us.
If nothing else, a cavern certification will teach you the proper kicking techniques and proper buoyancy skills to keep that from happening.
Ontwreckdiver
Contributor
I would reccomend taking the TDI Cavern course.
This is what I was thinking when I made the comparison between wreck and cavern training. To clarify, I was asking if a recreational wreck specialty class would offer training very similar to a recreational cavern class. I have done little cavern diving and I was curious if the two specialties were similar at the PADI level of expertise.
They recently redid the manual for their Cavern course--it's not too bad.
And the answer is ---- It depends on the instructor!
I am a PADI instructor who has the cards from PADI which say I am a PADI Wreck Specialty Instructor and a PADI Cavern Specialty Instructor. From my way of thinking, the sad reality is that I have no special instruction in the teaching of either activity -- BUT, I do have a lot of instruction in Cave Diving (I'm "Full Cave" and approaching 100 Cave dives now). IF I were to actually teach a Cavern Class, I could probably do an OK job but, to some extent, it would be the dumb teaching the blind!
OTOH, I have a friend in Mexico who also is a PADI Cavern Specialty Instructor and who would teach a wonderful Cavern class. Why? Because she has been guiding Cave dives for several years and has been interning with several different Cave instructors. Not only does she have lots of experience in Cave Diving, but she has experience in teaching Cave diving -- something I lack.
The big difference in how PADI authorized me to teach Cavern and Wreck is that I at least had to prove I had significant training and experience in Cave Diving before I was eligible to get the Instructor card. All I needed to do to get the Wreck Instructor card was do 20 wreck dives -- which I've done over the years -- but with minimal special training. Now I believe I can teach a Wreck Specialty Class that will impart a lot of good information but will absolutely, positively NOT include penetration.
So, take the PADI Cavern Class if you find an instructor who works for you -- it really IS the instructor.
(To answer what is perhaps an unspoken question of WHY I got a Cavern Instructor Card -- it really was to help out with Cavern Tours when I'm taking groups to the Yucatan -- and to give the IRS another something to chew on as to why I'm deducting yet another cave diving trip!)
The PADI Cavern Course is required to be conducted with a single tank, but PADI Cave Intro and PADI Full Cave could be conducted with twins.
Jonas Samuelsson
PADI Cavern Instructor Trainer / TDI Full Cave Instructor / Trimix Instructor Trainer
AWARD WINNING PADI IDC AND TECHNICAL DIVING
jonas@techkohtao.com
DAHAB (EGYPT), EILAT (ISRAEL), KOH TAO (THAILAND)
TEAM BLUE IMMERSION AND TEAM FOURTH ELEMENT
conducting technical courses all around the world.
Jonas Samuelsson
PADI Cavern Instructor Trainer / TDI Full Cave Instructor / Trimix Instructor Trainer
AWARD WINNING PADI IDC AND TECHNICAL DIVING
jonas@techkohtao.com
DAHAB (EGYPT), EILAT (ISRAEL), KOH TAO (THAILAND)
TEAM BLUE IMMERSION AND TEAM FOURTH ELEMENT
conducting technical courses all around the world.
Are you sure about the PADI Cavern requirements?
PADI Training Bulletin 2009 4th Quarter allows sidemount.
PADI Training Bulletin 2009 1st Quarter allows 1/6 of doubles, and reads as follows:
Cavern Diver
Changed equipment requirement: Divers may use a single tank configuration or a double tank configuration with dual manifold at the discretion of the instructor. Divers must adhere to the 1/6 rule for air management when using a double tank configuration.
Rationale: Many cavern diver students plan to progress to full cave training, and prefer to use the tank configuration they will use during cave training.
Changed equipment requirement: Divers may use a single tank configuration or a double tank configuration with dual manifold at the discretion of the instructor. Divers must adhere to the 1/6 rule for air management when using a double tank configuration.
Rationale: Many cavern diver students plan to progress to full cave training, and prefer to use the tank configuration they will use during cave training.
Is there an update that reverses these changes?
Keith
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