Warped View of the Dive World Vol 2 - Diving Beyond Your Training

[MauiScubaSteve]

On the third day, the operation had a trip to the Blue Hole scheduled. We were all encouraged to go. Of the six of us, the only two who opted to go were the couple who had just been certified. The next day we heard all about it from the wife ... who had been taken to 150 feet and ran out of air. The DM put her on his tank and rushed her up to 20 feet, where he left her breathing on a hang tank until another DM escorted her to the surface ... meanwhile the first DM went back down to assist another diver. She thought it was the coolest thing she'd ever done. I thought it was probably the stupidest.

I was asking about instructor guided cavern dives that may or may not fall into cave definition due to restriction, distance from surface and direct view of entrance/exit to open water.

Even on the "controversial" dive in my OP, a diver does not necessarily go to 130' so 150' seems kind of hyperbole-ish for this thread.

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

I was asking about instructor guided cavern dives that may or may not fall into cave definition due to restriction, distance from surface and direct view of entrance/exit to open water.

Even on the "controversial" dive in my OP, a diver does not necessarily go to 130' so 150' seems kind of hyperbole-ish for this thread.

Since I didnt' quote you, what makes you think I was responding to your question?

Take a look at the post directly above mine ... does the concept of "conversation flow" mean anything to you?

Once again, you appear more interested in creating conflict than conversation. I'm not sure why ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Dirty-Dog]

As a new diver (35 logged dives so far...) I'd say it just depends. My wife and I did two tanks in Chac Mool on dives #13 & 14. I'd say we have average bouyancy control for new divers, and we knew that neither of us is prone to panic. Yes, I know, there are plenty of people who list these cenote dives as Evil Trust Me dives, but overall, the rules and the dives seem to be setup to pretty well minimize the risks. Diving with the same instructor with whom we'd done all our previous dives helped, since he knew exactly what our skill level was (or wasn't).

I know nothing about the specific sites mentioned by the OP, but given the right set of circumstances, I might very well dive them.

 

[Adobo]

I am interested in hearing everyone's thoughts on following an instructor/guide through a cavern, that may or may not be a cave by cave diving definitions, with just an OW certification and less than, say, 20 dives?

What kind of an instructor?

 

[Jim Lapenta]

What kind of an instructor?

Thank you. There are some I would not dive with in OW let alone an overhead. Sure wouldn't trust them with my newly certed loved ones. You also have to wonder if they would go against their own agency's recommendations for OW divers, what other chances they would take with new divers to make a few extra bucks.

 

[Adobo]

Thank you. There are some I would not dive with in OW let alone an overhead. Sure wouldn't trust them with my newly certed loved ones. You also have to wonder if they would go against their own agency's recommendations for OW divers, what other chances they would take with new divers to make a few extra bucks.

In addition, I believe taking open water certified divers on cavern dives is not an unusual occurrence in cave country. I don't really know the details but usually, the better ops perform some skills assessment and briefing on basics with regards to how to properly conduct the dive. Usually, this type of thing is done by an instructor who has full cave training if not being a cave instructor. And I don't really believe this level of *orientation* is considered proper cavern diver training.

So put another way, it's one thing to follow a cave instructor into a cavern after he/she has assessed your skills, provided you adequate gear and provided you some minimal knowledge how to not get lost or how to not run out of gas even if you have to share gas to exit. It's a whole other thing to follow an open water instructor who doesn't have cave training, has no experience exiting an overhead in limited vis, has no experience in gas planning to have sufficient gas to exit two divers if someone has a gas emergency at max penetration and does not have knowledge on what equipment is useful/needed in a cavern dive.

This is not to say that I am a proponent of divers going into overhead environments without sufficient training even if your guide is a cave instructor.

Edit: I do know of an event where a dive shop owner from Cozumel hired a dive guide to take her and some of her customers on Cenotes dives in Tulum. If I understand correctly, the first dive went pretty well. The second dive ended badly - taking the life of the dive shop owner and two other divers.

 

[LakeCountyDiver]

I could see the good and bad in it. Is it suggested in any agency that it is safe or a good idea I think not. I would have to say it strongly depends on 1)the instructor 2)the diver 3)how many people are being guided.

That all being said in north Florida we have a LOT of OW/Cavern springs that turn a lot of open water students. On my OW class (I was the only student in the class) we went into the cavern and went down to **ft. I felt very safe and my instructor thought with my skill level that was not a problem. I know some new divers I would not bring under a boat let alone in a cavern.

What do I think about it? It again depends in 1-2-&3 above.

 

[Trace Malinowski]

When divers enter a solution cave such as those found in Florida, the Bahamas and Mexico, the passages can labyrinth seemingly endlessly. Fine particles of silt such as clay and bacterial sediments can be easily disturbed without careful propulsion. Emergency gas sharing may find divers squeezing through restrictions many hundreds or thousands of feet within the system establishing the need for careful gas management and adequate reserves. Loss of light or loss of a guideline may find a diver hopelessly lost.

Sea caves, lava tubes, and coral caves present similar challenges, but often to a much more forgiving degree. Proof of this is the fact that many divers enter these overheads every day without incident. Many of these same divers would perish if they entered a solution cave environment as they had prior to the availability of proper cave diving training and the rules of accident analysis cave divers have followed since the 1970's.

Having been a participant on such dives while on vacation, it's really disappointing to enter such an environment as a trained cave diver and lose the enjoyment of the beauty of such overheads due to the untrained divers stirring up the sand and reducing visibility. I've also been on a cavern dive in Florida with Baby Duck in Crystal River years ago in which an untrained guide took untrained divers into a cavern that quickly became quite silty. Trained guides on the other hand, such as when Cristina Zenato (an NSS-CDS full cave instructor), leads divers on cavern tours in Ben's Cave for UNEXSO in the Bahamas can offer a larger degree of safety and protection for divers. Guides such as Cristina also assess a diver's abilities to enter a cavern or cenote style tour and won't take anyone without good buoyancy and open water diving skills.

As a cave diving instructor and the director for technical and cave diving for a major training agency, I see having untrained guides as a lost opportunity for scuba diving instructors to attain the proper training in overhead diving and have this added knowledge and skill boost their wages or salaries at the dive centers at which they work. Having professionally trained guides would allow dive centers to charge more for the experience and instructors could earn more money and tips for the guide service they provide.

From a legal standpoint, having trained guides and standards divers need to meet before entering an overhead would probably be more defensible in court. An instructor who isn't trained in cavern/cave diving and who isn't somehow protected could probably be more easily thrown under the bus bu their employer, agency, and insurance company.

Professionally trained guides would be a win-win for the safety of the diving public and the business of diving.

 

[spoolin01]

Should a driving instructor take a recently licensed driver through a 100 ft 4-lane tunnel? Most will do fine.

I think it entirely depends on the nature of the cave. For most of what I've seen in Hawaii, if it were dangerous, it would be for the same reason that a deep dive, or a dive on a dark day, in murky water, or in a current - all of which OW divers CAN do quite successfully - would be dangerous. There's some chance that a newby diver would freak out. Beyond that they don't present any technical novelty or challenge (absent surge) - close to the surface, no constrictions, wide bore, no risk of snag, never more than a couple kicks from daylight at one or both ends. You could free dive most of them.

Tunnels is a maze, with constrictions - that makes it pretty unique for Hawaii that I've seen. Of the many holes at 5 Caves, there's one that goes back more than maybe 30 ft, and a couple of places you could squeeze through to get in farther - I can't imagine a guided dive doing either of those. Going in and out of the rest is a mundane event.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

I think there are very few people who manage to get certified without being informed that depths, wrecks, caverns and caves present dangers the basic OW can't guess and that training is appropriate and available. I figure if they then follow a group or a guide into one of those venues, they are offering themselves up as grist for Darwin's mill.

Since I didnt' quote you, what makes you think I was responding to your question?

Take a look at the post directly above mine ... does the concept of "conversation flow" mean anything to you?

Once again, you appear more interested in creating conflict than conversation. I'm not sure why ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

I have had threads I started that had plenty of conversational flow, and I plan to have those kind of threads, hopefully often, in the future.

Every now and then, I prefer to keep threads I start on the topic of the OP. Wrecks seems overhead and restricted enough to still be pretty on topic.