What makes one cave dive "bigger" than the other?

[victorzamora]

I know we've all heard it before, "That was a big dive" or "...and then we followed it up with a little dive in ABC Cave." So, that made me start wondering: What makes one cave dive bigger or smaller than another? Is it penetration, total run time, navigational decisions, depth, deco time? Something else? What determines a dive's "size"?

A concrete example: 5000ft of penetration in a ~100ft deep cave (Ginnie, JB, HITW, etc). How much penetration does a cave dive at ~160ft need to have to be "the same size"? How about at 300ft?

Another: 5000ft of straight-line penetration on a scooter at ~100ft deep, straight there and back. How much exploring at ~3500ft must one do for that to be "the same size" dive?

 

[kensuf]

I've been fumbling around with some ideas on an article about progressive penetration and pinnacle dives.

In my mind, a pinnacle dive, one where you are stretching the boundaries of your previous experience and comfort levels, is a big dive no matter how much penetration or how deep or how long it is. If you've never been more than 500', a 1000' penetration may be a very big dive, kind of thing.

I'm going to be interested in seeing the responses here.

 

[PfcAJ]

I've been fumbling around with some ideas on an article about progressive penetration and pinnacle dives.

In my mind, a pinnacle dive, one where you are stretching the boundaries of your previous experience and comfort levels, is a big dive no matter how much penetration or how deep or how long it is. If you've never been more than 500', a 1000' penetration may be a very big dive, kind of thing.

I'm going to be interested in seeing the responses here.

I think this really nails it. It's very individual.

 

[victorzamora]

If you've never been more than 500', a 1000' penetration may be a very big dive, kind of thing.

But penetration isn't the only factor, right? If you've only ever been to 500ft, but have done so at 100ft depths in super high flow cave.....is 1000ft of penetration in a super shallow cave a bigger dive? As an example, is 500ft in Ginnie a noticeably smaller dive than 1000ft in Peacock?

 

[tbone1004]

that's the part that I'm curious about. is Eagles Nest is at 1500ft penetration but 300ft much "bigger" than say 5000ft in Hole in the Wall at 100ft? How do you guys that have been at it longer than we have normalize these dives, or is there a way to normalize?

 

[PfcAJ]

My question is "what's it matter"? Is there something to be gained by placing a label of "big dive" on something?

 

[bamafan]

I think as stated above your perception really changes over time. I hadn't been cave diving long at all and I remember going solo diving in JB. I got to the first breakdown and remember thinking I am a long ways in this cave by myself. It is really amazing how things change and I think this can be dangerous.
I have had dives where I never got over 2,000' into the cave and they were a much more enjoyable and memorable dive than going on some 7 - 8,000' dives. I don't do a lot of deep stuff because I don't have a breather and doing a bunch of deco for a short bottom time doesn't really thrill me. The stuff the KUR guys are doing is impressive and I consider those big dives.

 

[tbone1004]

i don't think it's about the label, I think it's about analyzing a dive and how to compare it. Last year we went to the terminal room in Twin and it was a big dive at that point. Last week we went there after completing a near 3 hour dive to over a mile back in HiTW because we had enough gas and figured we may as well do a second dive because we had the boat rental for the rest of the day and it didn't seem like anything. Is it less of a dive because we were on dpv's to zip through the subway tunnel which cut over half an hour off of the run time, or is it bigger because of the added complexity of a DPV? Perception changes everything.

Right now I am comfortable going to 5k back at 100ft with a dozen plus nav decisions, but how does that translate when the depth goes from 100ft to 150ft? What if it was straight back on gold line? Just trying to figure out if, and if so, how variables depth, navigational decisions, etc. factors into the size of a dive. As engineers you are always trying to normalize data to be able to compare things, and if the answer is you can only compare it based on "gut feeling" and perception that is fine, but I think we both wanted to know from those of you that are doing dives that are infinitely "bigger" than what we are doing now how you normalize that data

 

[victorzamora]

My question is "what's it matter"? Is there something to be gained by placing a label of "big dive" on something?

Nothing, really. And I'm not trying to call anything a "big" dive objectively....certainly not one I've done or could dream of doing.

It'd be nice if I could compare dives I've been doing recently to dives I did further in the past, and dives I'm planning on doing in the future. It'd be cool to be able to get a number that tells me how much bigger the next dive is....maybe helping temper some complacency. It'd also be cool to plan a trimix cave dive based on "bigness"....or one in a new cave. The numbers wouldn't mean anything to anybody but me, but it'd be cool to play with.

It's been like 4 days since I've been in a cave and I'm already looking for something cave-related to help feed the addiction.

 

[Bennno]

Is there something to be gained by placing a label of "big dive" on something?

Sure there is! I've got the loudest truck in my neighborhood, I once scored 4 touch downs in one game, I have a 'hand' like a burmese python and I do big a$$ dives...