Phantom Incident

[LCF]

I was taught that, when you come back to an intersection (which this was), the first divers out not only move past the tie-in, but they move along the exit direction of the new line. Not until everyone agrees on the exit direction, do you move off (which of course, means the person holding the spool HAS to be the one to take the tie off the line). This is one of those little details that almost seem like one's instructor is simply being annoying, until you read a story like this one, and realize that all these little things have a function and purpose, and that is to keep us safe.

Thank you for telling your story. It is a cautionary tale.

[Meister481]

Why would anyone tie off to a rock when a perfectly good goldline is close by. Makes no sense at all.

[Dave]

Thats what I ws thinking.......or in that area, use the sign

[Michael Stroeck]

Seems the 'reel' problem began when, in an unplanned fashion, they swapped team positions. I won't do that unless it is pre-planned to do in a spot we all know to allow room and orchestration. Otherwise, assuming no failures, stay in formation. Each team position has responsibilities. Changing positions without coordinating the responsibility is dangerous.

I have always felt that, in a two-diver team, positioning should be almost irrelevant. You need to act according to actual conditions in the cave, not only according to protocol. You need to think about everything you and your buddy are doing (especially anything line related!), all the time. If you notice your buddy messing up one of the absolute basics, get him to fix it ASAP. If he can't or won't, he is probably not in good shape that day. Seriously consider turning the dive right there.

Case in point: Above dive report. The leader acted incompetently, complacently, or both. There is zero reason to tie into anything but the gold line when you want to go into the catacombs. It is beyond idiotic to pull lines as the first man out. Exiting from the catacombs without hitting gold line takes some seriously creative navigational decisions. Etc, etc,....

Right at the start, Perry should have tried to communicate the problems with that fist line placement, and gotten the "leader" to fix it. Failing that, he should have turned the dive then and there. It's "only" the catacombs, but it was his first dive there. His impending panic was averted by spotting the grim reaper sign. The same situation, back in a place like Double Lines, might have had a different outcome.

[DA Aquamaster]

A few observations.

1. The two had been diving together for three days, so one have normally hoped that the comunication issues had been resolved. The fact that they had not is significant. It also brings into question over all experience and cert levels.

2. Neither of them had been in the catacombs before and the "plan" was to penetrate them, but the tool was a "finger spool". It would be nice to know if this was a mini spool with 30-50' of line or a larger spool with 100-150' of line. The former would explain why the lead chose to tie off to a rock and by doing so preserve a bit more line for the penetration. Really stupid, but it at least provides a motive.

3. That said if the plan for the dive is to penetrate the catacombs it would have been a better idea to bring a primary reel (400' or so of line). An Intro level diver could have then done it from a tie off in the eye or ear and went all the way through the catacombs to the gold line just short of the lips. Obviously divers at the full cave level could have done the same thing. The fact that a finger spool was used instead suggests that the team probably did not have a primary line installed to open water either (unfortunately a common occurrence at Ginnie) or at a minimim was not thinking outside of the box enough to relaize they hada far better tool for the pentration already installed and at hand. Either way it's also apparent that someone on the team should have at least owned a primary so a primary reel should have been available for what was supposed to be a planned penetration of the catacombs. I seriously question the level of thought and "planning" that went into this.

4. Diver 2 apparently took long enough to tie in his jump reel and check his trim to enable the lead diver to lay the line of fthe finger spool, tie it of and return (not a big stretch to envision as the line was fairly short). However, the lead still obviously got 50-150' ahead of the trailing diver and in that section of cave would have clearly no longer bene able to see the trailing diver's light, so it suggests either poor SA or really poor judgement.

5. It's not clear why the trailing diver did not insist on the lead setting a proper jump, or in a better execution of the "plan" use a primary reel for the penetration rather than a finger spool. And not knowing how the team was going to proceed with the penetration once the line was set suggests poor planning as well.

6. As noted above having the "lead" diver on the exit pull the line with the trailing diver still in the catacombs is really stupid and a clear violation of training standards. This guy woudl end up on the permanent "do not dive with" list.

[netmage]

I had a silt-out experience in the catacombs during cave 1 class and one of my first few dives in Ginnie. I was supposed to lead and tie into the goldline and took a wrong turn somewhere and ended up in the catacombs. We kept bobbing from chamber to chamber - heck - I didn't know I was lost - and our instructor wanted to see how we'd handle it. Well - until #2 in the 3 man team did an accidental flutter kick trying to kit into a small hole and everything went white. We turned and exited just fine, and the light bulb went off when I saw the sign off to the left when we hit the main passage.

The comfort was I had the reel in my hand and it was secure in OW, likely tied off to the log if I remember correctly.

[BgDadddy]

You probably went in through the eye and turned left into the cats instead of turning right to get to the main line. I did the same thing in my intro class (my instructor kind of blocked my view to the passageway on the right so I would veer left). I was diving 3rds of a single 95 and hit thirds while I was going through the cats, so I turned the dive and reeled back out. I remember how tight I thought it was in there back then...