Cave Conservation & Student Cave Divers
Cave Diver Training & Conservation.
Recently I read a thread on this forum suggesting that the training of new cave divers is largely responsible for damage to our underwater caves.
When we as cave instructors take on the responsibility to train a diver to dive in a cave we take on a tremendous responsibility. The responsibility we undertake is to a large group of people and not just the one, two or three divers who have enrolled in our class. (Most of us will not train 6 cave divers at a time) Our responsibility is to the safety of the student diver, the family of that cave diving student, the cave diving public, as well as the well being and health of the underwater caves we conduct this training in, to name but a few.
We take on the responsibility to train these divers to dive safely and properly in a cave! Just what does this entail? If we were to poll all cave instructors and certified cave divers from all the cave training agencies we would find some very common attributes in which we all require and expect from divers certified to dive in caverns or caves.
Buoyancy control and proper body positioning are two of the things that we and all other cave divers require that the diver master before s/he can be issued a certification as a cavern or cave diver. This may sound all nice and self serving to the casual reader but please take time to read the rationale behind why we as cave instructors require the divers to have buoyancy and proper body positioning under complete control; thereby dispelling the myth that cave students are responsible for cave damage.
We facilitate the training by reassuring and encouraging the divers that they should move slowly and methodically and to get it right rather than to do it quickly. There is no place in the training repertoire where haste is the object lesson. The opposite is true; we teach and require slow, methodical and well executed movements, in this way the diver is better able to integrate each particular skill set in their muscle, or automatic memory. At the completion of training these divers go away with the ability to be neutrally buoyant and are able to do so almost automatically.
The underwater caves we dive into have sand, silt, mud or clay on their floors. Unless the floor has very coarse sand on the bottom once it is stirred up by errant fin kicks or by a diver sculling, the visibility in the cave can drop from 100 feet to zero in a matter of seconds. Losing visibility is a major safety issue and can cause divers to become disoriented, mentally stressed or even hopelessly lost in the cave. Even though we instruct these student divers how to cope with psychological stress such as this, we primarily teach them how to avoid situations of this nature. The old adage that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure certainly makes sense here.
From the very first dive in a cavern diver course we impugn divers to overcome the desire to settle down onto the bottom and work on their knees or fin tips. It is much easier to tie a reel onto a line while stabilized and resting on the floor, but it is not allowed. We instruct these student divers before they enter the water that when doing all the various tasks cavern/cave divers must properly demonstrate they must do these tasks while neutrally buoyant and with a head down position of about 20 degrees. This degree of control is a baseline standard.
Working in this neutrally buoyant, head down (knees bent, fins up) position helps prevent the diver from stirring up the sediment on the bottom – thereby reducing the propensity for reducing or cutting off visibility. These divers are required to master this skill at the cavern level before they are allowed to proceed to the intro level and beyond.
When one of these students is swimming through the cave or tying off lines they are expected and required to maintain proper buoyancy control and body positioning. These divers are also taught various propulsion techniques to assist in the reaching of this goal.
When we observe and evaluate student cave divers running reels, tying lines and swimming through a cave we, as instructors observe them for proper buoyancy control and body positioning, amongst other very important things such as awareness.
If during the open water evaluation phase of the training we see divers who have inadequate buoyancy/posture control we remediate that before proceeding onto the cavern phase. If the diver cannot remediate that deficiency relatively quickly, and perhaps with minor gear modifications we suggest that diver get more dives logged in open water and get their buoyancy skills under control and then come back to complete cave training. There is a minimum standard for divers to be measured by. This standard is not subjective, just the contrary it is very objective and quickly evaluated by a properly attentive instructor.
Our philosophy is such that proper buoyancy control and body positioning are 2 of the several items the divers should show up to the class with, or be able to show mastery of in a very short span of one or 2 dives in the open water evaluation.
These same student divers are cautioned against bumping into the overhead for safety reasons. Banging regulators and manifolds on the overhead is a potential source for catastrophic gas loss.
With the two problems of stirring up the bottom and banging into the overhead we stress upon these student divers the importance of proper buoyancy control and body positioning to prevent these potentially dangerous circumstances from occurring.
When cave divers are trained to a certain level we can only hope that they will dive at this level after the certification. Human nature invariably dictates that some divers will train to a certain level and dive to a different level after course completion, some to a higher level; others to a lower level. I think we can all agree that we see this type behavior in all walks of life.
Cave divers are trained to conduct bubble checks and gas sharing drills at the surface before commencing a cave dive. How many teams do you actually see conducting these drills before their dive commences? Cave divers are also trained to maintain a continuous guideline to open water. These divers are also trained to install reels at all jumps and not to do visual jumps. How many teams have you seen make visual jumps?
I submit that it is not student divers causing what little bit of cave damage we are seeing but rather trained cave divers who have already seen the first 1,000 feet or so of the cave and are ready to proceed with scooters, stage bottles or other means at a faster pace to see the more distant parts of the cave. Another old adage may be appropriate here “Haste Makes Waste”.
I further submit that we invite all qualified cave divers to re-evaluate their own procedures, skills as well as the motivations for diving in these caves, our precious resources.
Divers being trained by responsible and qualified cave instructors are held to a very high standard of performance which greatly minimizes the possibility of cave damage occurring. These divers are not allowed to bang the overhead or sink down to the bottom during the conduct of their dives.
Training and Conservation
Actually, in this instance both Jim and Johnny are correct. There is blame enough to go around; to students, trained cave divers, and Instructors. There are conscientious instructors, like Jim and Johnny, that drive home the conservation message. And then there are those Instructors that come from whereever to teach their twice a year cavern class and get in some dives, making yet more twice a year divers. How many Instructors are out there that never make a cave dive, if not instructing? There are still instructors teaching that certain valves are bad because they roll-off "when you crash along the ceiling"!! Why aren't they teaching Don't crash along the ceiling?
Don't read this as me bashing instructors because I am not; as I said above there is blame enough to go around. However, Park Managers and other regulatory persons read these forums and there perception is that damage comes from students. I have heard them say this very thing.
Their perception is our reality. If we don't police selves they will be happy to do it.
