The future of cave diving . .

[OutlawCaver]

Through the latter half of the 70s and first half of the 80s I attempted to be a competitive bodybuilder. I started with marginal genetics for gaining muscle mass. Over the years I learned to train hard and to train smart. Steroids became the normal suppliment from high school level competitions to the pros for so many competitors. I avoided their use for all but 3 months over a 7 year period. I left the sport in 83 realizing that no amount of training would make me competitive with the genetically gifted on steriods. It was a very hard pill to finally swallow. Several years later, I feel in love with cave diving although I had done some intro level dives in the mid and late 70s. I was careful to enter the realm of cave diving, meaning not to chase after the end of the line or records other than my personal best within my training and comfort zones. I tried (and still do) to perfect my skills and knowledge of the cave.

So, I guess it comes down to what will motivate people to cave dive. I will have plenty of cave to explore 10 years from now. It may have been explored by someone else already but not by me. My philosophy is, UNTIL I SEE IT, I DON'T CONSIDER IT EXPLORED.

I have seen cave divers come into the sport, dive to the EOL in the main systems and then they are gone to the next sport.

For those who choose to hang in there with me I present the following from - - - -Robert Browning

Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be.
The last of life, for which the first was made.

[cavedivenut]

Well, said! I agree 100%. Until I've seen all of the cave systems I can't say that they have been "explored"; and I have a long way to go and a lot of cave to explore in my lifetime, I hope. The question everyone asks me (those who do not cave dive) is "why do I cave dive"? I tell them because in every cave it's like looking at the Grand Canyon for the first time for me. Oh yeah and I never think about work while I'm doing it. I sure hope that it will be around for a very long time yet. To me it's my break from the every day grind of work, bills, deadlines, coworkers, schedules, work travel, customers, etc.

[brianstclair]

I just hope I have all my gear paid off in ten years...

Brian

[Cindy]

I just hope I have all my gear paid off in ten years...

Brian

I'll never have my gear paid off. I'll be poor for life! I'll be rich in my memories and happy with a roof over my head. Ok, I have to make enough to feed the cats.

Maybe I'm an optimist. I think cave diving will be here as long as any other sport that requires people actually have to get off a couch. It will change radically. Gear will change, dive sites will improve, training will change, it will be more of a common sport. We see more divers daily and in the short time I have been diving it's developing problems like pressure on the sites we do have, changes in training philosophy and look how many dang agencies there are now. The web is having an incredable effect on Cave Diving and our daily lives. I wish I could say it was always a good one.

Exploration. Still plenty out there! Even more made available daily with the sale of the larger land sections for development. Communication with agencies and land owners will become even more important to keep new caves from damage and press on with the discovery of new ones. Just because you don't see the new caves posted on every web site doesn't mean that a lot of exploration isn't going on. Exploration has not decreased. There is just such a jump in what most people refer to as recreational or non survey related cave diving that the people who do explore tend to be ignored, debated to death so they quit posting or just too busy to post.

I hope to be around to see some of the changes. I hope I can muster the tolerance to watch some of the bad and the clarity of mind to help with the good. I plan on writing as much of it down as possible. Cindy Butler

[curtschu]

Cavedivenut said just the right thing When I cave dive I don't think about work or stress at home or bills. I just enjoy the cave and work on skills and try yo be clean.

Curt

[Signal 20]

there is deffinetly unexplored cave out there. the reason people get upset and think this isnt true is because you cannot just drive down I75, pull off on the side of the road and jump into virgin cave. if it was that easy everything would have been explored. I know first hand, and I know alot of people on here can relate, that if you wanna find new cave your gonna have to get out there and get dirty. and isnt that most of the fun after all?

i also think that the future of cave diving gear wise will be rebreathers, but i think we will find a way to make them smaller, last longer, and not carry such a hefty price tag. it seems that progession means price drops, smaller in size, and longer burn times. look at the evolution of the dive light in the last 10 years.

[curtschu]

Except they have gone up in price.

[DeWayne]

I think what aw saw as a peak is more of a stable plateau. So much has happened since then that I don't see how anyone can label it as a decline from what was. Technology has improved ans continues to do so. The big names are not as prevelant these days simply because the sport has grown so much; individual accomplishment does not stand out as much in a large crowd as it does in a smaller group. There are still caves to be explored, you only have to get out there and look for them. Hell, over 2000ft of new line was laid in Hole in the Wall just recently and more tunnels are just waiting to be lined. Virgin caves do exist, they just are not sitting out in plain sites like the ones we have become accustomed to througth commercialization. I think cave diving will continue to grow as technology continues to improve and people start realizing just how vital a fresh water supply is.

[JE]

there's very little virgin cave to explore,

There's plenty to explore, you just haven't looked under the right rocks !!!

That is very true.

***I've seen some of my cave diving friends {including my own younger brother} throw in the rag, and yet today, I've made so many new friends, some of which I've logged dives with over the past year, & the spirit still lives on. I have friends some 15 or 20 years younger than I, who are so over-weight & out of shape that they will never get into diving at all. Then along comes Matt 'The Dreamer' Johnston who instills a new confidence in all of us. I've crossed wires with certain explorers whom I would have cherished learning from & taking lessons with, yet I still respect their goals, & only hope that they continue doing what they do best: Cave dive & Exploring. It is said that the Florida Aquifer is a virtual ocean of passageways, deep below our good earth, and is only a stones throw away from being discovered. Give us the tools & equipment to find them, & our spirits will lead our way to them. As long as there is a Dive Outpost {& Cathy} in Luraville, where we can sit around roaring fires in the dead of winter, roast marshmellows, drink good wine & booze, {& coffee} and tell our stories of this new 'window' or that new 'Jump', then we should never have to worry about losing sight of our cave explorations. It is in the very air that we breath, which carrys us to new horizons.
Tegg, Titan, Jordan, Lee, Bill, Sludge, Wingman, Cindy, Brian, FW, & a host of others............the fun has just begun-!

JE 8)

[Genesis]

I see two competing forces here.

1. Reality .vs. fantasy-land thinking. There's a lot of the latter and we need to get to the former. Reality means dealing with the fact that this is an "extreme sport" in that if something goes wrong 100' in and you can't breathe (say much less 15,000' in!) you're screwed. Yes, we all take backup for that eventuality, but the highest failure rate item in our kit is our brain, and next is our body. We can't solve either of those problems, although there are plenty who claim we can. This has led to policy positions that IMHO are pure exhibitions of boneheaded-ness, some of which is driven by profit and some by just a flat refusal to deal with issues logically.

This is a potentially-severe problem because once one sets the bar of "acceptable rates of risk" someone else gets to calibrate the scale. As soon as you say that something can be done "safely", someone else defines what that is and means. Eventually the statistics pile up and you get called out on your (lack of) performance, and then wham - doors start slamming shut. You've been hoist on your own petard, and its too late to protest.

To a large degree this has happened in the past. I predict that cave diving is dangerously close to this tipping point NOW in a second wave, and that one could endanger most of the public access we now enjoy, with the probable exception of access to caves on navigable waterways by boat. This, ironically, means that CEE (for example) ends up needing to set up a ponton boat rental department! But for many if not most of the existing land-access sites, this development would be very bad news. It is simply a matter of time before it happens unless divers start thinking this stuff through and insisting that agencies and organizations to which they belong start singing from a very, very different hymnal than they have up until now.

2. Equipment. I see strides here. Basic OC gear hasn't changed in 20 years+. But CCRs are evolving. These have been considered "specialty" gear for a very long time, have been radically overpriced and treated as "something scary." They're not. Indeed, RBs predate OC and there's an argument to be made that they're SAFER, especially in an overhead environment. Did you just have a siltout? So? You have three HOURS to find your way out instead of 15 minutes. Is it still a big deal that for the moment you can't see?

Part of my reason for deciding to build the K1 is to put a finger in the eye of those who have held what I view as a bankrupt position on these things and screamed it from the rafters, as well as trying to force what I see as a bankrupt business model associated with it down the throats of divers at their considerable expense. If I'm right - and I'm pretty sure I am - there's a product here as well. Yeah, this will make some people squirm. Good. That sort of change - an eCCR that, minus tanks and first stages, comes in under $5k with a "buy it off the rack; the only card you need is Visa, Master Card or Discover" philosophy - will change diving in a major way.

But if we don't fix (1), as divers, we all may need to buy boats.

Fortunately I already have one.