What has happened to...

[Line Squirrel]

cave conservation? I was in Orange Grove the other day and the first 1000ft or so looks like a bloody battle field I have watched most of the damage occur over the last 18 or so months. Grapefruit size chunks of rock from the ceiling in both O.G. and P1? Come on!!

My instructor hammered me in cavern class/Ginnie basin about my knees touching the rock bottom when I was setting my reels in OW, he wouldn't let me into the cave until I fixed the problem...that was cavern class, as it should be.

The quality of cavern through full cave divers is diminishing at a rapid rate IMHO.

How do we fix it? Why are students advancing to Intro, apprentice and full when they can't stay off the ceiling or out of the mud?

I hope it's not all about $$$ but sadly I have a feeling that's exactly what it has come to.

End rant

[Signal 20]

if you wanna see damage just go down the peanut line past the breakdown room, there are handprints in the clay/silt floor just about every 10 feet

[SLIM]

Many of them now days have not been tought about conservation but most do not care about it. They are TRAINED CAVE DIVERS and you cant teach them. Kind of like all the newly trained intro divers that are diving past their skills. If you sit back you will see that all the time. So many have read or watched others do skills and just pick up on it and dive past the 1/3rds in doubles and do jumps and gaps and complex dives and doing deco dives but they are only intro. Conservation would take to much time for them to learn, they were tought it but did not learn it after they got the certification.

SLIM

[ARY]

cave conservation? I was in Orange Grove the other day and the first 1000ft or so looks like a bloody battle field

Mike how is a viz at Lafayette Blue ?

P1 and OG are prime spots for new cave divers training besides Ginnie. Cave divers are now produced on a conveyer and students traffic in OG is dense, as a result we have damaged floor. I guess that PSSP and Ginne became sacrifiction caves for training regardless if we individually justify it or not. Trained cavedivers do not do prints unless they are total as$oles (example - expresssway Ginnie) because it will make viz reduced and dive not enjoyable. Too bad it takes a lot of dives to become skilled enough...

Is there any experience among seasoned cave divers to repair clay floor? I know Cindy did some repair. May be some kind of a floor restoration event should be organized: close park, place some extra lines, safety divers, and level prints with masonry tools? I wonder though for how long viz will be zero in OG after such a cleanup ...

[cavedivenut]

No kidding Mike! The last time that I was in O.G. I was appalled by what looked to me like a "cattle crossing" on the floor for the first 500 ft. It is sad that what was pristine cave now resembles Ginnie springs. I wasn't aware of the ceiling dings and chuncks of limestone though. That's even worse IMHO.

[allen]

In OW one learns to stay off the reef/floor, but there is no ceiling.
Most of us intros try to stay off the ceiling, but it takes a lot of practice.
Perhaps the intro course should be 3 days and a considerable amount of time should be spent on bouyancy control and trim control. Regardless of course length, a lot of drills during short penetrations might be more useful than a few drills on long penetrations.

[Genesis]

The Mud Tunnel at JB was even worse for a while - it seems to have healed itself over the last few months, but last summer there was what appeared to be mask, hand and finprints every 5' or so. It was disgusting.

Keeping off the floor and ceiling is pretty basic stuff.....

People want to argue about folks inadvertantly "trenching" with scooters, yet I don't see evidence of that sort of abuse of the cave that I do with the "splat special" (mask, hand and fin in an outline kinda like a diver.) Besides, there are no scooters allowed in Peacock.

Collisions with the overhead in Peacock severe enough to dislodge rock? You gotta be REALLY out of control to do that in a near-zero-flow system without a DPV!

Its not about people "exceeding their training" - that rant is so out of place - and outrageous - it doesn't really merit a response. The truth is that the "agency model" is fatally broken. You shouldn't have a cavern card if you can't keep your buoyancy under control.

Of course its convenient to try to argue that its about people who have no respect for so-called limits - it allows you to ignore the real issue instead of confronting and fixing it. Why should anyone respect a certification system that doesn't work?

Let's be straight here, ok?

You shouldn't pass AOW without being able to stay off the bottom, say much any overhead class!

If you care about the resource, then you need to stand up, band together and force change in the system as it now stands - including boycotts of agenices and organizations along with legislative changes so that they are "defanged" and the money element disappears as a consideration.

One sentence in the Sportsman Act would go a tremendous distance towards fixing this.

One sentence.....

[FloridaCaveDiver]

How do we fix it? Why are students advancing to Intro, apprentice and full when they can't stay off the ceiling or out of the mud?

I hope it's not all about $$$ but sadly I have a feeling that's exactly what it has come to.

End rant

Unfortunately, I don't think there is any fixing it.

There is absolutely no way for force responsibility upon anyone that is not willing to give it openly. Just as there will always be speeders, armed robbers and petty crooks... no matter if there are "laws" providing "penalty" or not there will always be criminals -- furthermore, there will always be careless people causing damage to caves.

It sucks -- but we can rant, cry and ##### all we want and nothing will change.

We all need to be realistic -- we don't live in a perfect world - or a world even close to it for that matter.

Brett

I'll tell you what I would be interested in - a class that teaches one how to do cave repairs. There's a trench in Jackson Blue at about 2450' (about 25' past the Elbow) that I feel almost compelled to bring in a trowell and smooth out. But I hesitate to do it because I might actually do more harm than good.

I think this is something that might need to be discussed.

[FloridaCaveDiver]

Its not about people "exceeding their training" - that rant is so out of place - and outrageous - it doesn't really merit a response. The truth is that the "agency model" is fatally broken. You shouldn't have a cavern card if you can't keep your buoyancy under control.

If you care about the resource, then you need to stand up, band together and force change in the system as it now stands - including boycotts of agenices and organizations along with legislative changes so that they are "defanged" and the money element disappears as a consideration.

What I am about to say is NOT a personal attack so please don't read anything into it -- I am just trying to make a point.

Ok here it goes:

Are you willing to personally audit every instructional class being offered by every instructor that is qualified to teach in the overhead?

Since it is obviously the opinion of the INSTRUCTOR if you pass or not then how do you audit EVERY INSTRUCTOR?

As long as a "people element" remains in the process of cave training and cave diving is not performed by machines we will continue to have this problem.

Hell man, the same people that almost run you over driving into Ginnie or Peacock because they can't perform a simple task like operating a automobile efficiently -- what makes you think they will be any more skillful in a cave?

All these rants I read from everyone HONESTLY HAS ONLY ONE SOLUTION -- and it is a solution none of us would want to hear.... that would be to BAN CAVE DIVING ENTIRELY and close ALL SYSTEMS PERMANENTLY.

There is no other way to reach perfection and not see ANY damage. If the argument then becomes "oh no SOME is expected but just not this level" then who determines the acceptable level?

Actually if anything needs to be banned it is Internet forums as they are a constant never ending source of complaints, crying, whining and ongoing general negative attitudes from many.

It seems when it is quiet and everyone is peaceful for a period of more than 5 days someone posts and open ended thread designed with one intention -- to wind people up and start a bitching session.

What other purpose does a question like this serve:

"Hey, I was in XXX cave the other day and a big chunk was lying on the floor - is this ok with you and what should we do about it? The agencies are at fault! The instructors are at fault! The state is at fault! The girl with her half naked butt hanging through the tube is at fault! (no wait, she isn't) -- etc etc etc etc

I don't think the solution will ever be found by sitting at home in the comfort of a lazy boy chair typing on a laptop, posting on an Internet forum while slamming back a beer -- bitching and complaining about cave damage.

Just a thought.

Brett