Just Wondering

[Dominick Gheesling]

So,

I?m one of those newish Cave Divers that still think that Cave Diving is an incredibly dangerous endeavor, considering that everything about the environment of a water filled cave is completely hostile to human life without the assistance of technology. In water filled caves it is dark (can?t see), cold (hypothermia), and of course that most critical consideration, humans can?t breathe water (at least not for any extended period of time).

I am not freaked out when I get in the water, which is the point that I?ll be getting to; I think that I just have a healthy appreciation for the risks involved.

I?ll get to the point, which is that I was just playing with ideas in my head and wondering, How much, like a percentage, does a successful Cave Dive rely on Training, Gear Maintenance and Surface Preparation Pre-Dive? I?ll qualify a successful Cave Dive a little more narrowly than ?any dive you surface from? (which is still the gold standard) to something like, no life-threatening emergencies transpired during the course of the dive. I?ll further qualify that as defining life-threatening as one of the following: Breathing Equipment Failure, Lack of Realistic/Conservative Gas Planning, Loss of Contact with Team or Serious Navigational Error. So, far most of the other problems I have encountered are simply that, inconveniences or problems provided I use my training and rely on the Stop, Breathe, Think, Breathe, Act mantra.

For myself, it seems that the successful Cave Dive almost exclusively relies on Training, Gear Maintenance and Pre-Dive Planning. I understand that even when working diligently to address these three aspects of Cave Diving, #### can and will go wrong but even then having diligently addressed these three aspects less #### will go wrong, which will lessen the stress.

And then of course there is PANIC. Seems to me that the BEST preparation for panic is to avoid it. It seems that it would be incredibly difficult (possibly inhumane) to accurately predict an individual?s stress threshold that will result in PANIC.

Just a few thoughts I was ruminating on and more than ever I believe that successful Cave Diving starts with a plan well before entering the water or at least avoiding bad Cave Dives is probably more easily achieved through constructing a plan well before entering the water.

[FW]

Cave diving is incredibly dangerous. Back in the '60s there were up to 40 fatalities a year. This all changed with the advent of training. Now only the cocky divers that think they are too good to follow the rules get into trouble, and sadly the ones that scooter into silty conditions and loose the line.

"Plan your dive, and dive your plan."

[Randall]

For what it's worth, Its really hard to quantify or put a percentage on what it takes to make a successful dive. Obviously the three criteria you listed are all important If I had to list them in terms of importance I would say #1 is training. Most incidents involve someone diving outside of their training level or comfort level. #2 would be proper dive planning and sticking to it. #3 would be properly maintained equipment. If you adhere to 1 and 2, number 3 should have already been taken care of. If something happens and you have trained and planned properly you can survive most any gear failure. This is just my opinion.

[DogDiver]

I?ve always said in 54 years of diving and 21 years of cave diving.
There are old divers.
And there are bold divers.
But there are no old, bold divers.


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[Kelly Jessop]

You mention some great things,but ultimately a successful cave dive is one you survived and drove home. That is overly simplified, but this culminates in the elements you have mentioned,but also the development of experience, which reinforces skill. What becomes dangerous is complacency- I know that jump and don't need a reel, trust me we can do that traverse on the gas you have, those bubbles aren't too bad and I don't need to get out of the water for maintenance etc etc.

[FW]

You mention some great things,but ultimately a successful cave dive is one you survived and drove home. That is overly simplified, but this culminates in the elements you have mentioned,but also the development of experience, which reinforces skill. What becomes dangerous is complacency- I know that jump and don't need a reel, trust me we can do that traverse on the gas you have, those bubbles aren't too bad and I don't need to get out of the water for maintenance etc etc.

To me, the drive home is FAR more dangerous than ANY cave dive, including extreme sump dives.

[MORGAN]

To me, the drive home is FAR more dangerous than ANY cave dive, including extreme sump dives.

I agree. You can control what you do in a cave and how you do it; on the highway there are all those other drivers.

[aa3jy]

Interesting listing....

https://www.tiebreaker.com/deadliest...-earth-ranked/

[FW]

Interesting listing....

https://www.tiebreaker.com/deadliest...-earth-ranked/

Number 3? If they had made their survey 30 years ago, cave diving would have been number one!

[OFG-1]

What a bunch of boowah! Cave diving more dangerous than Heli Skiing? Their own data contradicts this More dangerous than BASE jumping? Cliff jumping? Who makes this stuff up? Can we get them to stop?