For what it's worth-!

[JE]

There are at least two, maybe three submerged & gated cave systems that I know of. Devils Den is one, The Ballroom @ Ginnie is another, & there seems to be one on Vortex as well. They are there for a reason: To save lives-! If you feel strong enough go swimming in the muck with zero visibility, then by all means have fun, but please don't patronize one of our favorite dive sites by breaking the rules-! The Ballroom at Ginnie is gated shut & closed for good reason. No one is perfect, & all it takes is one non-thinking idiot to spoil it for all of us. There are numerous un-explored springs & caves to lay line in, & you really don't need to pay anyone to go have fun. Just please respect the land owners wishes & rules he has put up for your own well being.
Enough said. Been there, seen it, had fun, & respected the rules-!!
later.............>

je

[TonyDCaver]

Random.

[rchrds]

sounds like someone found a way around the gate? hee hee.
A lot of hot action at Ginnie lately.

[jj1987]

Would you support putting a grate up in devils to save lives?

Is the real issue here that we don't trust trained cave divers to make informed decisions on what caves they should or should not enter under their current combination of training and experience? If so, wouldn't the community be better off improving training rather than grating off access to cave systems? Seems that doing so would solve the ballroom issue, as well as the new exploration over at devils.

[SuPrBuGmAn]

The gate at Vortex has a hinge with a padlock. They'll give you the key to the padlock on showing Full Cave certification. I haven't been terribly far back beyond the gate, but its not incredibly silty, mostly a sand bottom. Actually kinda nice too, quite a change from the worn-smooth rock walls and graffiti leading up TO the gate.

[OFG-1]

There are at least two, maybe three submerged & gated cave systems that I know of. Devils Den is one, The Ballroom @ Ginnie is another, & there seems to be one on Vortex as well. They are there for a reason: To save lives-! If you feel strong enough go swimming in the muck with zero visibility, then by all means have fun, but please don't patronize one of our favorite dive sites by breaking the rules-! The Ballroom at Ginnie is gated shut & closed for good reason. No one is perfect, & all it takes is one non-thinking idiot to spoil it for all of us. There are numerous un-explored springs & caves to lay line in, & you really don't need to pay anyone to go have fun. Just please respect the land owners wishes & rules he has put up for your own well being.
Enough said. Been there, seen it, had fun, & respected the rules-!!
later.............>

je

Jenny was sealed off for one reason. Lawsuits. And in case you have missed the whole riparian rights deal in florida for the last 40 or so years, the land owners do not now or have ever owned the inside of the ballroom.

The grate in Jenny changed the flow and sediment deposition patterns in the area. The restriction into the cave was backmount with double 104's and a horsecollar bc and a light canister as big as your leg. And the front part of the cave is big and pretty. The back part is a silty nightmare, hence all of the dead morons. You could see all of Jenny with one 500 foot reel. It was a great training dive.

I was against the grate when the idea came up, and still think about a long dive with a sharp hacksaw.

[MedCop]

So there is no real legal authority stopping someone from removing the grate in the Ballroom?

I am in no way saying it should be done, or anything like that...just wondering under what authority it was installed..and so on.

[FW]

The restriction into the cave was backmount with double 104's and a horsecollar bc and a light canister as big as your leg.

We didn't have 104s at the time, those would have been Nimrod 100s

[Line Squirrel]

So there is no real legal authority stopping someone from removing the grate in the Ballroom?

Things that make you go hmmmmmmm

[Daedalus]

The cave goes under their land and the grate is attached to their rocks.