Under ice diving?

[RN]

Ya , fer sure , you betcha dere
I did the Ice Cert class and didn't do another one.
Yes , I remember getting in and out of da hole was EEK!!

Of course , that was LONG BEFORE I had any real overhead training.

I can DEFINATELY SEE why you don't use any of your "backgas" due to free-flow issues/inflator issues. (Froze mine open at the surface , me did...UFFDA)

Interesting. PLEASE keep us posted on all of your progress(es). (SMILE)

Jean

Was that when you first started wearing that 3mm shorty?

[FW]

I have tried cave diving equipment under the ice a couple of times. The biggest issue is cold hands! To be really effective, major changes would have to be made. Reels would have to hold thicker line, and be handelable with heavy dry gloves/mittens. FWIW, I gave up, and went back to the tether technique.

[JDostal]

That is essentially what we do. Some teams use the legs of a solid structure like a picnic table (that is frozen into the ground) as their primary tie-off, others use an ice screw.

Cool. I think I'm going to do that next year. Ice diving season is just about done around here with the warm weather we've been having.

We are used to operating lines with gloves on around here. All of our diving is done with dry gloves, especially in our mines. It's a pain but you get pretty used to running lines and reels with all of the extra stuff. Even wreck diving when you shoot bags you do it all with the thick stuff.

[brokenbones]

Cool. I think I'm going to do that next year. Ice diving season is just about done around here with the warm weather we've been having.

We are used to operating lines with gloves on around here. All of our diving is done with dry gloves, especially in our mines. It's a pain but you get pretty used to running lines and reels with all of the extra stuff. Even wreck diving when you shoot bags you do it all with the thick stuff.

Same here! I was shocked when I took my first cave course and found out that I did not need dry gloves. Gear handling became so easy with no gloves

[JDostal]

Haha, I know the feeling! It's so nice to get into warm water and not need gloves at all.

[Sludge]

You people need to hang out in a southern open-water shop for about a day. I have friends who "can't believe I go diving in that ice-cold 72° water."

[diverpaul69]

It’s interesting to read about divers who want to dive under the ice using cave dive or modified cave diving rules. I am only a cavern diver with hopes of becoming a cave diver soon. I have been diving in ice cold water for many years and have logged hundred of dives in winter conditions. The idea of going under the ice with a cave dive reel and heading off into the deep blue water really scares me. When you enter the water with only a dive real and head away from the hole it does not take very long to loose sight of the hole. Once you loose sight of the hole you your life is hanging on the hopes that that one line does not break.
The one thing I did learn from the cave divers I talked to in Cave country in Florida is that they have as many redundant safety features as possible. If you enter the water and dive under the ice you better be tethered to the hole and have at the very lest one dive team at the surface ready to help you if you end up in trouble. I might entertain the idea of using a reel, but I would also insist that my buddy also had one. Unlike diving in a cave that actually has some sort of reference back to the surface. Diving under the ice offers little of no reference back to the hole. Once you get a very short distance from the hole and look towards the surface everything looks the same. If you get in trouble under the ice and don't have a solid plan all you have is a guess which way is back to the little 10 foot triangle cut in the ice. I won't use ice diving training for cave diving don't use cave diving training for ice diving.

[NorthWoodsDiver]

I dive on a public safety dive team, or at least I am a diver on the team, and they do the tether thing but its never in good viz, never in familiar places, and running a reel and dragging a body around in 36 degree water is not something worth trying.

on the other hand, diving in familiar territory with good viz and minimum other task loading makes under the ice cave diving techniques another good tool.

I have had nothing but bad experiences under the ice for the most part and the most recent experience made me decide I am not going to ice dive if I have to do it tethered (public safety or recreational activity) so if I want to dive in the winter I have to come up with another way.

I decided on a set of protocols for myself based on my comfort levels and hope to try them out on one last ice dive this season.

-I plan to only dive solo unless its the local pit where silt outs are almost impossible and everyone is totally familiar with the layout of the site.

-use a #36 or heavier line.

-dive in double tanks or sidemount and never exceed thirds. Or rebreather when I make it that far.

-not exceed a depth of 150 feet on any dive and not exceed a depth of 100 feet on most dives based on certain criteria. ***

-only dive when a suit heater is available.

among others.

This limits the potential for someone else to cause problems for me and maximizes my ability to stay warm and clear headed if something should happen.

*** We often times place the hole over a permanent upline thats on a wreck or underwater attraction so on those dives I see no reason why its not acceptable to dive to these deeper depths without being tethered (tying into the upline at the wreck of course). Otherwise the depth limits are far more conservative and the whole is generally placed in much shallowed water.

[dive1dennis]

Cool. I think I'm going to do that next year. Ice diving season is just about done around here with the warm weather we've been having.

Hey Jason,
If so inclined, you might look me up next winter. Might be fun to try cave diving below the ice. You would have to find something other than a typical muck bottom lake, it would be very challenging to find places for tie-offs in the muck bottom of the typical lake on this side of the state.....

Dennis

[FW]

Hey Jason,
If so inclined, you might look me up next winter. Might be fun to try cave diving below the ice. You would have to find something other than a typical muck bottom lake, it would be very challenging to find places for tie-offs in the muck bottom of the typical lake on this side of the state.....

Dennis

Not that I think ice diving with a reel is a good idea, but you can use "silt stakes" in the mud. They are lengths of PVC pipe with one end cut at an angle to push down in the muck. The other end needs a notch to tie the line onto.