Can a certified cave diver escort a non cave diver

[oya]

If you can’t deal with it, stay at home, it’s voluntary. The last person you want on a recovery is a judgemental whinger.

I find this mantality odd.

When someone has gotten themselves into trouble cave diving, it's not like they bunked their head in the cavern zone and need a coordinated team of the world's most highly trained divers to come and extract them.

When a body needs to be recovered it's usually from somewhere hairy as hell. Somewhere they shouldn't have been. Somewhere that has, literally just killed someone(s), thus the need for the recovery.

I am, to risk immodesty, one of the most highly trained divers in the world. No, I'm not top 10 or probably top 100. But I am damn good at what I do.

When the call comes, as it has too many times, I answer. Because if I don't, someone else will have to.

Which means my wife will sit up and worry. As will the families of all the people who show up for a recovery (which, done properly, takes a dozen or more people).

I answer the call so that I know that my friends and collegues have the support that they need.

No one wants to be there. It's an awful task that you carry with you for the rest of your life. But you do it because it needs to be done. You do it because you know you are up to it when others may not be. You do it as a volunteer so that you don't hear later that someone else died trying to do the recovery.

And, all too frequently, you do it because some goddamn jackass thought they should be able to go cave diving without that annoying training that is involved.

And you do it for the jackass' family.

Having had to talk to such families before, or see them miliing in the distance as you're handling their loved one's corpse...

I absolutely ABHOR that "I should be able to do what I want, and if I die it's only me" mentality.

 

[G&J]

I enjoy train wrecks, they are hard to look away from. As for anything cave diving related, deferring to experts appears to be the most prudent course. Mistakes are unforgiving.

 

[BoundForElsewhere]

In my opinion, anyone ....... at anytime...... can dive anywhere they want as long as the site is not under the legal control of others.

I'm not sure I can get on board with that. An unqualified diver going into overhead conditions and, god forbid, a cave would unnecessarily put a lot of other people at risk should they have to perform a rescue or recovery operation to pull your dumb-ass out. Not yours in particular but someone's. One should really never put one's self at risk and most certainly not anyone else.

Dive your limits unless with a qualified and good instructor. Then you can have less limits!!!!

 

[Gone for diving]

It all good to have a very elitist I am a cave diver and know it all,

But you all stand on the shoulders of someone that was not certified to make a regulator, use or overpump tanks that were not ment for diving, (ww2 co2 tanks) used unsuitable gear, where not cave certified.(that's how cave diving started) And we can go on and on.
You cave divers still technically overpump tanks contrary to DOT rules,
(Homebuilt Rebreather is another one.
You wouldn't have all your fancy toys.)

I have have no problems with any of it.

If you are going to do something over your training or even capabilities. You better give it serious thought on many different levels.

And I'll push back again. Regular firefighters/emt's lack the cave diving training necessary to retrieve a corpse from a cave, so it falls to volunteer cave divers. Unlike full time firefighters, I'm just some random dude that has a unique skill set and training.

The times I responded to the calls, it was about bringing closure to the families and I am glad I was able to help the families of the deceased. But to be honest, I would have rather stayed at work or continued to enjoy a nice quiet evening at home with my wife than pull a body out of a water filled hole in the ground.

I would push back a bit on this,
while I agree, that people that do the recoveries do not want to do them, (death is tragic,)

But It tends to make some of them more well known and gives status, and probably in more then one instance made them money in the long run.
Also people like a challenge, and something different
For example, Dave shaw did not have to recovered a years old body at aprox 1000ft deep.

Neither would I have recovered and old outdrive, that could have killed me, even though I was not certified...

The thrill of adventure is very much dying in western culture,
so we have dumb people (with or without money) that come up with a risky idea for them, and kill themselves because they can't think things through, (like 600hp car that gets wrapped around a tree.)

For the OP and others, definitely follow the rules, lots of people have screwed up in caves, its way cheaper to learn from others mistakes.
But... choose carefully thoughtfully, who you follow, don't follow blindly,
The end of the day it's your life, and you have the most to lose,

 

[rddvet]

It



I would push back on this,
while I agree, that people that do the recoveries do not want to do them, (death is tragic,)

But It tends to make them more well known and gives status, and probably in more then one instance made them money in the long run.

No offense, but you literally have no idea what you're talking about. I am not a recover diver and never will be. I know quite a few of the recovery divers. Recovering dead people does not make them money.

You are 100% talking out of your anus. If the mods don't like my response they can take it down, but your comment is insulting to the people who put their life on the line, it's way off base, it's based on you having no direct knowledge, and you should be ashamed that you even said it.

 

[oya]

while I agree, that people that do the recoveries do not want to do them, (death is tragic,)

But It tends to make them more well known and gives status, and probably in more then one instance made them money in the long run.

I can't even muster the words for just how offensive this is. Bravo.

 

[flymolo]

Rarely! I am primarily a cold water Northwest diver and caves are not normal here. I still maintain that any diver.... anytime..... has the right to dive anywhere they choose.... anytime..... as long as they are not clearly trespassing or infringing on anyone's rights.

Just consider that when an unqualified (or qualified) diver dies at a site, that site may be closed to everyone else forever. I would consider that some sort of infringement on the community's rights.

But It tends to make them more well known and gives status, and probably in more then one instance made them money in the long run.
Also people like a challenge, and something different
For example, Dave shaw did not have to recovered a years old body at aprox 1000ft deep.

Wow, that's a crazy take. Take a look at the main page for one of the organizations that performs body recoveries, it's right here in the first sentence:

The IUCRR (International Underwater Cave Rescue and Recovery) is an international all-volunteer, not-for-profit public service and educational organization registered in the State of Florida.

It says all-volunteer and not-for-profit. The people who do these recoveries do them at their own risk and expense and only because someone has to. Can you name any of the divers?

 

[boulderjohn]

Just consider that when an unqualified (or qualified) diver dies at a site, that site may be closed to everyone else forever. I would consider that some sort of infringement on the community's righ

I think a primary reason for this is some of what you see in this thread--the unknowing public does not understand the difference between the untrained divers who die in the caves and the fully trained divers who can do those same dives safely. Here are two examples.

• A father with OW certification gave his completely uncertified (not even OW) 15-year old son new tech diving equipment for Christmas, and they immediately set out that very day for Eagles Nest, a dive some people call the Mount Everest of diving. (It isn't.) They had been cave diving for a while, without any training beyond Dad's OW cert. Eagles nest is so deep that any dive there calls for trimix (which they did not have), and the rules for the site call for divers to have qualifications even beyond full cave certification. They both died that day, and for years after that, their families campaigned relentlessly to have the cave closed for all diving, arguing that if people with the great expertise of those two could not survive it, then it was too dangerous for anyone.
• Ben McDaniel was an untrained, uncertified diver of caves, and he disappeared, apparently while diving in Vortex Springs in Florida. (The body was never found.) A video on which he appears shows him diving with makeshift equipment with beginning level skills. The search for his body went on for a long time, and it included some of the world's most renowned recovery divers. As it was going on, the online discussions of the search efforts included comments from friends and family saying that some of the people conducting the search were apparently really, really good"--almost as good as Ben.

 

[Cthippo]

What frustrates me about this discussion and hundreds more like it on a variety of topics is the assumption that nothing is worth dying for.

That death is never an acceptable outcome.

As I see it, we all die, and we should be able to choose which activities we are willing to risk our lives to do. I am only really into activities that can get me killed, the rest don't seem worth doing.

 

[boulderjohn]

As I see it, we all die, and we should be able to choose which activities we are willing to risk our lives to do. I am only really into activities that can get me killed, the rest don't seem worth doing.

I think that is a minority point of view. I am a cave diver, but I certainly don't hold that point of view. I follow the rules, and I don't take silly risks. I thoroughly enjoy diving in caves, but I have absolutely no interest in dying in one. I cannot imagine what the panic of those last few minutes before death must be like, and I don't want to find out.