Yesterday, Jon Bernot and I completed another successful exploration dive at Cathedral adding 2,747' of line for a total penetration of 21,536'.
This was the first dive where we weren't still setting up the cave. Prior to our first exploration dive on November 2nd we had not been beyond 10.500' so much of our time was spent patching and pulling the line out of the silt in addition to moving safeties out past 10,500'. On our second exploration dive we were tasked with moving four more safeties out to 12k, 14k, and 16k. This time the cave was setup and we were free to focus on the exploration. Well almost. On Friday, Ken Sallot and Jef Frank staged two xk1s at 8k and checked the safeties out to 10k. They found that the safety at 6k had somehow drained down to 1000 psi. Since they didn't have a replacement, they left it in place but let us know. Jon and I discussed it and decided to take one of the two safeties at 4k out to 6k, which we did. No big deal.
We made the trip out to the eol at 18,789' in 145 minutes. On the way we dropped and picked up fresh xk1 scooters at 8k and switched xk1s at 16k. On this dive we towed an additional xJoy 37 as a backup scooter that was not factored into the dive plan. The xJoy 37 isn't quite as fast as the xk1 but has approximately the same range and is a lot smaller. As such, it makes an excellent backup tow scooter.
Jon tied in the first reel and quickly spooled out 800' of line. The cave continues to vary in size but on average is smaller past 18k. About 300' into his second reel Jon dead ended in a slot canyon. There appeared to a small duck under down to the left but it looked too small for the continuation. I decided to go back about 100' and check out a big room. On the way back there were no other leads but the room looked promising. I waited for Jon to reel back to me for a few minutes but quickly realized he wasn't coming. I went back to where we dead ended and saw him waiting for me under the duck under. Once I descended down I realized it was bigger than it first appeared and this was clearly the way on. However, Jon was trying to hand me the reel. I didn't know why until he pointed to his mask, which was completely fogged. He couldn't see well enough to route find in these conditions. I took the reel and finished spooling out the remaining 500' of Jon's reel before dumping my 1,200' exploration reel.
It took us about 50 minutes to lay 2,747' of line on the trigger, which means we were moving at about 60 ft/min. The slower pace allowed us to scan the walls and find the correct way on without any other dead ends or alcoves. The 15-20' visibility makes for challenging route finding but I actually recalled something from my open water class and used the sand ripples to guide me when I couldn't see the passage shape. I moved perpendicular to the ripples and looked for any distinct line between dark passage and lighter walls. This proved to be quite effective.
After struggling to find a decent tie off it took us about 55 minutes to survey the 2,747' on the way out using the two-compass method. I set the azimuth and Jon counted knots and recorded the data at each station. Once the survey was complete the remaining trip out was uneventful. We made stops again at 16k and 8k to swap and pickup xk1s and enjoy a few GU packs.
Our bottom time was 397 mins. with an average depth of 131 ffw. My total dive time was 815 mins. with about 180 mins. in the habit followed by a slow 20 min. ascent to the surface. Jon ran a slightly lower set point on the bottom (0.7 vs 1.0) so had about an hour more deco.
Thanks to Kristi Bernot, Howard Smith, Derek Ferguson, Ken Sallot, Jef Frank, Ted McCoy, and Roberts Culbert for their setup and support this weekend. Also, thanks to Jon Jonathan Taylor for the incredible NY deli sandwiches after the dive.
Thanks to Casey McKinlay at D3 Diving/Suex, Faith Ortins at DUI, Lamar Hires at Dive Rite, and the Bernots at Cave Country Dive Shop for their materiel support.
Charlie Roberson
