Cave diving on CC is safer than on OC?

[tomfcrist]

There were a few at manatee that weren’t even trained cave divers.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but there were a few that were trained as well.

And quite a few of the rebreather incidents involve extreme stupidity/lack of training/ lack of checklist usage….all could just be wrapped under the stupidity vernacular.

 

[berndo]

I can think of a few in manatee pretty recently.

I've asked how many we have seen compared to ccr accidents.

...we only know about incidents that have occurred already

Yes, and from that we (at least the people who bother to read reports) have a pretty clear picture and it's this:

There are quite a bit of rebreather cave fatalities. There are honestly not a lot of rebreather cave divers. There are certainly some OC cave fatalities. There are a lot of OC cave divers.

 

[berndo]

Correct me if I’m wrong, but there were a few that were trained as well.

And quite a few of the rebreather incidents involve extreme stupidity/lack of training/ lack of checklist usage….all could just be wrapped under the stupidity vernacular.

Do you even read posts before you write an answer?

 

[PfcAJ]

Correct me if I’m wrong, but there were a few that were trained as well.

And quite a few of the rebreather incidents involve extreme stupidity/lack of training/ lack of checklist usage….all could just be wrapped under the stupidity vernacular.

I can think of one in recent years that was an unverified traverse attempt.

 

[rddvet]

What you mean by 'very front'? I think it's not that hard to carry 8k-10k liters/280-350 cuft of gas, even in SM and still swim well enough, which gives you quite a bit of range at Ginnie depth ... I think within that range it's safer to be OC. Most CCR accidents I'm aware of happened in or well within that range.
The delay you would have due a navigational error would likely be due to the divers being distracted by something... and getting distracted by something is much worse on a CCR as we have seen.


I think we see many more dead divers on CCR vs OC considering the numbers of ccr vs OC divers.
We don't have the numbers but I very much doubt that any diver that spends time in cave site parking lots would dispute this. Even without getting to see more reports.

I do feel like some instructors and scuba 'infuencers' are downplaying the danger or are oblivious to it.
Gus's analysis of his rr incident makes me believe they are oblivious. I feel more and more people have a very nonchalant attitude towards rebreathers. I'm surprised we don't see more accidents...

I just meant if you're a newer cave diver just making it to maple leaf/ front parts of bone line and hill400, the benefits of ccr don't dramatically outweigh the potential risks/complications.
I do believe the % of deaths will end up being higher on ccr. The problem is that it's very hard to quantify that in terms of the type of diving being done. If you're 5000 feet back in ginnnie on a ccr and kack yourself, that's very different than someone on oc with no stage in the first 1000 feet. Basically, even if theres more ccr deaths, how do you work the differences in the challenges of those dives into the equation? I have no idea because I am not a statisician.
Basically there's no right anwer. Its personal opinion on ccr being safer or not. IMO for my "bigger" dives, the ccr is is worth it because I feel safer due to more options

 

[rddvet]

Agree with the others who said Dive Talk is best for entertainment.

I very much like that diplomatic way of agreeing those guys are tools. I can't watch more than about 5 minutes of anything those guys do. Good for them for monetizing their diving, but they very much think of themselves as experts mainly from hobnobbing with "big names."
I speak from someone with more background knowledge than just watching their videos and thinking their tools.

 

[rjack321]

I just meant if you're a newer cave diver just making it to maple leaf/ front parts of bone line and hill400, the benefits of ccr don't dramatically outweigh the potential risks/complications.
I do believe the % of deaths will end up being higher on ccr. The problem is that it's very hard to quantify that in terms of the type of diving being done. If you're 5000 feet back in ginnnie on a ccr and kack yourself, that's very different than someone on oc with no stage in the first 1000 feet. Basically, even if theres more ccr deaths, how do you work the differences in the challenges of those dives into the equation? I have no idea because I am not a statisician.
Basically there's no right anwer. Its personal opinion on ccr being safer or not. IMO for my "bigger" dives, the ccr is is worth it because I feel safer due to more options

This too. If you die on a CCR cave dive that isnt even possible on OC how does that count? Or if you perish on OC but didnt run out of gas where do that fit in?

The problem with this question in the first place is that almost every death is multifactorial and you can't point to "one thing" as responsible. You cannot and should not be dividing deaths by dives and calculating some sort of percentage and saying "look more dengerous!" The premise and the question are flawed - which is to be expected from the simplistic Huey, Dewey and Looy of internet diving.

Cue the swiss cheese model of accident causality here.

 

[berndo]

IMO for my "bigger" dives, the ccr is is worth it because I feel safer due to more options

I don't think anyone doubts that.

This thread was asking for tourist dives thought. I think we have clearly seen over the last 25 years that CCR diving is way more dangerous that OC.

 

[berndo]

The problem with this question in the first place is that almost every death is multifactorial and you can't point to "one thing" as responsible. You cannot and should not be dividing deaths by dives and calculating some sort of percentage and saying "look more dengerous!"

Traffic accidents are also multifactorial so I guess we can't know if riding a motorbike is more or less dangerous that driving a car in the same city/distance/time of day/weather, according to your logic.
We do know what's more dangerous and it's pretty obvious why.

A machine that allows for the operator to make more mistakes that are also more severe in consequence, is more dangerous. That's not an 'opinion'. Look at 'Failure mode and effect analysis'.

If you die on a CCR cave dive that isnt even possible on OC how does that count?

Has nothing to to with the question:

(Let's assume we are talking non-solo tourist cave dives, not cave exploration expeditions.)

 

[lostsheep]

Traffic accidents are also multifactorial so I guess we can't know if riding a motorbike is more or less dangerous that driving a car in the same city/distance/time of day/weather, according to your logic.
We do know what's more dangerous and it's pretty obvious why.

A machine that allows for the operator to make more mistakes that are also more severe in consequence, is more dangerous. That's not an 'opinion'. Look at 'Failure mode and effect analysis'.


Has nothing to to with the question:

Do you dive CCR @berndo ?