Diver missing at Ginnie?

[Manatee Diver]

How many caves are on private lands that are not currently and may never be open to cave diving due to owner's fear of liability?

That is a good question, but I'm not sure how keeping the IUCRR reports secret helps that.

Perhaps what we need is more data. Start collecting how people cave dive are conducted each year compare it to medical and non-medical accidents.

I am willing to bet that number is quite low. I don't know of how many medical events we have in cave diving. As those are even more hush hush. We seem to get about one cave diving accident every year to two years.

 

[cerich]

How many caves are on private lands that are not currently and may never be open to cave diving due to owner's fear of liability?

More than anybody knows, for more reason that just fear of liability regards divers.

 

[boulderjohn]

More than anybody knows, for more reason that just fear of liability regards divers.

Although they are not caves, there are only two dive sites in the southern Rocky Mountain region that are suitable for tech diving and tech diving training. Both are on private property. In one case, almost no one knows about it because the owner has never allowed any diving there because of a fear of liability. In the other case, we have been living on the edge of the possibility that it would be closed to us because of those fears for more than a decade. If you go to the Rocky Mountain region site on ScubaBoard, you can see how many times the closing of Rock Lake has been announced and then retracted. The latest announcement was by me about a month or two ago. We then got another reprieve, but we don't know for how long.

 

[Johnoly]

Just what's involved in seeking an IUCRR report from police in such an instance?

Could one of you do this if so inclined?

If you obtained it, could you then post a PDF copy online for everyone to see?

I have pulled a half dozen Sunshine diver death records. Some were easy, some I had to "persuade" the county attorneys,, who always agreed with my request, but the county M.E. wasn't happy about it.

I'm only speaking about Florida since IUCRR works in many states. The police may "aide" in a diver death investigation, but the M.E.'s office is the lead investigator and all requests will go thru their office. There's nothing for the police to give you, it's all turned over to the M.E.

Re: Posting the PDF copy online - The reports you receive are public records but slightly redacted. I won't publish the actual information in an open forum, But I have summarized the important details specifically on the "Chain of Events". Remember that ALL death accidents are never 1 single cause, but rather a chain of events that if just one link was interrupted, the death would not have occurred. If after the summary, someone has a specific chain link question, I'll share that part of the report privately with an individual known to me. It still may not answer their question, because the M.E. didn't address it in their report. (ie body position). I also will bring a copy and let family/teammate read the entire report. I only pull reports when I don't get answers and I knew the diver/buddy.

 

[Doby45]

With that said, I think the above posted is a great idea. I can see how many people, myself included, would be all fun and games going on a technical dive at a technical site... but a sign like that, at a place that I don't go to every day, would cause me to pause and think things through a little more. Those signs would be filled with a lot of the greats... way better divers than I'll ever be. And if it can happen to them, it could happen to me.. I would pause and double check things maybe one more time. It would be enough to possibly save someone like me.

You don't always need a sign. You can still do a dive through Orange Grove and see a spot in the clay that looks like a grenade of fins blew up there. That's where a diver passed and all the clay disturbance is where the struggle happened. Every time I go past that spot, I am reminded.

 

[ofg-1]

How many of the Florida caves are on private property? I know Ginnie,.

Devils is in the river, not on private property. Land access is on private property. People have been diving it from boats for years. There are numerous sites accessible only by boat.

 

[kensuf]

Perhaps what we need is more data. Start collecting how people cave dive are conducted each year compare it to medical and non-medical accidents.

That's an excellent idea! Are you volunteering to collect the data?

 

[Manatee Diver]

That's an excellent idea! Are you volunteering to collect the data?

State park, Suwannee Parks, Jackson Parks, and other governmental actors wouldn't be hard to get the data from (assuming they keep it). I am not sure if Edd tells IUCRR about what he does up in Marianna, though I can ask Dene.

The real question would be if Ginnie or IUCRR will give numbers.

 

[cerich]

State park, Suwannee Parks, Jackson Parks, and other governmental actors wouldn't be hard to get the data from (assuming they keep it). I am not sure if Edd tells IUCRR about what he does up in Marianna, though I can ask Dene.

The real question would be if Ginnie or IUCRR will give numbers.

Edd is a IUCRR member and gives them reports

 

[tbone1004]

One of the things about cave diving is that when cave divers are solo, they are never running video except for the Bushman's Hole tragedy. Just the other day, I was thinking about adding a second Go Pro to my speargun and facing it toward me. That way, I can play it back and see if a shark I didn't see saw me. That's kind of a joke. But, in spearfishing, so many guys are running action cameras that videos exist of just about every incident and lots of close calls with the local wildlife.

Solo cave deaths have no witnesses living or electronic. Even if we could piece together what happened, the why would be unknown.

you say that, but do we actually know they don't have a camera running or is it covered up by the IUCRR like the dive logs from the computers and everything else?