Florida Springs/Caves up to date status?

[TSwain]

Orange Grove was blown out Friday. Just got home from there today. We did all our dives at Ginnie Springs.

 

[jimdiverman]

We are sitting here at Dive Outpost tonight. To the best of our knowledge, if you are headed this way, only Ginnie, Manatee and JB are still open. We will be at Manatee for the next couple of days.

 

[jeandiver]

Well , I am going to opposite way ... California to work ... (ohboy)

But you are correct.
Madison is under , Peacock is syphoning OR has river intrusion thru all of it's systems.
Little River is a huge syphon right now ... (eek)

But this happens from time to time...Cleans out the pipes.

Ginnie , Manatee and Jackson Blue are the only systems open for diving right now.

Thanks!
Jean

 

[Dive-aholic]

And the flow is up at JB...quite a bit up...

Anyone have a scooter they want to sell?

 

[jeandiver]

And the flow is up at JB...quite a bit up...

Anyone have a scooter they want to sell?

I was going to say , call Rich at CEE , but I think he sold all of his old ones.

I am SURE GLAD I got to do JB this winter during low flow etc.
But the caves are in control , they need to clean themselves out from time to time.

Jean

P.S. That rain event for this Monday/Tuesday in N.C. Florida will have to be watched (I know I will )
Hopefully it won't add to the rising Suwannee/Withlachooee etc.
Funny how the Sante Fe at High Springs is steady , but the closer you get to the Suwannee , the higher it gets. Maybe backflow from the Suwannee?

 

[Dive-aholic]

Did a few dives in JB yesterday. It's still quite swimmable (is that a word?!?). I guess it's just been so long since I dove it with flow that I forgot how to for a couple of dives. Visibility was also up.

Jean, let me know when you want to see JB with flow and we'll go diving.

As for the Santa Fe, it starts in Florida so the rains from up north don't have an effect on it. It's the local rains that bring that up.

 

[jeandiver]

Note: Written in the Oakland Airport waiting to catch a red-eye to JAX !!!! And then it's off to Ginnie...I'm a nut ... (EEK)

I checked the guages this afternoon on the JAX NOAA site.

Suwannee was dropping but has now taken a turned towards the upside.
The Sante-Fe continues to back-up because of all of the water in the Suwannee.

I'll let everyone know how Ginnie is after this weekend.

Peacock is still closed. Madison is flooded out. Cow is blown out. And Little River (I believe) is STILL Syphoning.

Thanks !

Jean
03/09/2008

P.S. I hope NONE OF MY BUDDIES were hurt/injured etc this Friday morning from the awful storms in Lake City. I saw a few pics on CNN of the damage.. WOWZA
My prayers go out to everyone affected. (amen)

 

[karstdvr]

There was a lot of rain in South Georgia,which comprises the Withlacoochee,and Suwannee,plus I understand there was close to 5" that fell in the Suwannee valley region. I would anticipate that this will prolong the flooding,and perhaps raise the river levels more. This may sound awful,but I actually hope that the flooding is prolonged with a lot of continued rain. In years past seasonal flooding was typical,and putting your gear away during the spring was common,but this will lead to a well charged aquifer,and detritus carried into the caves which cover hand prints,and tank marks on walls,hence some good cave diving in the future. The one down side is that with the aquifer having been low due to a drought it may take awhile to really clear up,last time it took little river close to a year.

 

[jimdiverman]

Note: Written in the Oakland Airport waiting to catch a red-eye to JAX !!!! And then it's off to Ginnie...I'm a nut ... (EEK)

I checked the guages this afternoon on the JAX NOAA site.

Suwannee was dropping but has now taken a turned towards the upside.
The Sante-Fe continues to back-up because of all of the water in the Suwannee.

I'll let everyone know how Ginnie is after this weekend.

Peacock is still closed. Madison is flooded out. Cow is blown out. And Little River (I believe) is STILL Syphoning.

Thanks !

We dove Manatee on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. The flow is down in that system. We were able to get almost to Friedman's on thirds from Catfish, and probably could have made it there on another dive. The vis was close to perfect.

On Wednesday and Thursday we dove Ginnie. The flow at Ginnie is up a little bit from a few weeks ago. Visibility is still pretty good in that system also.

On Friday, we dove JB. There was another couple of divers replacing line in some of the passages. They were on scooters. The flow is up and the vis is down. The vis is no better than 30 feet. The guys on the scooters said it cleared up after 2000 feet in. We penetrated 800 feet and turned the dive on thirds. We are going to head back there today.

I'll let you know more details in another thread.

Dive safe.

 

[SuPrBuGmAn]

The guys replacing line were Ben Martinez and Jim Clark, they were relining the horseshoe circuit(Goodman siphon on the map). Its recently had several breaks and the lining was a bit weird anyway. They talked with Edd and relined it, supposedly the downstream side loops back around on itself(?) now.

There are apparently other systems good to go... Jug Hole for one. I'm willing to bet there are several high flow systems along the rivers that are still pushing enough to keep clear - just not the easy access ones

I'm not planning on a dry spring, I suppose I'll just have to start bringing the boat out.