Hi
I do not have any websites as I said but I have been an active certified ice Divemaster for 15 years. I hope you are certified before attempting to Ice Dive. As I said Ice diving is great, but it is a dangerous sport without the right training, gear and support people. Done properly, it is a gear & support people intensive sport.
Although most people that take Ice training are police and fireman training for under ice recovery, there are some brave souls that just want to do it (like my son). Lots of things can and often enough do go wrong under the ice. Mostly regulator failures. Your regs should be rated for ice diving to have the best chance of this not occurring. You should use an ice harness that you have to climb into in some fashion, either full body or jacket style, with 2 d-rings sewn in a few different places but preferably in the upper chest area. This makes it easy to hold the line away from you and also to reach the line should it slip from your hand while diving. The harness is the first thing on and the last thing off. It is not wise to clip into the BC! If for any reason you have to remove your BC underwater (like fishing line entanglements) you will always be connected to the surface with a harness. (first thing on last thing off). If you have a harness made, be sure it is sewn together well and the d-ring will not rip off. It is your only connection to the surface. I will see if I can find the name of the company we got the harnesses from.
The line HAS to be a floating line (approx 3/8) and should be a very hi breaking strength. My lines are 1000lbs. This is to help insure the line does not break while being heavily pulled on by the tender in an emergency, or if it get caught on something, severing your life line to the surface. We use 200ft lines with locking carabiners attached to both ends. One end locked onto to the diver, the other locked to an ice climbing screw on the surface about 15ft from the hole. The lines should be dressed out over the ice, not in a pile, to avoid entanglements. There is another very important piece of equipment between the diver and the ice screw, an experienced line tender for each line in the water. There should also ALWAYS be a rescue diver completely geared up and attached to a rescue line, (we use a 600ft line) sitting on the surface ready to drop into the water for an emergency, whenever divers are in the water. You should have a tent with a propane heater to get divers out of the cold, to get dressed into and out of their suits, as well as line the tenders whose hands get wet and cold tendering the line. Propane or gas stoves to always keep hot water available should a second stg diaphragm freeze up just as divers are getting into the water. Also a good idea to have soup on the stove throughout the day.
There is still more stuff, but this certainly gives you a lot to think about.
Dive safe
KVDIVR
