Thought this was the intro thread and I was being nice, but...Is this a serious question? Are you HONESTLY arguing that cave diving is SAFER than open water diving?
Yeah, what he said!
Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.
Benefits of registering include
Thought this was the intro thread and I was being nice, but...Is this a serious question? Are you HONESTLY arguing that cave diving is SAFER than open water diving?
To folks dismissing the conversation completely as absurd or a stupid question...
In my experience (recreational guide and instructor for 10+ years, technical instructor and guide for ~10, cave instructor and guide for ~5) OW divers tend to be a LOT scarier in terms of their safety or lack thereof. Many frequently not even realising the amount of danger they put themselves into and needing to be pulled out of it by a DM.
Cave divers, on the other hand, by and large tend to be able to keep both themselves and their team safe.
Again... this is not the absolute, unvarying rule. But it's often enough that I simply expect it.
So in my opinion it's a very fair question and an interesting thing to explore. Perhaps in the context of, "Why is Open Water training more demanding so that people ARE capable of taking care of themselves and a team properly?"
Not sure I fully agree with the last part - put a cave only diver in bad OW conditions outside of their training or past experience and they won’t do well either… but I do agree that an OW only trained diver in a cave will not ever go well.Apples to oranges. Cave diving is inherently more dangerous than your typical OW diving. Hence, why cave training is so rigorous compared to your average OW and AOW training. You can take a cave diver and put them in the OW, but you can't take an OW diver and put them in a cave (well, you can, but it will most likely be a one way trip).
So my arguments were that cave diving is generally safer because it lacks the hazards of the open ocean:
The strongest currents I've ever experienced were in a cave.strong currents
OKstorms
OKboat propellers
OKdangerous marine life
Absolutely wrong; the visibility in a cave can go to zero in seconds.unreliable visibility
The are other weird water conditions, not just down currrents; for example, haloclines so you can't see the line.weird water conditions like downcurrents
This can be a disadvantage if you really need to get to the surface.An overhead environment can be an advantage because it prevents you from shooting to the surface in a bout of panic
To folks dismissing the conversation completely as absurd or a stupid question...
In my experience (recreational guide and instructor for 10+ years, technical instructor and guide for ~10, cave instructor and guide for ~5) OW divers tend to be a LOT scarier in terms of their safety or lack thereof. Many frequently not even realising the amount of danger they put themselves into and needing to be pulled out of it by a DM.
Cave divers, on the other hand, by and large tend to be able to keep both themselves and their team safe.
Again... this is not the absolute, unvarying rule. But it's often enough that I simply expect it.
So in my opinion it's a very fair question and an interesting thing to explore. Perhaps in the context of, "Why is Open Water training more demanding so that people ARE capable of taking care of themselves and a team properly?"
Is this a serious question? Are you HONESTLY arguing that cave diving is SAFER than open water diving?
Is this a troll post or are you actually serious?