Even philosophically or theoretically, the answer is NO, no it's not. The question itself reflects a potentially dangerous attitude.
Is cave diving safer than Open Water
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Even philosophically or theoretically, the answer is NO, no it's not. The question itself reflects a potentially dangerous attitude.
bradlw
Contributor
when I read the original post, I get it......
My take is that they meant it as "in a way".... not "absolutely"
open water has so many variables, current, waves, surge at shallow depths, marine life, climbing back onto boats......some of which are not set up to make that easy, etc.... It can be like drinking form a fire house for some timid or on the edge of control people.....
Instead of caves, I would say Florida springs.....
in a way....perhaps form an overgeneralized kind of way, I think doing training checkout dives in some springs is silly. No measure of ability and no confience building right of passage for a new diver. Some are very open and very shallow....no different than a swimming pool, just a little colder and maybe a few feet deeper. (I'm thinking Devil's Grotto, Rainbow River, Crystal River (even though that does through a slight river element)
The classes I did all my Divecon training with were all checked out in various springs and I've done a lot of my training dives in them myself. No or little current, water clear as air, not very deep, no waves or surge....
The Virginia quarries I did my OW class in was in a loose way similar....the only challenges it had going for it was 40°F water and much worse visibility/water clarity...and they were deeper.
Some of the sink holes around here are black as night and can be deep, so they are a step up in difficulty, and some such as 40 Fathom Gratto are very deep..... but are still somewhat like a shallow open spring
...and to the OP's point, some caves are a lot like that...the one and only cave that I dove in during my Trimix class was like that...... shallow depth, had a ceiling so no out of control ascents, unlimited vis, negligible if any current...etc....
My take is that they meant it as "in a way".... not "absolutely"
open water has so many variables, current, waves, surge at shallow depths, marine life, climbing back onto boats......some of which are not set up to make that easy, etc.... It can be like drinking form a fire house for some timid or on the edge of control people.....
Instead of caves, I would say Florida springs.....
in a way....perhaps form an overgeneralized kind of way, I think doing training checkout dives in some springs is silly. No measure of ability and no confience building right of passage for a new diver. Some are very open and very shallow....no different than a swimming pool, just a little colder and maybe a few feet deeper. (I'm thinking Devil's Grotto, Rainbow River, Crystal River (even though that does through a slight river element)
The classes I did all my Divecon training with were all checked out in various springs and I've done a lot of my training dives in them myself. No or little current, water clear as air, not very deep, no waves or surge....
The Virginia quarries I did my OW class in was in a loose way similar....the only challenges it had going for it was 40°F water and much worse visibility/water clarity...and they were deeper.
Some of the sink holes around here are black as night and can be deep, so they are a step up in difficulty, and some such as 40 Fathom Gratto are very deep..... but are still somewhat like a shallow open spring
...and to the OP's point, some caves are a lot like that...the one and only cave that I dove in during my Trimix class was like that...... shallow depth, had a ceiling so no out of control ascents, unlimited vis, negligible if any current...etc....
RobPNW
Contributor
I would reword for the answer- cave divers are safer than OW divers.
OP
freeflowigb
Registered
It was only later that I realised that sea caves can syphon on you when the tide reverses. That was a bit unnerving in retrospect, but I definitely remember feeling much calmer in the cave that out in the blue. Might be that the overhead environment was giving a false sense of security. The ceiling of the cave had big air pockets, so I was like - even if I run out of air, I can at least breathe some possibly toxic air before they come to my rescue.
The Chairman
Chairman of the Board
It all depends on definitions. There are certain marine caves I call "swim throughs". They are nothing like the caves I dive here in North Central Florida. I would also suggest that I, as a fully trained caver with good control and adequate equipment, am safer a thousand feet back in a cave than an out-of-control OW diver on a 60FSW reef.
100days-a-year
Contributor
The only way to find an honest answer is to quantify the injury and death rate per person or per time unit.
Subjective opinions without data to back them are what we do best here though
It is a subject that has been studied a bit.
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Subjective opinions without data to back them are what we do best here though
It is a subject that has been studied a bit.
Thirty years of American cave diving fatalities - PubMed
Even with improvements in technology, the greatest hazards faced by cave divers remain unchanged. Efforts to develop preventative interventions to address these hazards should continue.
pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Of course cave diving is safer. It is more difficult to have a lung overexpansion injury in a cave than in open water.
Duh!
Duh!
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