Mexico Cenote Diving or sth else in Latin America/Cavern Diving

[halocline]

Hi,

I do think that bringing open water divers with no previous experience in overhead environment to the Cenotes is something at least irresponsible and dangerous.

On anyone's first cenote dive, they are an OW diver with no previous experience in overhead. This is even true for students in a cavern class. The question is, how are such divers introduced to the cenote environment?

As long as the guides are properly trained and equipped, and follow the very specific safety protocols that are in place, guided cenote dives have proven to be very safe, although with any diving there is an inherent risk. You might 'think' it's "irresponsible and dangerous" but the fact is that every day there are hundreds of cenote divers in the Yucatan and have been for years. The vast majority of these dives are completed without incident. That's the 'proven safe' part. Fatalities are quite rare given the number of divers, and typically involve mistakes and/or irresponsible behavior on the part of guides. The same sort of thing happens all over the world, in many different types of dive environments.

It is true that any overhead is a very unforgiving environment to dive in, and I agree that anyone seriously interested in diving in this environment should seek quality overhead dive training. I started cenote diving with several guided dives, then went on to cavern and cave training. I think that many cave divers have followed a similar path.

 

[halocline]

I believe earlier up in this thread someone mentioned that the Mexican news and PoPo do a good job of not fully investigating (reporting) these things because of the impact to the economy.

You are making claims without any documentation. Instead, you are insinuating that in Mexico, there is a conspiracy to cover up diver deaths so as to not interrupt the flow of tourist dollars. It's a serious claim.

There are also deaths and lots of tourist money in the FL caves. Is there a similar conspiracy there? Or is it just a "Mexican" problem?

 

[kafkaland]

Those that we hear about. My impression is that they cover up all the ones they can. The police in Mexico investigate about 4.5% of total crimes, with about 99% of crimes resulting in nobody being convicted. 98% of murders in Mexico last year went unsolved

You are making claims without any documentation. Instead, you are insinuating that in Mexico, there is a conspiracy to cover up diver deaths so as to not interrupt the flow of tourist dollars. It's a serious claim.

There are also deaths and lots of tourist money in the FL caves. Is there a similar conspiracy there? Or is it just a "Mexican" problem?

I cannot imagine that there are vast numbers of cavern tour fatalities that are being covered up. Not in this day of social media, and a very gossippy local cave diving community. There are always dozens of divers at the more popular cenotes, including guides and instructors. On a busy day it's quite a zoo in places like Dos Ojos, Ponderosa, Tajma Ha, Chac Mool, etc. If something happened that triggered a rescue or recovery operation, everyone would know, and it would be all over Scubaboard and CDF within a day or two. So I really believe that the fatality rate is roughly what we hear about: one every year, or every other year, which comes to something like 1:100,000. That's roughly comparable or even better than Great Lakes wreck diving, for instance.

 

[rongoodman]

The biggest danger in going on those guided dives is that you'll leave wanting to come back and spend a bunch of money and time becoming cave trained. Ask me how I know.

 

[Dogbowl]

I cannot imagine that there are vast numbers of cavern tour fatalities that are being covered up. Not in this day of social media, and a very gossippy local cave diving community. There are always dozens of divers at the more popular cenotes, including guides and instructors. On a busy day it's quite a zoo in places like Dos Ojos, Ponderosa, Tajma Ha, Chac Mool, etc. If something happened that triggered a rescue or recovery operation, everyone would know, and it would be all over Scubaboard and CDF within a day or two. So I really believe that the fatality rate is roughly what we hear about: one every year, or every other year, which comes to something like 1:100,000. That's roughly comparable or even better than Great Lakes wreck diving, for instance.

I kind of agree. It's rather difficult to cover up incidents these days. Even if every guide kept quiet about an incident they saw, the customer divers would be on social media asap I would think. Most people have phones with a camera on them locked in the truck on these dives. It wouldn't take a day for an incident to hit social media these days.

 

[kafkaland]

The biggest danger in going on those guided dives is that you'll leave wanting to come back and spend a bunch of money and time becoming cave trained. Ask me how I know.

LOL- the exact same thing happened to me. It's a powerful gateway drug. The first hit is (almost) free. You can get the excitement as an OW diver in your regular gear for the price of a boat dive. And then you want more, take the courses, buy the technical gear, travel back to get more experience, and before you know it you're deep down into the rabbit hole.

 

[Dogbowl]

LOL- the exact same thing happened to me. It's a powerful gateway drug. The first hit is (almost) free. You can get the excitement as an OW diver in your regular gear for the price of a boat dive. And then you want more, take the courses, buy the technical gear, travel back to get more experience, and before you know it you're deep down into the rabbit hole.

Yup! Did 2 dives in 2015. Back here now and did 6 more. Thinking of doing cavern course later.