True Ice diving...... -0.7 Celsius....

[Hoosier]

Have you ever watched “Decent into the Ice” on PBS?


The explorer and scientist did true ice diving inside a glacier at 11,000ft altitude to find out the hidden lake in Mont Blanc. The water hole was about 80ft. They were using nitrox and argon.


A water temperature of minus zero-point-seven degrees Celsius. It's remarkable that the temperature is actually below freezing in a pool of water. They're suspended in the balance where glacial waters lie—between liquid and ice. The visibility is marginal, due to a high concentration of ice crystals mixed into the water.

Their regulators keep freezing open with gas leaking out before they've even looked below the surface.With six regulators among the three of them, only one remained as backup by the end of the dive.


It looks like they were using the famous “Poseidon” regulators, but it also iced up.

 

[namabiru]

Now there's some character-building diving, right there.

 

[Midnight Star]

I saw that too! I think out of six total regulators (3 divers total), only one didn't freeze/malfunction at that temperature (one good working reg for 3 divers!). They cut down into the ice using a chainsaw over 3 feet (if i'm not mistaken) to make a 5' diameter hole to dive into the glacier. The lead diver had ice in his mouth, and was afraid of frostbite on his lips.

I was also amazed to see a time-lapse of the glacier actually moving downhill. Until then, I never thought of a giant mass of ice, sticking on a mass of land, actually sliding down 2' per month.

-----

Mike.

 

[Diver0001]

Have you ever watched “Decent into the Ice” on PBS?


The explorer and scientist did true ice diving inside a glacier at 11,000ft altitude to find out the hidden lake in Mont Blanc. The water hole was about 80ft. They were using nitrox and argon.


A water temperature of minus zero-point-seven degrees Celsius. It's remarkable that the temperature is actually below freezing in a pool of water. They're suspended in the balance where glacial waters lie—between liquid and ice. The visibility is marginal, due to a high concentration of ice crystals mixed into the water.

Their regulators keep freezing open with gas leaking out before they've even looked below the surface.With six regulators among the three of them, only one remained as backup by the end of the dive.


It looks like they were using the famous “Poseidon” regulators, but it also iced up.

That's a bunch of typical TV crapOLA. Around here we dive in water at or aound the freezing point ever winter (my coldest on record is -2C in salt water on a windy day) and I can assure you, most sealed regulators will manage just fine unless you have awful technique.

My guess is that they didn't think taht diving in a big ice-cube was exciting enough for TV so they spiced it up for the ratings....

R..

 

[divemaster_jim]

Not being familiar with the equipment you use there, I can say that in Michigan almost all regs will fail, it's not a question of if, but of when, there are certain things you can do to lessen the chance of it doing that, like not breathing off of it til your submerged or leaning back into the water for a few minutes to allow the first stage to acclimate to the water temp.

 

[Diver0001]

Not being familiar with the equipment you use there, I can say that in Michigan almost all regs will fail, it's not a question of if, but of when, there are certain things you can do to lessen the chance of it doing that, like not breathing off of it til your submerged or leaning back into the water for a few minutes to allow the first stage to acclimate to the water temp.

See? Jim's got technique!

Of course you can make any reg fail but with a little technique you can limit your problems to "incidents" -- exceptions instead of the rule.

Want to know what fails every time it's bitter cold? Inflators.

R..

 

[divemaster_jim]

See? Jim's got technique!

Of course you can make any reg fail but with a little technique you can limit your problems to "incidents" -- exceptions instead of the rule.

Want to know what fails every time it's bitter cold? Inflators.

R..

Gotta love them sticky buttons!!!!

 

[Hoosier]

That's a bunch of typical TV crapOLA. Around here we dive in water at or aound the freezing point ever winter (my coldest on record is -2C in salt water on a windy day) and I can assure you, most sealed regulators will manage just fine unless you have awful technique.

My guess is that they didn't think taht diving in a big ice-cube was exciting enough for TV so they spiced it up for the ratings....

R..

Rotuner,

I don't think it is a typical TV carp... I am not an expert in the chemisty area though.

It isn't only about the temperature, but about the freezing point. As I recall, the salt water's freezing point is - 2.2 Celcius. So, I guess that any salt moisture on the regualtor won't be iced up at 0 Celcius degree, but the fresh water is different, so it is more likely to be iced up pretty faster in a fresh water than in a salt water enviroment. They dived at 11,000ft altitude on the mountain. Can you imagine the air temperature, too?

I could be wrong though......

 

[nadwidny]

I watched that episode. What a gong show. They were diving nitrox so they said they used argon for a suit gas because their underwear would catch on fire with the elevated oxygen in their breathing gas.

I can understand why they had so many reg problems. Part of the pre-dive drill seemed to be "While on surface put reg in mouth. Take some breaths. Submerge". Whoops! There's another free flow. Gee...whoda thunk that was gonna happen.

Also it's a good thing that they were diving independent doubles since it didn't look like any of them could do a shutdown.

And what's with that white crap on the face? I've dove sub-zero water before and I've never had frostbite.

It looked like a very interesting project. However I suspect any science that could be done was hindered by the fact that Larry, Curly, and Moe were running the dives.

 

[Tamas]

is the show available online anywhere to watch? they have a tiny preview on the site but that is it, lacks all the details you talked about