kidsdream
Contributor
Here are some excerpts from some posts related to a cave dive my buddy and I made at Manatee Springs this past Sunday. During our dive we came upon two OW divers diving in the cave system.
Our plan was to enter at Catfish Hotel, go into the flow toward Sue's Sink and then exit back at Catfish (covered with some of the thickest duckweed matting I had ever seen). The good - the dive went as planned and we easily found the gold/main line. Once out of the cavern zone this cave got very dark with pretty iffy vis when compared to Peacock or Ginnie. On entry, we typically could not even seen across the wide cave opening as it was totally black ant the vis was limited due to lots of particulate in the water. We made it about 75% of the way to Sue's before we turned the dive. Coming out we stayed a bit higher in the water column and this helped a lot in getting a better perspective of the cave.
I was leading on the way out when we came upon two divers about 300' into the system. God was really shining on these two morons with their single ALU 80's, no back up regs/tanks and just a couple of yellow beam open water lights to guide them in the dark. my buddy Chris got them turned around and they exited most likely with no air to spare (they did not do a safety stop as they were out of the water before Chris and I even hit the cavern zone). Why would somebody pass by two signs that expound upon the dangers of cave diving without proper training is beyond me.
These are Chris's comments about this experience:
As we entered Manatee I ran a line from open water to the beginning of the gold line (the permanent line that begins about 75 feet into the cave) so that we could find our way out if vis turned bad. From the end of the gold line you could not see natural light.
The vis in Manatee was horrible and I was as spooked as Jeff was. Because you could never see more than one wall at a time it felt like we were just heading into the abyss. We stuck real close to the gold line because it would have been very difficult to find it again in such a big cave with low vis if we were to loose it.
After using our allotted gas and turning round we eventually saw 2 lights heading toward us (as Jeff already stated) at a penetration of roughly 300 feet from the cave opening (depth was about 85 feet at that point I think). I remember thinking "that's weird, I didn't see any other cave divers suiting up while we were". As I was pondering this oddity, I noticed something that stuck out like a sore thumb... snorkels. Snorkels? Really? Holy $&!+ I thought. Then I noticed the single AL80's with single 1st stages. And then it hit me... the cloud of silt these morons had been kicking up all the way into the cave (we were in a rare low-flow portion of the cave) so vis got even worse than it already was.
At this point all sorts of things ran through my mind in a matter of seconds... This really wasn't conscious thought, and I'm not even sure I should be sharing this... Do I really feel like dealing with this right now? What would happen if I don't do anything? Will I blame myself later for their deaths? Would their deaths cause people to say that cave diving is unsafe? Would their deaths cause the park management to close the caves to trained cave divers? etc... Well it didn't take long to realize I had to act. I flashed my light at them to get their attention then shined my light on my other hand and signaled "You Out". They starred at me blankly. Again "You Out". No reaction. "You Out", "Out, Out, Out". They look at each other but do nothing. This actually goes on for about 45 seconds before one of them (the 2nd diver heading in) begins to turn around. After another 5 or 10 seconds the lead diver finally decides to turn around as well. Anyone want to guess what happens next?....
Yep, that's right. They start hauling A$$ out of the cave flutter king up a rooster tail of silt in their wake. Vis deteriorates even further. As Jeff and I slowly make our way out I keep thinking about how amazing it is that these two really seemed to think it was OK for them to be in there. I wonder if they knew that I was going to remove the line they had followed into the cave? I wonder what they would have done when the got to the end of the line and were still well within the cave? Would they have guessed the right way to go (I was not necessarily obvious since the cave is so big there). Would they have left themselves any reserve gas to be able to search for the exit?
Heading into the cave I used about 70 cubic feet of gas getting to about 500 feet of penetration. A little math shows that I must have used about 40 cubic feet of gas to get to 300 feet. An AL80 holds about 78 cubic feet of gas with a 3,000psi fill. I'm going to guess that these two did not start down our line as soon as they jumped into the sink hole. I'm sure they swam around the sink for a while, discovered our line, and then decided to follow it. This would mean that they had significantly less than 78 feet of gas when they started into the cave. They were still swimming in when I stopped them. How far would they have gone before turning around if I hadn't stopped them? Would the have had enough gas to get out? What if something had gone wrong?
I could not identify these two when we finally exited the water (Jeff and I stayed in the sink for a while before exiting). I don't know if they were still around or if they took off, but neither of us saw them. I'm still not sure exactly what I would have said.
The whole incident leaves me scratching my head. I can certainly understand being curious about the cave, but don't they know it is a dangerous place that requires special training and proper equipment. I guess ignorance is bliss...
Some additional detail about this cave system.
One more comment about the somewhat unique nature of the Catfish Hotel. Unlike the main spring run where there is a significant flow and big surface boil, the basin/sink at Catfish has virtually no water movement. Even as you first enter the cavern zone there is no effective flow even down to the 60' range. Only when you get within 20-30 feet of the gold/main lines do you really feel the flow.
This is significant, because if the crazy open water divers had not had the line our team (Chris did the hard work) laid as a reference to open water, they might have easily ended up lost in the cavern or just as bad; heading with the flow out to the Manatee Spring run - another 450' away.
Someone's significant other made it home last night due to Chris's actions.
Our plan was to enter at Catfish Hotel, go into the flow toward Sue's Sink and then exit back at Catfish (covered with some of the thickest duckweed matting I had ever seen). The good - the dive went as planned and we easily found the gold/main line. Once out of the cavern zone this cave got very dark with pretty iffy vis when compared to Peacock or Ginnie. On entry, we typically could not even seen across the wide cave opening as it was totally black ant the vis was limited due to lots of particulate in the water. We made it about 75% of the way to Sue's before we turned the dive. Coming out we stayed a bit higher in the water column and this helped a lot in getting a better perspective of the cave.
I was leading on the way out when we came upon two divers about 300' into the system. God was really shining on these two morons with their single ALU 80's, no back up regs/tanks and just a couple of yellow beam open water lights to guide them in the dark. my buddy Chris got them turned around and they exited most likely with no air to spare (they did not do a safety stop as they were out of the water before Chris and I even hit the cavern zone). Why would somebody pass by two signs that expound upon the dangers of cave diving without proper training is beyond me.
These are Chris's comments about this experience:
As we entered Manatee I ran a line from open water to the beginning of the gold line (the permanent line that begins about 75 feet into the cave) so that we could find our way out if vis turned bad. From the end of the gold line you could not see natural light.
The vis in Manatee was horrible and I was as spooked as Jeff was. Because you could never see more than one wall at a time it felt like we were just heading into the abyss. We stuck real close to the gold line because it would have been very difficult to find it again in such a big cave with low vis if we were to loose it.
After using our allotted gas and turning round we eventually saw 2 lights heading toward us (as Jeff already stated) at a penetration of roughly 300 feet from the cave opening (depth was about 85 feet at that point I think). I remember thinking "that's weird, I didn't see any other cave divers suiting up while we were". As I was pondering this oddity, I noticed something that stuck out like a sore thumb... snorkels. Snorkels? Really? Holy $&!+ I thought. Then I noticed the single AL80's with single 1st stages. And then it hit me... the cloud of silt these morons had been kicking up all the way into the cave (we were in a rare low-flow portion of the cave) so vis got even worse than it already was.
At this point all sorts of things ran through my mind in a matter of seconds... This really wasn't conscious thought, and I'm not even sure I should be sharing this... Do I really feel like dealing with this right now? What would happen if I don't do anything? Will I blame myself later for their deaths? Would their deaths cause people to say that cave diving is unsafe? Would their deaths cause the park management to close the caves to trained cave divers? etc... Well it didn't take long to realize I had to act. I flashed my light at them to get their attention then shined my light on my other hand and signaled "You Out". They starred at me blankly. Again "You Out". No reaction. "You Out", "Out, Out, Out". They look at each other but do nothing. This actually goes on for about 45 seconds before one of them (the 2nd diver heading in) begins to turn around. After another 5 or 10 seconds the lead diver finally decides to turn around as well. Anyone want to guess what happens next?....
Yep, that's right. They start hauling A$$ out of the cave flutter king up a rooster tail of silt in their wake. Vis deteriorates even further. As Jeff and I slowly make our way out I keep thinking about how amazing it is that these two really seemed to think it was OK for them to be in there. I wonder if they knew that I was going to remove the line they had followed into the cave? I wonder what they would have done when the got to the end of the line and were still well within the cave? Would they have guessed the right way to go (I was not necessarily obvious since the cave is so big there). Would they have left themselves any reserve gas to be able to search for the exit?
Heading into the cave I used about 70 cubic feet of gas getting to about 500 feet of penetration. A little math shows that I must have used about 40 cubic feet of gas to get to 300 feet. An AL80 holds about 78 cubic feet of gas with a 3,000psi fill. I'm going to guess that these two did not start down our line as soon as they jumped into the sink hole. I'm sure they swam around the sink for a while, discovered our line, and then decided to follow it. This would mean that they had significantly less than 78 feet of gas when they started into the cave. They were still swimming in when I stopped them. How far would they have gone before turning around if I hadn't stopped them? Would the have had enough gas to get out? What if something had gone wrong?
I could not identify these two when we finally exited the water (Jeff and I stayed in the sink for a while before exiting). I don't know if they were still around or if they took off, but neither of us saw them. I'm still not sure exactly what I would have said.
The whole incident leaves me scratching my head. I can certainly understand being curious about the cave, but don't they know it is a dangerous place that requires special training and proper equipment. I guess ignorance is bliss...
Some additional detail about this cave system.
One more comment about the somewhat unique nature of the Catfish Hotel. Unlike the main spring run where there is a significant flow and big surface boil, the basin/sink at Catfish has virtually no water movement. Even as you first enter the cavern zone there is no effective flow even down to the 60' range. Only when you get within 20-30 feet of the gold/main lines do you really feel the flow.
This is significant, because if the crazy open water divers had not had the line our team (Chris did the hard work) laid as a reference to open water, they might have easily ended up lost in the cavern or just as bad; heading with the flow out to the Manatee Spring run - another 450' away.
Someone's significant other made it home last night due to Chris's actions.
Last edited:
