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UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY ~~~~ JULY / AUGUST 1988

Sheck Exley decompressing at 80 feet following his world-record-breaking cave dive to a depth of 780 feet. See article on page 4. Photo by Ned Deloach.

Underwater Spe/e%gy is the official newsletter of the

CAVE DIVING SECTION OF THE NATIONAL SPELEOLOGICAL SOCIETY, INC.

P.O. Box 950, Branford, Florida 32008·0950

• BOARD OF DIRECTORS· CHAIRMAN,

Jellrey A. Bozanic P.O. Box 490462 Key Biscayne, FL 33149.()462 (305) 666-0748

VICE-CHAIRMAN:

John W. Burge, Jr. 11711 Chanticleer Ct Pensacola, FL 32507 (904) 492-2232

SECRETARY-TREASURER:

Lee Ann Hires P.O. Box 3308 Lake Ctty, FL 32056 (904) 775-5913 TRAINING CHAIRMAN:

Joseph Prosser 7400 N.w. 55th St Miami, FL 33166 Hm (305) 966-0619 Wk (305) 592-3146 LEAOERSHIP COORDINATOR:

Peter Butt RI. 1, Box 152·H High Springs, FL 32643 (904) 454-200 1

MEMOERS AT LARGe:

H. V.Grey P.O. Box 575 Venice, FL 34284-{l575 Wesley C. Skiles Rt. 1 - Spring Ridge 418 Billy Brown Rd. High Springs, FL 32643 (904)454-3749

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• PROGRAM COORDINATORS·

Publications Chairman ...... , ........ H. V. Grey T-Shirts ...... _ ......... _ ...... Kathy Jasper Maps ..• __ . _ .......... _., ... Frank Howard Ind. Book Orders ......... _ ..... Judy Verano UWS Back Issues ...... _ ....... Stan Hankins Buk Sales ........ _ ............ Joe Prosser

NewsletterEditor ......•............• H. V. Grey Membership Manual. _ ••......... _ Tom Gilleland Adve~ising ......... _ .......... _ . _ .. Pete Bun Foreign Correspondent •.......... _ ... _ . . . . .. ? Cartography ..... ___ ........... _ .. John Burge

Frank Howard Computer Applications ........ _ ... Tom mleland Survey ....................... _ . _ Lamar Hires Cave Files Committee ............. Bob McGuire Accident Analysis ...... _ ............ John Crea ConservationCoordinator _ ........... Tom Morris Salety Committee (South) ......... Mali<. Leonard Safety Comminee (North) ... __ . Randy Kwiatkowski Techniques ............. _ ....... Woody Jasper Sump Diving Project .. __ ........ John Schweyen Landowners Relations ...................... ?

Science Committee .... , .... __ ...... Tom Morris Biology ...... __ ......... __ ... _ ... , . Jill Yager Photography ......... , ... _ ...... Bob Janowski Abe Davis Award .......... __ .. _ . MalHeonard ICDSA .. _ . _ ........... _ .. Dr. Milledge Murphey Activities Coordinator ...... . _ ........ Pete Bun RescueiRecoveryTeam . Lr. Henry Nicholson ~ Column ......... Dr. Milledge Murphey Cave Diving Manual Revision ......... Joe Prosser

H. V_Grey

RESCUE/RECOVERY TEAM MEMBERS ..• Report any change of address or telephone immediately to

your Area Coordinator!

AREA ONE: North Florida Lenny Kolc~ynksi 1000 Broward Rd .. #1106, Jacksonville, Fl32218 (HI 904-765-1940 (W) 904-771-6207

AREA TWO; Northwest Florida G. E_ O'Brien 5429 Hamilton Bridge Rd. Milton, FL 325<1 (HI904.Q94-6082 (W) 904-Q94-4540

AREA THREE: Central Florida Joe 5_ Harrell 8t62 DarlS SI. Brooksville, FL 34613 (HI904-5!lfl-439S (W)813-847-8t02

AREA FOUR: South Florida & Caribbean

Joe Prosser 7400 N.w. 55th SI. Miami, Fl33166 (H) 305-966-061 9 (W) 305-592-3t 46

GEORGtA: JohnCrea P_O. Box 1906 Bainbridge, GA 31717 (HI 912-246-9349 (W) 912-246-3500

ALABAMA: Joe Dabbs 1815 Inspiration Lane Humsville, AL 35801 (H) 205-534-8668 (W) 205-544-0623

TEXAS: Jim Bowden 1306 Cotorada 51. Austin, TX 78701 (H) 512-477-5043 (W) 5t2-441-3708

OTHEn (United Stales): Steve Ormeroid 629 West 41h SI. Marysville, OH 43040 (H) 5 13-642-7775 (W) 513-644·2559

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15. No_ 4, p. 2

THE NSS AND CAVE DIVING. Founded in 1941, Ihe Nalional Speleo!ogical SOC:!e1Y ioins togelher ;housands of individuals dedicated 10 the safe study, elplora!ion, .,~d conse,,:a!ion of caves. The firs! cave·diving inlormation ever published in Ihe U.S. was In a 1947 NSS Bulietm In t948, NSS divers were responsible for the first cave dives in Ihe U.S. using s~uba. Priorto 1973. cave diving within the NSS was on a purely local level. Thai year saw the cleat:cn 01 the NSS Cave Diving Section to provide a vehicle for information exchange. Today, with over 400 members, the Cave Diving Section promotes sale cave diving through semi·annual wor1<shops; cawrn- and cave-diving training programs: warning·sign installation; search, rescue, and recovery through Ihe National Cave Rescue Commission; cave exploration and mapping: severalte~s and p~b!lCa!lons on cave diving; and the bi-monthly newslener·journal, Underwater Speieology, thal you a'e presently reading. .

MEMBERSHIP, The National Speleological Societt welcomes the interest of anyo~e ..... hJ has a sincere concern in the safe study, exploration, and conservation of ca,'es, wet or OCj, YO" may join the NSS either by writing to the NSS main ollice .directly (National SpeleolD!licai Society, Inc., Cave Avenue, Huntsville, AL35810) OrlO the Cave DIVing SectIOn (NSS Cave DIVing Section, P.O. Box 950, Branlord, FL 32008-0950.). Regular NSS Membership is now 525.00 pe' year. and entitles the member to monthly issues of NSS News and a semi-annual technical !(;Jrnai on speleology, voflng privileges, and discounts on publications, convention fees, etc.

As a sub-organization or ·section· of the NSS. the Cave Diving Section is sutjectto the by·laws and ethics of the NSS. Membership in the Cave Diving Section is open to anyo~e who is a member in good standing o( the NSS. Regular membershp is 55.00 per year, and we also offer a CDS Family Membership lor $1.00 for family members (who are also NSS members) of regular CDS members. Membership in the Cave Diving Section includes slbscription to our bi-monthly (6 issuesJyear) newslener, Underwater Spe/eology, voting privleges, discounts on publicatio'15 items, workshop registration fees, etc. .,. . .

NEWSLETIER SUBSCRIPTION. ~ you do not Wish to JOin the Cave DIVIng SectIOn, bot would like to keep current on cave-diving events, exploration, and technology, you are !nvited to subscribe 10 Underwater Spe/eo/ogy for $15.00 per year.

WHAT THE NSS-CDS HAS TO OFFER, The NSS Cave Divirg Section sponsors lWO Safety and Inlormation Exchenge Woli<.shops each year, traditionally held in Bfamord. Florida ov~r the Memorial Day and New Year's Day weekends, a~hough exact dates and formats vary. ThIS year's WINTER WORKSHOP Will be held at the Branford High School 00 Dec. 31 - Jan. 1,1989. The SPR ING WORKSHOP will be conducted on May 27-28, 1989. In (ormation and pre-registration materials are published in the newsletter and can be obtained by writing to the NSS Cave Diving Section (P.O. Box 950, Branford, FL 32008-0950)_ .

Inlormation on cave-diving books, back issues of Underwater SpeIeoIogy, T -shins, Maps (available only to people wtth a cave- diving ceMication (rom an accred'ned agency such as NSS·CDS, NACO, YMCA, or NAUI), and free safety brochures may be obtained by writing to NSS·CDS Publications Coordinator (NSS Cave Diving Section, P.O_ Box 950, Branford, FL 32008·0950).

Information on cavern- and cave-diving training can be obtained by writing to the NSS-CDS Training Director (NSS Cave Diving Section, P.O. Box 950. Bramord, FL 32008-0950).

IMPORT ANT! -CHANG ES OF ADDRESS. Members and subscrbers are urged to repon any change of address or address corrections in writing immediately to the Section in ordeno insure continuilY of newsletter receipt. Membership/subscription status, applications, and general inlormation may be obtained by writing to the Secretary-Treasurer c/o the Section's permanent address:

SecretarylT reasurer NSS Cave Diving Section P.O. Box 950 Branford, FL 32008-0950

NEWSLETIER SUBMISSIONS. We welcome all current news items, repoltS, anicles, photographs, negatives, slides, cartoons, noticesforgearwantedlforsale (individuals only), or other submissions o( relevance or potential interest for publication in this newslener. We can now accept textual information on computerdiskene ~ fi is in ao IBM-XT·compatible standard ASCII teXl fermat or WordStar version 3.3 Or lower, using 5·1/4· 360K floppies; however, all computer diskettes !!!.!&l be accompanied by a complete paper printout. All newsletter submissions should be sent in directly to the Editor:

CALENDAR

HY Grey, Editor, UWS P.O. Box 575 Venice, FL 34284-0575

Sept. 30 - Oct. 2, 1988 - FADO (Florida Assoc. of Dive Operators) "International Dive and Travel Show." Orange City Convention Center, Orlando, Florida. Conbct Russ Teall, 111 Saguaro Ln., Marathon, FL 33050, (305) 743-3942.

Nov. 5-6. 1988 - NACO Annual Cave Diving Seminar "Exploration '88." Kamp Kulaqua (Hornsby Springs), High Springs, Florida. See announcement p. 3. .

Nov. 18-20. 1988 - NSS-CDS Instructor Institute_ To be held in Florida. For additional information, contact the Section or Training Chairman.

Dec 31.1988 -Jan. 1,1989 - NSS-CDS Winter Cave Diving Workshop. Branford, Florida.

Feb. 3-5. 1989 - NSS-CDS Instructor Institute. To be held in Florida. For additional information, contact the Section or Training Chairman.

May 27-28, 1989 - NSS-COS Spring Cave Diving Workshop. Branford, Florida.

Nov. 17-19, 1989 - NSS-CDS Instructor Institute. To be held in Florida. For additional information, contact the Section or Training Chairman.

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NACD CAVE DIVING SEMINAR -"EXPLORATION '88"

The National Association for Cave Diving (NACO) will be hosting its 20th Annual Cave Diving Seminar, "Exploration '88," Nov. 5-6, 1988 at Kamp Kulaqua, High Springs, Florida. The beautiful Hornsby Springs Cave System is located on the property. ..

Exploration '88 will celebrat~ the NACO's 2~th anniversary and offer a variety of professional presentations on .recent cave-diving projects, discoveries, exploration, and equlpme~t technology. One of the featured sp~akers ,,:,iII b.e D~. Bill Hamilton of Tarrytown, New York, who IS a phYSiologist with 23 years' specialization. in di~ing, ae~6space, and ~nvironme~tal physiology, with particular Interest In decompresslo~, breathing gases, and the effects of pressure: .He ha~ bee~ Invol.ved as an advisor in many recent cave-diving projects Includmg the Sullivan Sink Connection, the Wakulla Springs Project, the Andros Island Expedition, and the record deep <7've dive i.n northern Mexico at Naciemento Mante. Lt. Henry Nicholson will also be offering an NSS Rescue/Recovery Workshop.

Anyone interested is invited to attend this very educational seminar on cave diving. For more information write: NACO, P.O. Box 14492, Gainesville, FL 32604.

NSS-CDS WINTER CAVE DIVING WORKSHOP

Kathy McNally, cave diver and medical student from Miami, has courageously volunteered as Workshop Chairman for the 16th annual NSS-CDS Winter Cave Diving Workshop to be held at the Branford High School in Branford, Florida Saturday-Sunday, Dec. 31, 1988 - Jan. 1, 1989.

Workshop plans and speaker arrangements are alre~dy well underway, and individuals interested in present!ng exploration slides or videos, or in giving a lecture presentation or technical seminar should contact Kathy at (305) 666-0748 as soon as possible.

A more detailed announcement will appear in the next issue of UWS and all NSS-CDS members and UWS subscribers will receive the usual pre-registration forms and agenda.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR April 15, 1988

Dear Editor: Finally, someone that expresses my thoughts better than.1

can. I'm referring to John Schweyen's article in the March/Apnl Underwater Speleology, "Solo Diving." Although less than 16% of my cave diving has been done solo, nearly 50% of all of my open-water dives have been "solos."

I fully agree with John that the additional people only add to the additional problems, delays, and near disasters. I can more fully enjoy a solo dive,get more involved in my reason for t~at particular dive, and just plain relax. Now I am not advocating solo diving; if an individual isn't comfortable diving solo, doesn't have the proper equipment (or if it isn't properly maintained),. or isn't extremely experienced, that individual should never dive alone. I know from personal experience that all of my "close calls" have come about from shortcomings of a buddy. The "closest" call that I have ever had while cave diving was credited to two untrained, uninvited, "surprise" guests! When I am diving in open water with another diver, it se~ms that I. am alwaxs "eating their silt," helping them out of a Jam, worrYing, or plain "nursemaiding" them.

Again, I am in no way advocating solo diving, nor d? I recommend that you try it to see if you like it; I am merely stating my personal feelings and preferences. If you think I'm crazy, that's your opinion. I have been diving 7 years, logged 300

dives, and helped teach many, many scuba classes (as I am an assistance instructor--however,I always stress that you should ~dive with a buddy. I feel that if an individual decides to dive alone, that must be his own decision, made in his own good time and experience).

I thank you for taking the time to ready my personal letter, and if you should so desire to print it in UnderwaterSpeleology, please feel free to do so with my permission. Thank you for a "newsletter" that I can look forward to many, many weeks before I receive it, and read the print off of if after I receive it!

Sincerely, Norman R. Cooter, Greenville, Tennessee

April 30, 1988 Dear Editor:

In a recent issue of the NACO News, an article titled "Emergency Oxygen System for Divers, ft by George S. Lwebel brought up some interesting points. I feel that many of the NSS­CDS members had access to this article, and I would like to make a few comments.

I totally agree with the need for 100% oxygen in the treatment of diving accidents. Mr. Lwebel mentions the BENDEEZ oxygen adapter as an answer to many of the portable systems that have been sold to dive-boat operators and that will not deliver 100% oxygen or anywhere near that concentration as sold. The BENDEEZ oxygen adapter will only work on refillable oxygen cylinders with Pin Index Safety System valves (this usually includes size E cylinders and smaller) and would not work on most of the disposable systems on the market.

For the diver who is interested in obtaining oxygen for emergency use, I would recommend one of two routes. 1) Purchase a commercial oxygen cylinder (E size contains 659 liters or 23.3 cu. ft.). An E cylinder can be purchased with valve for approximately $125.00. 2) Purchase an aluminum scuba tank and have it cleaned and adapted for oxygen service (Viton O-rings, oxygen-compatible lubricants, etc.).

The advantage of buying the commercial cylinder is ease of getting it filled. Disadvantages include short duration of use (at 500 cclbreath, 16 breaths/min., duration would be 82 minutes), and the need for the BENDEEZ adapter or other adapter.

The advantages of using an aluminum 80-cu.-ft. tank a~d having it converted are: 1) No need for any adapters to use With scuba regulators; 2) Longer duration (assume that you will be able to get 2000 psi fill with oxygen, volume will b.e 53.3 cu. ft., and duration will exceed 3hours at the surface). Disadvantages include: 1) Getting this system filled (I have been informed that one can find a supplier in Jacksonville who can fill directly to scuba valves). .

This article did not mention that the regulator used With 100% oxygen should be cleaned and prepared. for oxygen service with Viton O-rings, oxygen-compatible lubricants, etc. Although I have no information of anyone having an accident when using a standard scuba regulator with 100% oxygen, the potential for a major disaster is there.

Also I think that the readers of Underwater Speleology would b~ interested in learning that a USA-made alternative to the BENDEEZ is available for sale at Ginnie Springs, and possibly elsewhere. .

Also, it is relatively easy to assemble one yourself. You Will need an Oxygen Yoke assembly x 1/4-18 male (part #69-203-33 from Mercury Enterprises, Inc., costs approx. $16.00) plus a Sherwood Block assembly (part #9-3030-1, check cost from your Sherwood dealer). These two parts will go together with Teflon tape on the treads, and the cost will be under $50.00.

If anyone is interested in learning more about this topic, they can feel free to contact me at P.O. Box 1906, Bainbridge, GA 31717, orcaH me in the evenings at 912-246-9349.

I hope this information is helpful. Sincerely, John T. Crea, Bainbridge, Georgia

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY. July/August, 1988. Vol. 15, No.4, p. 3

DEPTH RECORDS BROKEN - by Sheck Exley

On June 21, 1987, Mary Ellen Eckhoff became only the second American (5th in the world) to reach a depth of 400 feet in an underwater cave. She also broke herown 7-year-old world

. Tecord of 312 feet for the deepest cave dive by a woman. She used a mixture of 50% helium/40% nitrogen/1 0% oxygen. Her total dive time in the large spring at Mante, Mexico, was nearly six hours. I monitored her decompression followil"!g. her solo effort. - .-

Mary Ellen Eckhoff preparing for her record-breaking 400' dive at Mante. Photo by Sheck Exley_

Two days later we switched roles as I made an attempt at Mante on German Jochen Hasenmayer's world record cave-diving depth mark of 656 feet, set at Vaucluse, France in 1983. I had previously set an American mark at Mante on April 22, 1987, with a dive to 520 feet (see NSS News, Oct. 1987).

Unfortunately, conditions had worsened since April, the visibility dropping to about 15 feet and the current much stronger. Another setback occurred on descent at 270 feet, when a regulator valve on a trimix bottle malfunctioned. This made it neoessary to continue breathing compressed air to 330 feet, a depth far below the normal maximum safe depth for that gas. At 330 feet I switched to a trimix bottle left there for ascent, using it instead for descent. At 520 feet I reached the end of my old line and hooked on a new measured line, carefully laying it straight down so I could accurately determine my depth. After dropping a considerable distance, I saw the shaft narrow to only 5 feet, causing the current to increase enormously. Since I had already overstayed my 2-minute maximum descent time by 4

UNDERWATER SPElEOLOGY, July/August, 1988. Vol. 15, No.4, p. 4

Support divers Angel Soto and Sergio Zambrano placing tanks in the cave for the 780' dive. Photo by Ned Deloach.

Sheck Exley at the entrance of Mante at the start of the 780' dive. Photo by Ned Deloach.

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minutes, I tied off my line and started up, carefully counting the knots set at 10-foot intervals. After ascending 140 feet, I reached the end of myoid line, where I had left a depth gauge for decompression.

Beginning at 390 feet, I had 39 decompression stops on ascent, during which I breathed 6 different gas mixtures to keep from getting the bends, oxygen toxicity and hypoxia. The total dive time was 11 hours and 13 minutes, the longest cave immersion ever. A total of 15 tanks were used on the dive, plus additional safety tanks that were not used.

I did not consider my 660-foot dive a new world record since it is so difficult to determine depth precisely at that level. I could easily have been shallower (or deeper) by 10 feet, so it would have been unfair to claim a new record by only 4 feet.

In April, 1988, we returned to Mante for another attempt at Hasenmayer's record that I had tied with the 660-foot dive the previous year. After several setup dives by my excellent support team of Sergio Zambrano and Angel Soto (Association Mexicana de Buceo en Cuevas, a.c.) and Ned Deloach, I was able to install 140 feet of line on April5,1988 to a depth of at -least 780 feet and possibly as much as 795 feet. The discrepancy is due to the cave slanting down at a slope of 10 to 30 degrees from the vertical once I was below 660 feet, instead of straight down (as on earlier dives). Beyond my tie-off the cave is continuing to flatten its slope, to about 45 degrees. I could see the cave going 40 feet deeper down the slope, then vanishing into a blue void.

Despite my bottom time being only 24 minutes, _my ascent time was over 10 hours including 52 decompression stops. By using 11 different gas mixtures and special tables formulated by Bill Hamilton, I was able to surface 1 hour and 27 minutes sooner than indicated by the tables I had formulated myself. My

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Sheck Exley starting down from the sump pool on the 780' dive. Photo by Ned Deloach.

Poseidon regulators, Casio watches and Pelican backup lights all worked very well at depth. Also, incredibly, a 42-watt primary light designed by lamar English never quit on me. I doubt if any other primary light could have worked below 350feet, much less 780 feet. A regulator failure, battery pack implosion and SPG-needle sticking incident kept things exciting for me.

Thanks to Arwin Carr 0' Spring Systems Dive Resort for donating airforthe 660-foot dive, Paul Deloach and Dale Sweet for donating the use of some equipment, Paul Heinerth, Bill Hamilton, Bill Stone, John Troutner, lamar English, and especially my support divers, Mary Ellen Eckhoff, Sergio Zambrano, Angel Soto and Ned Deloach. And, of course, Jesus Escabeo Gonzalez and his family, owners of the spring, who allowed us access and helped with the dive.

DIVERS CLAIM RECORDS FOR DISTANCE, DEPTH

lAP - Reprinted from Sarasota Herald Tribune, June 20, 1988.]

TAllAHASSEE - A diving team claimed records Sunday for the longest and deepest traverses of an underwater cave system after emerging from an 8440-foot limestone tunnel, near the site of a companion's death several weeks earlier. The 4-man team surfaced several minutes after 5 pm. The divers had spent just over an hour breathing specially blended gases to decompress from the craggy journey that took them 240 feet beneath the surface of Leon and Wakulla counties south of here.

"My lungs are a little scratchy from breathing all that oxygen. Other than that, I'm fine: said Parker Turner, Director of Safety for the National Association for Cave Diving. ~It went real smooth. But boy, if you had a problem, it would have been distressing. ~

Turner, 36, of Destin ran into trouble almost immediately after starting the dive 4 hours earlier in Sullivan Sink when his high-intensity light short-circuited. He could have been stranded in the lightless waters if not for a smaller backup and his companions' beams.

UNDERWATER SPElEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 5

The previous record for the longest cave traverse was set 1'\ 0 by a 6400-foot dive in Keld's Head, England, and the deepest 0 (.rJ 0 cave traverse was set during a 230-foot dive in the Sullivan 0

. system, said Turner.

The team had measured the 40-million-year-old Sullivan tunnel system in January in separate dives by stringing lines from .each end, setting a record for connecting the longest underwater cave, but had not traversed the entire system in one dive until Sunday.

The group got a late start because Bill Main, 36, needed time to cool down form an apparent case of heat stroke he developed as he prepared for the dive while wearing his insulating wetsuit in the 90-plus-degree heat.

"I really wasn't ready to make a dive like this today because I was so hot, but when I got down to the refrigerator section I was fine,· Main said of the 68-degree water.

Aimed primarily at mapping the tunnels, collecting rock samples and studying the caves' geologic structures, the expedition could result in evidence linking the caves to underwater rivers that flow into the Gulf of Mexico some 20 miles south. Geologists are more certain they could learn about water flow in the Floridan Aquifer, which provides drinking water to wells from the mid-Panhandle almost to lake Okeechobee in South Florida, said Frank Rupert of the Florida Geological Survey, who attended the dive.

"The discovery of the tunnels sheds some new light on the possible path of pollutants; he said. ·When they finish their work, we'll know where this water flows.· He said the limestone caves were formed about the time a shallow inland sea covered Florida and part of Georgia. '

A fifth diver, Wes Skiles, said that during a preliminary dive he found rock formations similar to those he had seen in a record-breaking dive last December at the freshwater Wakulla Springs, several miles to the south. That effort was sponsored partly by the National Geographic Society. Skiles was helping videotape Sunday's dive.

They started at Sullivan Sink about 12 miles south of Tallahassee in Leon County and exited at Cheryl Sink about 1.6 miles away in Wakulla county.

"What a wild ride," said TUrner, who said an underground current of at least 1 knot carried the team through in about 55 minutes. "I'm really glad we waited because the flow was real strong."

The caves are part of what is believed to be a 40,OOO-foot system, which would make it the longest documented underwater limestone cave system. The second longest is the 36,OOO-foot Lucayan tunnel beneath Grand Bahama Island, said Lisa Burkett, the team's publicist.

Lamar English, 24, of Greenville, and Bill Gavin, 28, of Panama City, were the otherteam members. Burkett estimated the cost of the expedition will be about $8,000. That money will come from the divers and other private sources, she said.

THE POTENTIAL DEPTH OF UNDER­WATER CAVES IN THE ORLANDO AREA

- by William L. Wilson The City of Orlando and its surrounding metropolitan area,

in Orange and Seminole Counties, Florida, is very picturesque when viewed from the air because of the profusion of nearly circular karst lakes that dot the landscape (Fig. 1). Orange and Seminole -Counties have 895 lakes, most of which occur in sinkholes up to 0.6 miles wide that have been flooded by a shallow water table. The number of lakes is more than any other area of comparable size of Florida. The numerous karst lakes, and an annual crop of 10 to 11 new sinkholes, indicate that karst processes have, and still are, actively shaping the land surface.

Unfortunately; cave entrances are nearly nonexistent

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because the cavernous aquifer is mantled by sand and clay averaging 120 feet thick. Most of the lakes are shallow, seldom exceeding 15 feet in depth. Surficial sand and peat have filled most of the sinkholes. However, the expression of karst topography through such a thick, generally impermeable cover, indicates prodigious cavern development beneath Orlando. The purpose of this article is to examine the frequency and potential depth for underwater caves in the Orlando area, by reviewing the available geologic information.

The outstanding karst feature in Orlando is Emerald Sink (also known as Mystery Sink). Emerald Sink is approximately 300 feet wide and extends approximately 70 feet below the surrounding land, which is at an elevation of 90 feet. At the bottom of the sink is a weed-choked lake approximately 100 feet' across. The lake extends downward through a 30-foot-wide vertical shaft to a depth of 90 feet at which point the shaft opens into a room approximately 400 feet wide. The top of a debris cone occurs at a depth of 225 feet. The sides of the debris cone slope to a depth of 390 feet, as reported by Sheck Exley. or 405·' feet as reported by Hal Watts. Currently Emerald Sink is ranked by Oliver Knab as the deepest underwater cave in the United States and the 8th deepest of the world.

Please take note that Emerald Sink is privately owned and definitely closed to diving as a result of diving-related deaths that occurred there in 1972. Respect the owners' wishes and do not ask to dive in Emerald Sink.

Cavern potential can be assessed by evaluating the frequency and size of cavities penetrated by drill holes. Lichtler and others (1968, p. 96) reported the occurrences of cavities that were penetrated by 63 drill holes in the Orlando area. The proportion of drill holes that penetrated at least one cavity in each 1 ~O-foot elevation interval is shown in Fig. 2. Two major cavern zones are separated by a relatively barren zone. The upper cavern zone is 600 feet thick and occurs between elevations of approximately 0 and -600 feet NGVD [National Geodetic Vertical Datum = Mean Sea Level of 1929; they had to change the name because sea level is no longer constant]. A 400-foot barren zone extends from elevations of -600 to -1000

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 6

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feet NGVD. The lower cavern zone has not been fully penetrated by an adequate number of wells. but it is at least 400 feet thick and occurs between elevations of approximately -1000 to -1400 feet NGVD. The upper cavern zone will be discussed in some detail because it contains the caves that are potentially accessible to divers.

The upper cavern zone is developed in the Ocala Group Limestone and the Avon Park limestone of Eocene age. The Ocala Group averages approximately 100 feet thick and the Avon Park limestone is usually 500 feet thick. However. the lower 200 feet of the Avon Park formation is composed almost entirely of dolomite. In the Orlando area. the upper 1400 to 1800 feetof limestone and dolomite form the famous Floridan Aquifer.

A total of 88 cavities were penetrated by 63 wells that were drilled through all or part of the upper cavern lone. Between elevations of 0 and -400 feet NGVD approximately 25% of the drill holes penetrated cavities in each 100-foot depth interval. Cavern development reaches a peak (mode) of 54 percent between elevations of -300 to -400 NGVD.

The peak interval of cavern development occurs at the base of the upper limestone unit in the Avon Park formation. At an elevation of -300 feet, the frequency of cavern development begins to decline with depth as the upper cavern zone passes into the dolomite at the base of the Avon Park formation. The lowest reported elevation for a cavity in the upper cavern zone is -650 feet NGVD. The potentiometric surface of the Floridan Aquifer, in the Orlando area, is approximately 50 feet above NGVD, so caves in the upper cavern zone extend to depths of approximately 700 feet.

The height of reported cavities in the upper Floridan Aquifer,

used in this tabulation. ranged from 3 to 92 feet and th,O! '1188.n

height was 10.7 feet. The frequency distribution of cavity height is shown in Fig. 3. The median cavity height is 8.0 feet. Little or no Correlation exists between cavity height and elevation as shown in Fig. 4. Most of the reported cavities are high enough to be accessible to divers.

The upper cavern zone coincides quite well with low sea-level stands that occurred during the Pleistocene Epoch (0.01 to 2.0 million years ago), when sea level repeatedly dropped approximately 400 feet. The maximum interval of cavern development occurs at elevations of 300 to 400 feet below modern mean sea level. Caves at these elevations probably formed at grade with low stands of sea level. Caverns at greater depths may represent phreatic flow paths (those that formed entirely below the water table).

With the cavern-occurrence facts above. the total cave potential in the upper cavern zone can be estimated. 63 drill holes penetrated 942feet of cave (88 caves x 10.7feet average heighVcave). The total linear drill-hole distance, in the 600-foot-thick cavern zone, amounts to 37,800 linear feet (63 drill holes x 600 feeVdrili hole). So, the percentage of cave in the upper cavern zone is approximately 2.5%" (942 feet137,800 feet x 100). A volume of rock 600 feet thick and 1 mile square will contain 418 million cubic feet of cave (600 feet x 5280 feet x 5280 feet x 0.025). Assuming the average cave is a tube of 10.7 feet in diameter, then the cavern space is sufficient toform 880 miles of cave per square mile (418,000,000 cubic feet of cave per square mile - 5.35 feet x 5.35 feet x 3.14 - 5280 feet/mile ).

The caves will generally occur at depths ranging from 50 to 700 feet below water surface, but they are most commonly developed at depths of 350 to 450 feet. Obviously, most of the caves are beyond the safe limits of scuba with regular compressed air. Special air mixtures and more technologically advanced equipment is needed for divers to reach, and safely explore, the tremendous cave systems that must underlie the Orlando area.

The major problem for cave divers in the Orlando area is one of access. Emerald Sink extends into the zone of maximum cave development, but is closed to diving. Other entrances to deep caves are not known. The floors of the numerous karst lakes should be checked more thoroughly for shafts leading into the Floridan Aquifer. New sinkholes do form in the Orlando area, and potentially a new entrance might be created. For exampl'e, the day after Christmas, 1987, the floor of the famous Winter Park Sinkhole dropped 30 feet as the sinkhole swallowed 23,000 cubic yards of sediment. Water is now soaking more

g

co <n

,., ~ u

'" '" ~ g

L.. ... ~ ~ ;;: J'

~

'0'

0 10 15 20 25 30 92

Cavity HeIght Class Intervals (Feet)

Fig. 3. Frequency distribution of cavity height in the upper Floridan Aquifer in the Orlando area, Florida.

: I~II)ER'!.'·-<=R SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 7

\00

-lOa

i -200 I'

.. .. -300

~ .: - ;-

....... : ....... -' -

~ w ·400

.-92 1

-500

-600 0 30 10 15 20 25

cntty Height (f •• t)

Fig. 4. Scatter diagram of cavity elevation versus cavity height in the upper Floridan Aquifer, in the Orlando area, Florida.

rapidly through the floor of the sinkhole. A cave entrance might open eventually. Another possibility is that large..<:fiameter water-development wells will penetrate significant cavities. Divers could potentially enter the cavities through a drill hole. This may sound extreme, but it remains a possibility.

If other areas of Florida have the most cavern development at elevations of -300 to -400 feet NGVD, then the frontiers of cave diving lie in deep diving, helium-oxygen breathing mixtures and underwater habitats for decompression. The potential is there, but following it will require a few cases of exceptionally good access, great care, and substantial financial backing.

REFERENCES: Lichtler, W.F., Anderson, W., and Joyner, SF, 1968, Water Resources of Orange County, Florida: Florida Division of Geology, Report of Investigations No. 50,150 pp.

CAVE DIVING IN THE 1950'S: an Interview with Oliver Wells

- by John Schweyen SUMMARY: Cave diving in England was started in the

1930's on an informal basis by Graham Salcombe, Jack Sheppard and their friends. It became properly organized when the Cave Diving Group was founded in 1946. This interview describes cave diving between the 1930's and 1950's, and the use of mixed-gas rebreathers in caves. Also, it describes a book edited by Jim Hanwell that is about to be published to describe 50 years of cave diving in Woo key Hole Caves.

NOTE: The original transcript was edited and sent for review to Graham Salcombe and Jack Sheppard, both of whom are in fine health, I am happy to say. Comments attributed to them were taken from their replies.

JOHN SCHWEYEN: Why don't we talk a little about your early caving-activities, how you got started, for instance?

OLIVER WELLS: At age 6 or 7 I was told about Caste ret's discoveries at Montespan about 15 years before. The idea of plunging through a totally submerged passageway captured my imagination. At age 9 (this was in 1940) we went as tourists to the 3rd chamber of Wookey Hole, which was as far as the tour went in those days. We listened fascinated while the guide told us about the divers who had gone into the pool of water in front

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 8

of us and had found great chambers in which their lights dill not reach the roof. (Little did I realize that I would later be going there myself.)

At age 15 I was away at school when an uncle took me out to tea. He had a fascinating line of talk about folks who floated along in cave passages with their noses only an inch or so below the roof. (He said nothing about it being cold.) At age 17, we went to France and our host (who was a much more athletic person than I) said, wVoulez vous aller a las grottes?W and like a fool, I said, wOui." We rode on bicycles for many hours to this placewhere it was wet and cold. It wasn't a very great success, I'm afraid.

JS: You found out what a "grotte" was. OW: Yes indeed. I then forgot about it until I was drafted

into the Army. One of my companions wanted to talk about caving so I said, ·Oh, I can do that, too'" Wewentforaweekend in the Devon caves where John and Winifred Hooper very kindly told us about their work with bats and generally pointed us in the right direction. They even had us working on one of their cave digs. It was a good example of how a wefl-organized caving club can get you really interested in caves.

Perhaps I might mention that we had two sets of clothing in our military days, and we wore the less respectable of these underground. There was an interesting moment the next morning when the platoon was on parade and the two of us were a bright red color because of the mud. We felt very conspicuous. We wondered if the officer would notice, but nothing was said.

JS: So like most English cave divers, your initiation to cave diving was through caving as opposed to diving.

OW: Yes. JS: You started cave diving in '56? OW: No, '55. There had been a very active community of

cave divers in England since the mid-1940's, and you must contact Sob Davies in Philadelphia if you would like to hear about that. Graham Salcombe and Jack Sheppard had started cave diving in the 1930's. Graham and his friends dived with pump-fed naval equipment at Wookey Hole at about the same time as similar efforts were being made at Vaucluse in France. (Sir Robert Davis of Siebe Gorman ltd. lent them the equipment and an instructor free of charge.)

In 1936, Jack Sheppard constructed a lightweight pump-fed diving dress called "Jimmy" with which he passed Sump I in Swildon's Hole and so became the first cave diver to discover an extensive passage in a cave (Oct. 4, 1936). Two weeks later he free-dived through it and laid a rope so that the others could follow. I looked up the detailed description of Jimmy last night, and it was a wonderful device, with a two-piece waterproof suit, air provided by a small hand-operated pump, telephone, light in the flexible helmet, and so on.

Graham Salcombe was the first to use a self-contained respirator for cave diving, in the 2nd sump of that same cave (Nov. 22, 1936). In 1944, which was a year after Jacques-Yves Cousteau, Frederic Dumas and Philippe Tailliez had first used the aqualung in the Mediterranean, Salcombe was making preparations for his underwater explorations in Keld Head that started in March 1945. In England, Graham founded the Cave Diving Group in 1946 during a diving meet in South Wales. For equipment, they used mainly Government Surplus oxygen~rebreathing gear.

JS: So people avoided diving deeper than 30 feet. OW: Absolutely, yes. JS: When people were diving with helmets, what kind of

times were they spending underwater? OW: Up to two hours. That was in the 1930's with the

traditional naval apparatus. You had your friends turning the handles.

JS: Turning the handles? On the pumps? OW: Yes. You could tell who your friends were.

. '. (,-.

(

[SH EPPARD: "Much of the early work at Wookey was done with the 'see~saw' pump, with two men at each end. Hard work, but it was amazing how to some pairs the work seemed exhausting but others seemed to form a team and the work seemed effortless. This was the pump that Sir Robert Davis hoped, on our first discussions, we would take down Swildon's Hole."]

JS: What was the typical penetration distance in those days?

OW: At Wookey Hole Graham Balcombe and Penelope ("Mossy") Powell went in for about 170 feet pulling the pipes after them. That was from Wookey III to Wookey VII. Wookey III is where the tourists stand beside a large pool of water, and from there you can reach IV by going under a wide submerged arch. You can walk under this arch when the water is low, and indeed, they found bones and things like that. You can also reach V in a boat if the water is low (the water in V is 5·10 feet deep). The helmet divers went down a slope through the WLetterbox," which under normal conditions is 16 feet deep. They had to indulge in underwater rock climbing to get up the. slope and onto the level plateau in VI and VII. When I made the trip using self--contain&d gear with Graham Balcombe and John Buxton in 1955, I was astonished by the achievement of the helmet divers in pulling their air hoses for such a great distance.

[BALCOMBE: "Concerning underwater rock climbing··that was one of Mossy's bits of overemphasis. Suggest: The leading helmet diver had to indulge in some simple boulder-climbing ... W]

JS: The pipes were air supply and communications hoses? OW: The jargon of the day was as follows. The Wshot rope"

was the present-day "guideline" that was laid between concrete blocks on the passage'floor (except that it was more than an inch in diameter). The equally thick "breast rope" (with the telephone wires woven in) was the lifeline. The air hoses Were additional. They could talk to each other, which is something that cave divers couldn't do for many years afterwards. They were ahead of us on that.

JS: When you first started diving, were helmets being passed up in favor of rebreathers or were they still being used on a regular basis?

OW: Helmet diving in caves stopped in the 1930's. The equipment which we used was government surplus respirators fro:n World War II.

JS: What was the training like? OW: They had a training schedule with 5 hours underwater

and various tasks on dry land. Underwater, you had to do all the usual things like taking your mask off and putting it back on again. On dry land you had to experience carbon-dioxide excess and oxygen lack to the point of unconsciousness. You needed medical supervision for that--I don't recommend it even slightly.

JS: What kind of qualifications were people looking for for prospective cave divers?

OW: You had to be experienced as a caver. Also, it was considered that cave diving required a certain degree of dedk:ation, and that if you were not going to stick with it, then the sooner that this was found out, the better. The trainer diver had to keep control of the equipment until it became clear that you were going to persevere. The days when you could buy equipment at the friendly neighborhood dive store and then sign up for a regularly scheduled class came later.

JS: Where did training take place? OW: The first thing that you had to do was to find someone

to train you. I had been a supporter on the occasion (organized by OliVer Lloyd) when Bob Davies 8nd Graham Balcombe had done great things in Sump II of Swildon's Hole (June 26, 1954). Possibly because of this, Bob was able to prevail upon Jack Thompson in Sheffield to give me my initial training. So I rode on my motorcycle for many hours to Sheffield where Jack was

kind enough to put me up for the night as well as dress me in the drysuit, big black rubber boots, and oxygen respirator which is what a well-dressed cave diver wore in those days. Sometimes I would dive in a lake beside a dam, and sometimes in a pool indoors.

JS: What was happening with the aqualung at that time? OW: The earliest reference that I can find in the COG

newsletters is dated June 1948: " ... [Jean Ruffel] sends us a preliminary mention of a French invention which he says is particularly safe and would greatly assist exploration.w

Cousteau's book, The Silent World, was published in England in 1953 and I can remember the enthusiasm with which it was received. However, as far as the members of the Cave Diving Group were concerned, they were copiously supplied with government surplus gear, while aqualungs were expensive. So why get involved with something that you cannot afford while the stuff with which you are familiar is to hand?

However, non-cave divers had no such inhibitions, and the Sub-Aqua Club was founded in 1953 with a complete prohibition on oxygen apparatus. Jack Thompson was one of the converted, and while I was being trained in the use of oxygen for cave diving, there were others in the pool with aqualungs. As I remember it, there were two manufacturers from whom you could buy scuba equipment: Siebe Gorman and Heinke.

JS: Where did you make some of your earlier cave, dives? OW: My first cave dive was in Peak Cavern. Jack

Thompson took me for a dignified walk for a few yards along a commodious tunnel underwater at the Swine Hole (Aug. 28, 1955). My next cave dive was at Wookey Hole with Graham Balcombe and John Buxton when we went through to VII (Oct. 1, 1955). Perhaps I should emphasize that John was a cave diver for several years before I became involved, and without him, none of this would have occurred (John contributed significantly to cave diving for many years).

JS: What are conditions like in Wookey? OW: On the way in, the visibility on a good day can be a

100 feet or more. But the mud soon enough rises up in clouds so that on the way out, you cannot see a thing. Jokes were made that you must find your way out by the senses of taste, smell, hearing and touch (mostly touch). The water did not move fast enough to push you around (remember, we were walking) but you certainly saw the mud clouds moving. When you were going upstream the things to do was to mOVe slowly so that you could see as much as possible before the mud cloud swept around you in the various eddies that always seem to exist when the passageway in not a perfect tube.

JS: Why is it that so much work has been done at Wookey·-what is the big attraction there?

OW: The underwater tunnels are large, the water is clear (at least to begin with), you can walk in along the concrete paths, there is a comfortable place to dive from, it is an excellent place for a beginner to practice in, there were bones to be found, and so on. Mind you, not everyone agreed with this, and during the early '60's, I think it was Fred Davies who said, "Wookey--why, yes, of course it is interesting··it is the other end of Swildon's."

JS: When was your last dive in Wookey? OW: My last serious pushing dive in Wookey was when we

reached the entrance of the 15th chamber in a descending slot at a depth of 65 feet--that was on March 14, 1958. About a year later, I had my last dive at Wookey (a training dive for some new divers, really) and put my nose into a tight vertical rift in IX-1 without really getting anywhere (AprilS, 1959).

JS: How far into the cave were you when you looked into XV?

OW: It seemed like a long way, involving two dives in sequence to reach the upstream pool in IX (because we crossed IX by the underwater route) and two more to come out. But perhaps I should mention that when I started diving at Wookey Hole, Graham Balcombe and Donald Coase had already

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No_ 4, p. 9

discovered the 9th chamber at about 100 yards upstream from III. Also, they had gone for some distance beyond that to XI, where the floor drops away beyond 30 feet. Bob Davies discovered XIII with his aqualung by swimming down to about 50 feet in XI, under a low arch, and then up a narrow rift on the far side (Dec. 10, 1955).

So to answer your question, our own explorations took us from the edge of XI, down the slope and into XIV, and then across to the entrance of XV where we reached the depth limit for the 70130 oxygen/nitrogen gas mixture that we were us!ng. We walked across below XIII, which was up in the sky as far as we were concerned. John Buxton came with me on those dives.

There were several other divers who would come through to IX and they would do various essential things but it was only John and myself who dived with mixtures (unlil I had come to America when several other divers started mixture breathing). It is, of course, agreeable to see that mixed-gas rebrealhers are now being used in caves again after so many years.

JS: The other divers were serving in a back-up capacity? OW: The expression "back-up capacity" doesn't sound

quite right because they did more than this, such as explorative dives here and there, training dives, hunting for bones in IV and generally keeping things going.

JS: What was the feeling about solo diving, going off into the yonder by yourself?

OW: It was OK to dive on your own if you were on the end of a rope that was paid out from dry land and if you didn't go past an underwater "obstacle" of any kind (such as a sharp corner or tight place). There was a code of sharp pulls on the line to indicate more rope, less rope, or stand still. If you laid your line from a reel then you were supposed to have another diver with you.

Graham Balcombe did quite a bit of solo diving laying his line out from a reel in Keld Head and at Gayden Pot in 1944 and 1945 when he found Coase's Loop between the two water surfaces in Wookey IX, but in Balcombe's notes we find "the bad lad had done the loopway ... without warning us."

You will have to ask Bob Davies what his thoughts were on solo diving, but as far as I can remember, when he went off on his own and discovered XIII, well, nobody approved of that at all.

JS: Before the fact or. .. ? OW: Certainly after the fact. Bob's discovery of XIII is, of

course, well known. His swim upstream looking for air after he had lost contact with us, and his subsequent escape swim out again while short of air must surely rank as one of the most astonishing exploits by any cave diver ever. Bob had his aqualung and he wanted to swim down to the bottom of XI and take a quick look around. He was going to lay a line and come back. We were going to go with him as far as the edge of XI.

JS: That's where the bottom drops off. OW: Yes, from IX to XI is a gentle walk and then the sandy

floor of the passage drops aways as if you are at the edge of the Continental Shelf. Bob swam ahead 01 us to show us the way. John Buxton was the absolute model of dignity as he walked alcng, leaning forward slightly, laying the line lrom the AFLO (light and line-reel combination) which he held in his right hand. We had been told it was 200 feel to the edge, but it turned out to be much less that that.

Suddenly I saw that John was jumping up and down like a Scottish dancer--he was holding his light above his head and dancingilecause he didn't want is momentum to carry his over the edge. Equally abruptly, I became aware that there was not a great deal of anything under me either (Ihis is not good for the mental equilibrium). Way, way below us we could see Bob Davies spinning his light around. In fact, the change in slope was not as great as it appeared at first sight, and neither of us was in any real danger of doing into the dreaded "free-fall."

JS: So he was already off and going.

OW: Bob didn't realize Ihal he had gone over the edge, and was surprised to find himself al a deplh of aboul 50 feel al the bottom of XI. He was back wilh us in a moment to fix his line. But there was a delay at the that point, and I could see he was trying to get his line reel organized, His reel was in darkness at the back of his AFLO, so I poinled my light at it so that he could see what he was doing. He was trying to untie the end of the line while the visibility steadily gal worse, slowly at first, and then suddenly it was zero (and I mean ZERO). For a time, my main function was to act as an objecl against which olher objects bumped from time to time.

So I just stood still, under the impression that all was well and that Bob was away and exploring. John materialized out of the mud and tried to speak to me but I couldn't understand what he was saying. Nobody had mentioned the possibility that Bob might get lost in the muddy water, and my brain refused to admit even the possibility that such a thing might have occurred. It is probably true to say that I was confused by the unexpected turn of events. So we returned briefly to IX to see if he was there before going back to XI. By that time there was no sign of Bob anywhere.

JS: How long was it before you realized that Bob was: in trouble?

OW: John realized what had happened as soon as he saw that Bob was not back in IX. We were wearing full facemasks and it was quite a business to take them off. So John couldn't just remove his mouthpiece and talk to me when we were back in IX--he sort of grunted and vanished back towards XI faster than I had ever seen him move before. I couldn't understand why he was getting so agitated.

It was a perfect example of confusion between divers. Nowadays, divers operate solo, and this sort of thing is much less likely to happen (Bob was way ahead of his time in being in favor of cave divers operating on their own). .

JS: So you went back to IX again? OW: Well, eventually we did (but as I said earlier, we did go

back there for a moment in the confusion when Bob vanished). We stayed in IX for a while and Bob didn't reappear, so after a couple of hours, we went back to III. We debated whether to go back to XI to start a search but we didn'l, We didn't even have the intelligence to leave a line with a light on il in XI.

Dan Hasell was in charge of things in III, and when we arrived he called out other divers. Graham Balcombe, for example, was hard at work getting his stuff together in London (this was in the early hours of the morning) when Bob reappeared. Most of us were in the cave owner Gerard Hodgkinson's house by then, and were greatly surprised when someone came in to say that Bob was back in III. For a moment I refused to believe that this was so. He had come all the way out of the cave on his own.

JS: What happened to Bob? OW: Well, first of all, he hadlos\ contact with the line in the

confusion in XI. He had wound the wire around his arm, bul was distracted when the battery box on his AFLO opened unexpectedly, and with on thing and another, he lost Ihe wire. He swam in circles under conditions of zero visibility, until his first cylinder ran out. He equalized his cylinders, and kept on swimming. When he ran out 01 air the second time, he became alarmed and, finding himsell in clear water, swam upstream looking for air. He found air in what he blor called the 131h Chamber and also that he could climb up a short cliff to reach a horizontal place where he could sit and (as he put it) "ponder upon the verities."

JS: Of course, he was very lucky. Robert Harper visited XIII 25 years later and wrole: "Finding XIII look Iwo trips ... suffice to say that underwator thore is ;1 tighl blind rift right next to it'"

But to return to Bob's story, it turned oullhat he had more air in his cylinders than he had expocted (33 atm.). When his tanks were full, they had' 20. So he wailed there for 3-1/2 hours

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August. 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 10

c

I·

!'

for the water to clear and then set out (laying a line this time) on his spectacular escape swim that took him into at least one blind alley but which fortunately ended in IX.

JS: How much air did he have when he got back? OW: 3 atmospheres, according to the pressure gauge (his

breathing had become "difficult" when he was still about 10 feet down).

JS: 3 atmospheres ... il must have been an exciting experience. Did he do much diving after that?

OW: He went to Philadelphia after that, and has been there ever since.

JS: Where else did you dive besides Wookey? OW: About half our dives were at Wookey and the rest were

elsewhere. Some of the water that emerges at Wookey Hole comes from Swildon's Hole in the Mendip Hills up above. There was an emotional connection between these two cav.es as well as an actual physical connection. (At one time Swildon's Hole was decorated by a stolen road sign: "To Wookey Hole avoiding City Center.") Bob Davies dived in Swildon'salso (that is when I met him). And finally I did some downstream diving in Swildon's; I got through two sumps there. That was under conditions of zero visibility.

JS: Was diving in Swildon's more difficult than at Wookey? OW: In Swildon's you are diving downstream over a sand

and mud floor so the visibility is essentially zero. However, the tunnels are not large and you can feel your way through (the problem in the later sumps is that they are too tight). When finding VI, I was greatly helped by a solutional groove in the roof that was just the right size for running a finger along (I had no idea what lay on either side). The trip to the dive site involved low crawls and squeezes, and took several hours. I suppose that you must have had a similar transport problem during your dive in McFail's cave in Schoharie County.

JS: Where else did you dive besides Swildon's and Wookey?

OW: We dived in Yorkshire a couple of times. Our main success in Yorkshire was in Threaplands Cave where we got through a sump that was about 65 feet long into a big stream passage that ended in another sump (June 23, 1956). Here, I was about to abandon the dive in totally muddy water, when I just happened to notice that the top of my mask was in air (it was an upstream dive but I had just gone through a small opening Over a sand and mud floor, and the mud had risen). We also dived in South Wales, in Derbyshire and in Somerset.

JS: How many people were required for a typical diving operation, to get the gear to the dive site?

OW: When I got through Sump IV in Swildon's Hole we had something like 20 or 30 people. We were using our usual Wookey equipment, which had evolved under conditions where the carry-in was easy (in fact you can walk to the dive site in Woo key along the tourist paths wearing the apparatus). But in Swildon's, things were different. So for the discovery of VI I made a lightweight oxygen respirator. We managed very well with about half a dozen people. The later divers managed to streamline operations even further.

The record achievement for a party without sherpas occurred on one of Graham Balcombe's blasting trips to Sump I in Swildon's Hole in Jan. 1934, when he had packaged 60 Ibs. of equipment. In the event, he carried this most of the way to Sump I entirely on his own--which took him about 8-1/2 hours with 13 journeys at every point (3:30 pm to midnight). Jack Sheppard joined him about a day later and they did some blasting, but without making very much progress. So the brilliant successes that they later achieved in this cave were very well earned, as you might say.

JS: You mentioned the AFLO device. What is this? OW: It was a diver's light with depth gauge and so forth fixed

onto it. Graham Balcombe was a great enthusiast for acronyms, and AFLO was short for AFLOLAUN: Apparatus For Laying Out

Lines and Underwater Navigation. JS: I've seen your AFLO and it seemed to have more than

a light and depth gauge. OW: It had a notepad on the top. My AFLO had an

electronic signaling device and a sound-powered telephone for use from dry land. (This was especially useful curing my discovery of Swildon's V and VI.) We were mainly walking divers and the light which we carried was fairly bright (36 watts). The AFLO had a motorcycle battery in it, and independent lighting system with a dry battery, a watch, a space for tools and so on. My AFLO also carried a waterproof light fixed across the front with rubber straps (3 lighting systems in all).

JS: What kind of burn time did you get? OW: About an hour from the main light, and several hours

from the others. JS: These devices were homemade? OW: Yes. In John Buxton's AFLO, for example, there was

a plank of wood with a motorcycle battery in a box about half way along. The main light was in front of that with two depth gauges close to it so that he could read them using the main light. The line reel was at the back. The carrying handle was over the battery box and was fairly long, so that he could hold it at the point of balance. In muddy water it can be useful to have a fairly long AFLO because you can then jab with it to find out what's where. For a walking diver it worked very well. Underwater they didn't weigh very much, but OUr supporters expressed opinions about their weight out of the water form time to time. On my Swildon's VI dive I left the AFLO at home and used a very much lighter outfit altogether.

JS: Can you describe the rebreather system in use? OW: Graham Balcombe had been able to obtain an

enormous quantity of government surplus diving equipment, and this was entirely of closed-circuit design. He went with a moving van and loaded it up. They also had many drysuits, for example. The Siaden suit was used with the human torpedoes during the war-- they got a lot of those. It was a baggy sort of suit and you could pile on the clothing and end up feeling rather like an elephant. This was good for walking but less good for swimming. You got in through the front, and then sealed the opening with a metal clamp.

They also had two-piece wartime frogman outfits called ·underwater swim suits· that were tighter and more suitable for swimming. Bob wore one of these for his trip to XIII. The oxygen respirators were mainly Siebe Gorman Amphibian Mk II, which dated from about 1943. Graham told me that they were given enough boots to equip an army.

JS: Was this the same apparatus that was used below 30 feet, only with a different gas mixture?

OW: In fact they were different units. For diving below 30 feet, we used an early version of a World War II mixed-gas rebreather called the P-Party Set. These had been used for harbor clearance during the invasion of Europe. As compared with our oxygen respirators, the P-Party Sets had larger cylinders for the gas mixture, a larger soda-lime canister, and a special regulator to give a constant mass flow. The Navy had the so- called Universal Breathing Apparatus (UBA) which came later. Both of these were semi-closed-circuit respirators into which the oxygen/nitrogen mixture was blown at a fairly fast rate. We used a 70/30 oxygen/nitrogen mixture blown in at 3.3 surface-liters per minute for longer duration instead of 60/40 02/N2 at 4 sl/m, which was generally used by the Navy. Swimmers must Use flow rates several time larger than this. The P-Party Sets carried two mixture cylinders of 9 cubic feet (=500 liters total mixture supply), and this was good for well over an hour with the 2:1 safety margin that we like to have (we also added an oxygen cylinder).

Graham Balcombe had bought two P-Party Sets in 1946 and he was very helpful in telling us how to get them working. Sir Robert Davis at Siebe Gorman gave us some spare parts and

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1999, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 11

was extremely helpful also. JS: How much oxygen did you carry with you? OW: The main cylinder on the oxygen respirator had 6 cubic

feet and that was good for 2 hours if you were slow moving. The reserve tank had 4 cubic feet. I always like to finish the dive with at least half of the oxygen still there.

JS: How was the C02 removed? OW: The breathing tube went from the stopcock on the front

of the full facemask to the soda-lime canister and from there to the breathing bag which you wore around the neck ~with. UBA, the breathing bag was on the chest). The soda-lime duration was "equivalent to main gas," to quote from the jargon of the day. This depended, however, on the quality of the soda lime. Graham would measure this, and we would keep the better stuff for the more serious dives. The P-Party Set had a larger canister good for 3 hours. You could not allow any water to get into your soda lime. I don't think I ever wet my soda lime unless I was practicing mask removal, when it did get rather wet.

JS: Did you ever practice buddy breathing? OW: People talked about the possibility, but it was really

not possible. This business where you change the mouthpiece underwater, that was not done. The mouthpiece was something you put in your mouth before you went underwater and it stayed there until you came out.

JS: What kind of line were you using? OW: Ex-Army telephone line about 0.125" in diameter. It

had both steel and copper strands inside a waxy outer layer. It was very strong when it was new, but was worse than useless after a couple of years underwater when all you had left was rusting iron and the thin copper lines. We either laid it from a reel or in some cases a friend on dry land would payout the line to us. In this second case, I would signal with a homemade morse key on my signalling device while underwater, or talk with a sound- powered telephone from dry land.

JS: So on the way out, you would take out the guideline? OW: Not if I was laying it from the reel. If I was being life lined

then I would sometimes ask for the line to be withdrawn while coming out. But in Swildon's VI, for example, they paid out the line to me on the way in underthe control of my signals (3 bleeps for more line, 2 to pull it in slowly, 1 to hold still where you are, and so on). We spoke from VI using the,telephone. Then I tied the line to the roof and came out along it.

(My Swildon's VI dive was the nearest that I came to solo cave diving. I had reached the point when I was happierto have the second diver on dry land during the preliminary investigation of a sump in muddy water because: First, you know that he is safe. Second, if the line DOES pull across into a tight place in the muddy water, then he is on the right side of the obstruction to help you out.)

JS: What was the procedure for being off the line? OW: If you were walking on the bottom, the line could not

be too far away. One idea would be to put your AFLO on the ground and pull out some line and start exploring using the AFLO as a point to return to. Having a heavy AFLO had certain advantages. If you wore flippers, then you could go sailing away for miles and there was no real solution.

JS: Did you have any problems with line breakage? OW: The ex-Army telephone lines were very good for the

short term, but after a while would decay. At Wookey there was a thick rubberized wire through to IX, and this was much better.

JS: Was falling into a hole a serious concern? OW:'lhis was an absolute nightmare. I came close to it

once. In Yorkshire, I very nearly stepped over the edge of an underwater Cliff. That would have been very serious. I was being lifelined by my friends using a nylon Climbing rope, but the idea of it vanishing into the sump while I plunged forever downwards still worries me occasionally (Deepdale Rising, 6fT Jan. 1957).

JS: Did the earlier cave divers in England avoid dives which

involved crawling? OW: Graham Balcombe's earliest cave dives were in

Swildon's Hole where he had quite a job carrying his stuff into the cave. This involved crawling BEFORE you reached the dive site. Divers did go through tight places underwater--I remember in Yorkshire going through a tight hole, tucking the cylinder around a corner, doing that sort of thing.

JS: What kind of setup were divers using when you left England in 1959? .

OW: We were using mixed-gas rebreathers for the deeper dives, and oxygen for the shallow work (this is what the Navy was doing at that time also). This continued within the Cave Diving Group for a while, but other divers started with aqualungs. For example, Mike Boon used an aqualung in the far sumps in Swildon's Hole in the '60's, and did much to promote their use. Progressively, the aqualungs took over as people got more confident with them and with swimming.

JS: And the use of fins. OW: That's right. When I was diving, the use of fins was a

matter of concern because too many people had gotten into trouble with them. Gordon Marriott, the naval diver, drowned using fins in Wookey. He lost the line. And then Bob Davies and Don Coase, they got lost in XI using fins once. You took one flip in the wrong direction, and you were off in the blue .... Not in the blue, you were off in the mud. And I had my own reactions from the night when Bob Davies had the good fortune to discover XIII.

JS: What happened to Gordon Marriott? OW: He was an ex-Royal Marine diver of extreme

experience who had taken part in the D-Day landings and things like that. He was diving at Wookey Hole with members of the Cave Diving Group but ran out of oxygen on his way back from IX. He had a smaller main cylinder than the others (4 cubic feet as opposed to 6). His fins got him into difficulties at the last moment when he lostthe line. He had a habit which wasn't good for cave diving: he carried a spare oxygen cylinder on his belt, and had become extremely adept at tucking the threaded outlet of this spare breathing circuit (with a rebreather, you can rebreathe this for a while before needing to blow in a bit more).

Theyfound his spare cylinder at some distance from him so the theory is that he was trying to do this after his main supply ran out. He must have known that he was very Iowan oxygen, but he must also have believed that he could keep out of trouble in this way. ,

(Perhaps I should mention that Bob Davies put himself in danger on that occasion by hunting for Marriott while his own oxygen cylinder was practically empty.)

JS: Do you thing there were advantages in getting into cave diving as a caver rather than a diver?

OW: The established wisdom in the Cave Diving Group was that you must have caving experience. People blamed Marriott's problem on the fact that he had very little caving experience.

JS: What brought you over to the States? OW: I was becoming alarmed by the extent to which my life

was dominated by cave diving (although I refused to admit this at the time, of course). So we came overfor a short visit in 1959 and are still here.

[BALCOMBE: "I think that my exit from rock climbing was much the same: I took to cave diving as a relatively safe shelter from the sort of stuff I could not keep my fingers off. Despite a few near misses, I think I did right (I am 81 now) ... ."] .

[SH EPPARD: "I did not wish cave diving to become my sale interest in life. BecOming married ... made the break essential."J

JS: You did some diving over here though. OW: I brought my stuff here and did a few reconnaissance

dives but nothing more than that. We had planned to go back with it all to England, but never did.

JS: What did people think about the rebreather system you

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 12

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c

were using? OW: People were polarized on the subject, either for or

against. Naval shallow-water divers were using oxygen apparatus at that time, and they spoke about it as if it was OK. When my sister's house caught fire in England in 1963, the firemen put on oxygen rebreathing apparatus togo into a smoke-filled room, and nobody told them to go back to the firehouse and find something more sensible, as far as I can remember. On the other hand, aqualung enthusiasts spoke about oxygen as if it was a deadly sin.

JS: Somebody told me that you dove in Schoharie Caverns. OW: Yes, that was on August 27-28,1960. JS: What did you find there? OW: I went down a gentle slope and looked into the

entrance of a wide horizontal passage. While there was enough room to get through at the highest point. there were also boulders on either side with narrow spaces behind them into which I did not wish to go. So it seemed to require very careful belaying of a fixed guideline to weights on the floor. With only one diver, this did not seem to be a possible thing to do. Besides which, the mud was rising up in clouds and made me reluctant to go into a place where the line could easily get behind a rock.

JS: Otherwise you get too far and you run into one too many line traps on the way out.

OW: Yes, and you would begin to wish that you hadn't begun.

JS: What kind of support did you have on that dive? OW: Many people were there but I was the only diver:

Russel Gurnee was there (earlier, he had penetrated into the sump for about 25 feet with an aqualung when diving with Bill Wittosh). In a letter to me dated July 16, 1960, Russell wrote: "It was a shock for me to discover that this beautifully clear water silts so badly that visibility is completely lost."

It was, of course, very kind of you to invite me along as a supporter on your dive there with James Brown on Feb. 20, 1988. I was fascinated by the way cave diving has changed since my dive in 1960. First, solo cave diving has become respectable, while in my day it would brand you (almost) as being not too different from a common criminal. Second, there was the total change in apparatus. Third, there was the use of redundant kits. (Dumas carried a "micro-aqualung" on his belt during his dive with Cousteau into the Fountain of Vaucluse on Aug. 27, 1946, but generally we had only one respirator which we checked very carefully.) Also, ,. had never seen surgical rubber tube being used to hold things together. But the general business when you pull objects of various kinds out of bags and assemble them with a serious expression on the face was the same as before.

JS: Another dive you made in the Northeast was at the Arch Spring resurgence to Tytoona Cave. What did you find there?

OW: There again I just looked into a passage underwater, but didn't go into it on my own. Solo cave diving wasn't the custom in those days.

JS: Did you dive in the surface pool or in the sump in the cave at the surface?

OW: I went into both. JS: Were you using your rebreather again? OW: Yes, it was the only one I had. I was converted to the

aqualung when I went to Florida in 1961. I went on some guided cave dives because I was on my own. I met two cave divers who agreed to take me into a couple of places. We had single tanks, a single regulator, no buoyancy compensator of any kind (the idea that a cave diver should carry more than one respirator was not in fashion at the time). The first dive site was an open pool with a shaft in the middle that went straight down to about 60 feet, and then off into little tunnels for a short distance. In the tunnels, the mud rose a little bit but basically, it was claar water the whole time.

JS: Were they using guideline?

.. , ... ,,' ....... ..:,..,, .. ;

OW: Oh, yes. JS: When did you discontinue your cave-diving activities? OW: I continued cave diving for a short time after we were

married, but when we had children, I gave it up. We took up camping and skiing, things that were family oriented.

JS: You can't take the wife and kids sump diving for the weekend.

OW: That's right. JS: Have you done any diving recently? OW: We went to Hawaii in 1987 and I went diving through

some lava tubes, which was rather fun. That was after a layoff from cave diving of about 24 years.

JS: Do you ever feel inclined to make a sump dive after all those years?

OW: Occasionally, yes. But I haven't been doing enough diving to do anything serious, in my opinion. Before going to Hawaii, I put in 10 hours underwater in a pool with a very helpful local dive store. The spooky thing was that BOTH of my regulators broke down during the pool practice, so I had to get entirely new stuff. likewise in Hawaii, I saw TWO divers lose their air owing to equipment malfunctions (!)--and this leaves me more than ever impressed with how careful you must be to do this sort of thing safely. On the other hand, the idea of attending a cave-diver training course and then doing some beginner-type tourist cave dives in Florida using the new-fangled methods might be fun.

JS: You're working on a book at the moment.... OW: I'm contributing two chapters to a book that Jim

Hanwell is editing on behalf of Wells Museum (no connection with my own name--Wells is the city in Somerset with the cathedral). Jim has done a wonderful job in locating many of the early explorers--for example, he found Jack Sheppard by telephoning every Sheppard in Wales (Jim said later, "Thank goodness that he was not called Jones or Evans.").

Obviously in this interview, I cannot do justice to the multitude of cave divers who have contributed to this work. For this you must refer to Jim's book when it comes out. For example, Oliver lloyd was active for many years, but he died just as work on the book was beginning. Jim had to write his chapter in addition to his other editorial labors.

Bob Davies has written two chapters, and Jim has obtained either chapters or memos from many others who have been active from the time of the helmet diving of the 1930's to ... actually to 50 years in the future. I wrote the chapter on cave diving in about the year 2038--at which time we can expect that present-day techniques will be about as old-fashioned as the helmet divers seem to us now.

JS: What specifically will you be writing about? OW: For the future I discuss first the human diver and how

modern technology will provide sensing, communication, navigation and life-support systems of a more advanced kind. Thus, we can expect that many of the items in small-manned submarines of today will be developed into a form that a diver can carry. Second, I considered what can be done by remotely operated vehicles under the control of someone on dry land (already this has been done in Vaucluse in France and--to a lesser extent--at the Cheddar Caves just a few miles from Wookey Hole). Finally, I consider totally automatic, computer­controlled exploring vehicles that will resemble in their mode of operation, I suppose, the Voyager II spacecraft that carried out such amazing explorations of the Planet Uranus. If a microprocessor can be programmed to play chess (usually defeating me quite handily, to my great annoyance), then certainly it can win over me at cave diving also.

JS: Takes some of the adventure out of it. OW: I don't think so because these things will explore for

great distances and the adventure is going to be to follow them through. I think it's merely going to create problems that people will want to solve. We can expect that the distances and depths

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 13

explored by divers (or their automated servants) will exceed present limits by at least an order of magnitude within the next SO years, and that automatic devices will safely go through holes that are either two small or too fast-flowing for cave divers of the human variety, and that they will make measurements and record data, take photographs of air spaces, survey through walls and floors using penetrating sonar, and so on. It might even be possible for an automated device to come out of the water at the far end of a sump and explore on dry land, but I would expect this to be much more difficult than. desjgning something that stays in the water. -.

Remotely operated vehicles might be made to work in hot water, thus making it possible to explore the hot springs in Yellowstone National Park, or the hot-water vents on the mid­oceanic ridges. (To do this, it will probably be necessary to replace semiconductor technology by integrated thermionics). I am assuming, of course, that we will see progress in the NEXT SO years comparable with what it has been in any such interval in the past.

JS: What kind of improvements do you foresee in the area of human exploration?

OW: Well, in terms of respirators, as you know, the British cave divers Rob Palmer and Stuart Clugh recently reached a depth of 91 m (300 feet) in the Blue Hole Stargate Cave using military rebreathing units with a helium/oxygen mixture (NSS News, Feb. 19B8, p. 4S). According to the manufacturer's specification sheets, a modern sensor-controlled rebreather is about the size of a two-tank aqualung and will last for 6 hours or more at depth down to about 1000 feet. They're amazing machines. Many of the basic principles were, of course, demonstrated by the American diver Max Gene Nohl in his incredible dive with helium/oxygen mixtures to a depth of 420 feet in Lake Michigan on Dec. 1, 1937. William Stone is the man to ask about advanced rebreathers.

And then there's the question of whether you really have to lay a line. With modern technology, sonar, doppler measurements, inertial navigation and so forth, you can in principle put together a system that will take you out of the cave eVen through the muddiest water without a line. That's an obvious thing that one has to think about.

JS: Is there anything that accurate which would allow you to get back to where you came from?

OW: Small manned submarines can do it now. The only trouble is that it costs about $2S0,OOO for the equipment. Not many of us can afford that sort of money for a weekend activity. This is with accelerometers, sonar, microcomputers and all that sort of thing. I am hoping that the price will come down within the next 50 years.

JS: What else are you talking about in your chapters? OW: In the other chapter I cover many of the things that we

have talked about here. I am, of course, tremendously impressed by the achievements of present-day cave divers, the distances they go in, the times that they stay underwater and so on. Jim Hanwell has done a tremendous job in persuading people to write chapters for this book and in collecting photographs and diagrams, so that the tremendous progress that is still being made in cave diving is made clear.

THE INITIATION - by Joanna Florio Jeffreys

[All illustrations by the author.] No one in the U.S. issues C-cards to sump divers. Not as

of yet, anyway. For most, learning the art of sump diving is a matter of hit or miss. The only other option is an apprenticeship. Many cave divers who began as open-water divers, may be appalled. For them, taking a diving course for a certification is a natural thing. Most have probably had advanced courses in

Locust Creek Cave entrance.

ice and wreck diving from their local dive shop. For MdryM cavers, there are no schools. While many grottos offer impromptu vertical training sessions, most new skills are learned by doing­with others. Sump diving is no different.

My initiation into the world of sump diving came on Oct. 31, 1987. I was invited to help map and explore a newly discovered section of Locust Creek Cave in West Virginia. Up 'til then, my cave diving had been restricted to the warm springs of northern Florida. My slimp-diving experience was limited to dragging dive gear for miles through caves only to watch others dive. This is a frustrating situation for a dry caver trained in cave diving. So when this opportunity arose, I was ecstatic!

Locust Creek Cave would have been more aptly called:

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No_ 4, p_ 14

(

...

(

Locust River. Even in the dry season, the cave pumps a large volume of water. It is a major drain for the Droop Mountain area. It's possible Locust could connect with the Friar's Hole Cave System. Friar's Hole is among the longest in the world.

On the morning of the dive, I found myself assembled with five veteran sump divers: Jim Brown, Bob Jeffreys, John Schweyen, Ron Simmons and Roberta Swicegood. It was hard to believe. but the first sump began at the mouth of the cave. Locust required no equipment hauling.

The dive line Jim and John had previously laid weeks before, could be seen secured to the north wall. We would dive as individuals, since the buddy system is of limited used in most sumps.

One of the trip leaders, John Schweyen, informed me that I was to be one of the first to dive the sumps. I had the least experienced and the visibility would be better. I was grateful for his valued judgment and proceeded to check my regulators and adjust my mask. Once completed, I began the customary equipment checking with Bob. I floated across the small lake to the dive line,looked one last time at Bob, dumped my BC air, and dove.

As I began my descent in the darkened overhead environment, the viz dropped to a couple of feet. The previous silt had not settled frO(ll the other trip leader, Jim Brown. The fragile, thin dive line beckoned me to penetrate deeper. I soon found, that I was not completely alone in this alien environment. My companion during the dive was a pair of eyes staring and a gaping mouth that confronted me on the line. I paused, then began to fin forward. Startled, the skittish fish swam to safety. As I continued to follow the line, it started to rise toward the ceiling. My ears began to pop and my light beams caught the surface skin of the air and water contact. The first 100-foot sump popped up into a small chamber with one solitary light beaming on me. It was Jim. Silently, he waited 'till climbed out of the water. Seconds later we heard Glubb ... Glubb ... Glubb echo from the water. Shortly after, a familiar head emerged. Bob.

After a brief hike lugging the equipment across the chamber, Jim guided us to the next sump. Jim dove first again. I followed and Bob brought up the rear. I continued through the low, wide passage. Everything seemed calm and still. I felt time had no meaning here. Time and motion seemed as one. All was silent, except for the hypnotic rhythm of my regulator. The sudden thump of my helmet hitting the ceiling sobered me up. The line ended abruptly on the surface, terminating my enjoyment. I had reached the other side of the second 200-foot sump. Quickly, I scrambled alit of the way so Bob could enter the chamber, too.

Jim was already transformed to a dry caver. In noting this, I decided to pick up his lead. Behind me, Bob could be heard

coming out of the sump. Soon the three of us were cavers sitting on a rock, waiting for the rest of the party to catch up~

It wasn't long before everyone went through a metamorphosis and stood together. We talked of two survey teams, one surveying the huge, main passage, and the other, a side passage. There was a moment of silence, then Ron Simmons said: ftLet's go caving!" And we were off wading through stream passage prepared to "rape and pillage."

Jim, John and Ron left us to survey one of several side leads. Hopefully, future exploration in one of them will lead to the surface. Roberta, Bob and I surveyed the main passage. Through a 40·foot-diameter phreatic tube, we mapped along a wide, flat stream bed.

Our surveying has halted by a tremendous mountain of breakdown 1/2 mile into the cave. It wasn't long before we were ready to leave. I was getting a bit chilled and so were Bob and Roberta. Roberta suggested finishing off a side passage near the breakdown, which ended abruptly at a small waterfall. After accomplishing this, we exited quickly for the sump series.

Upon entering Sump II, I was greeted with the embracing coolness of the water. The awkward weight of the equipment from gravity was lifted into suspension as I finned. I followed the line out to the surface, scampered over some rocks, and waited for Bob and Roberta to arrive. All was well, and we continued on with haste to dive Sump I.

Shortly after, I surfaced into the cold night air. Cavers were at the entrance waiting to help carry some of our gear back across the field to the vehicles.

As I peeled off my wetsuit in the frosty night air, I had a feeling of accomplishment. My past frustration had been lifted. Instead of waiting at the sump for news of the other side, I was able to partake in the adventure.

The trip had been a profitable one. The combined efforts of both teams surveying mapped out about 1-1/2 miles of passage. My initiation into sump diving had been a thoroughly enjoyable one without incident. I am looking forward to contributing to further exploration and mapping of this system in the future.

THE AQUATIC FAUNA OF DRAGON'S BREATH LAKE - by A. J. Penney

INTRODUCTION. The main task of the divers who participated in the survey of Dragon's Breath Lake was the exploration and mapping of the underwater area of the lake, so enthusiasm naturally centered on the possibility of locating underwater passages that might lead to extensions of the system. However, from the outset some excitement was generated by the possibility of discovering fish or other organisms specifically adapted to life in the lake, perhaps even a new species unique to Dragon's Breath. The discovery of a new cave-dwelling species is always intriguing, as many of these creatures have developed special adaptations to rope with the challenges of an underground existence. There was also the possibility that the fauna of Dragon's Breath would help to clarify the relationship of the cave to other systems nearby, such as Small Beginnings or Harisib.

GENERAL FAUNA. The first and most obvious residents encountered in the cave were bats, which occurred from 10m within the entrance to the furthest reaches of the cave. These were Sundevalle's Leaf-nosed Bat (Hipposideros ca"et), an insectivorous bat ranging from sub-Saharan Africa to northern Namibia and South Africa. A quick count estimated there to be approximately 300 bats in the group directly above the rafts and the entire population in the cave must have numbered in the low thousands at the time of the survey (although bat populations in caves often very markedly in numbers depending on food availability an their breeding status). The existence of this bat population raised hopes that aquatic organisms might be

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 15

encountered in the lake, as bats often provide a fairly rich organic input, in the form of guano, into otherwise organically poor subterranean waters. The structure of the fault providing access to the lake also suggested that there might be a fair input of organic detritus, such as vegetation litter, into the system at certain times of the year, either as a result of wind transport or from water flow during raining periods. It is this type of combined input of guano, rich insect remains, and windblown vegetation detritus that supports the population of blind cave catfish in Aigamas Cave. . _ . .

That Dragon's Breath Lake does indeed receive a fair organic input was confirmed during the first explorations of the lake surface and bottom. A layer of fine organic dust was found floating on the lake, concentrated towards the northern end, and a number of insects were collected from this area. A new species of harvestman, related to spiders and somewhat similar in appearance, was found walking on the water surface among the dust. Although not fully cave adapted, it Was losing body pigmentation, being pale yellow in color, and had reduced eyes. A number of small hemipterans, or water-skaters, still possessing eyes and not appearing to be highly adapted, were also found in the same area. However, it was during the first dive that the magnitude of the organic input into Dragon's Breath was first appreciated.

AQUATIC FAUNA. The floor of the lake was found to consist of angular blocks of rock, varying in size from 2cm to over 5m, derived from the collapse of the roof area. All upper surfaces of these rocks were covered in a layer of fine, dark greenlbrown organic sit, forming a mantle over 3cm thick in places. This organic mantle was thickest on the flat area directly below the cave entrance, confirming this as the principal point of organic input, and in this area large drifts of snail shells were piled up to 1 m wide among the detritus. These all originated from terrestrial snails and were presumably washed into the system as already empty shells during the rainy season. Five species were represented in these drifts, principally two larger and fairly common snails (Xerocerastus sp.), together with smaller numbers of three smaller and scarcer species (Subu/ina [vitrea?J, Pupoides [ca/aharicus?J and Gu/ella [caryatis?]). Being terrestrial, the existence of these shells merely presented some evidence for the direct input of waterborn detritus into the Dragon's Breath entrance, but it was while searching among these rocks and shell drifts below the entrance that the most interesting biological discovery of the survey was made.

During ageneral salvage and exploration dive directly below the entrance, one of the divers managed to capture a number of small elongated, white, so-called "cave shrimps· among the detritus between the rocks. These creatures, similar to those found in other caves, belong to an order of crustaceans known as amphipods and are therefore distantly related to the larger and more familiar crabs, crayfish and shrimps. Approximately 4600 species of amphipod are currently known to exist. Most of these are marine species but a number of freshwater and a few semi- terrestrial and terrestrial species occur. Many of the species are fairly small, under 10mm in size, and tend to be laterally compressed, giving them their characteristic shrimplike appearance.

The majority of amphipods are scavengers or detritus feeders. Among the amphipods reported from freshwater environments, a number of species are confined to cave pools and streams. These show numerous adaptations to a subterranean existence, usually being pale, blind and possessing an abundance of sensory hairs. These freshwater, cave-dwelling amphipods have all evolved from marine ancestors and, although there are few such species in comparison with the populous marine sub-orders, freshwater amphipods have shown a remarkable ability to adapt to specific, isolated water bodies by rapid speciation. As a result, new species are fairly frequently being discovered as various,

particularly subterranean, lakes and streams are explored. Three main groups of freshwater amphipods occur in South

Africa/Namibia, in three widely separate areas: 1. In the southwestern Cape, 12 species of amphipod,

mostly belonging to the genus Parame/ita, occur in both surface streams and caves in mountainous areas, particularly in the Cape Peninsula and Hottentots Holland Mountains. These species are closely related to their marine ancestor and this is the only area in the world where such species occur in a freshwater environment. In moving from the ancestral marine habitat, this group has shown a spectacular evolutionary radiation with, for example, each species on Table Mountain originating from a different stream or cave.

2. A second group of amphipods of the genus Sterno­phys;nx, evolved from a completely different ancestor as the Parame/ita group, occurs in the Transvaal, mostly from caves in the Makapansgat area. Four species have been recorded from Peppercorn Cave, Ficus Cave, the Sterkfontein Caves and the Makapan Caves and springs. Again, this group has radiated to occupy the available habitats and each species was collected from a separate cave or cave system.

3. The third groupof amphipodsoccurring in southern Africa contains the species found in northern Namibia and belongs to the sub-order, Ingolfiellidea. This is particularly interesting group, only containing approximately 60 species in comparison with the thousands in the three other sub-orders. The genus /ngolfiella originated with the discovery and naming of /ngolfiella abyssi, collected from a depth of approximately 3700m in the Davis Straights by the research ship, Ingo/!. Since then a number of species have been described from widely varied habitats, including marine gravel at adepth of 50m,Iittorai and intertidal shore areas and subterranean groundwaters, showing that this group is also able to adapt to a range of habitats by speciation. Most of these species are adapted to an interstitial existence between stones and gravel and are therefore thin and elongated, quite different in appearance from more typical marine amphipods and only 1 mm to 3mm in length.

Amphipods of Northern Namibia. In 1951 an exceptionally large species of Ingolfiellid amphipod, measuring between 14mm and 20mm in length, was collected by Dr. Leleup from cave pools at Kakontwe and Kasongo in the Congo. Subsequently named Ingolfiella leleup;, this species was later found to occur fairly widely in the southern Congo and to extend to caves in Zimbabwe. In 1964 a second species was collected from a borehole near Tsumeb. This was even larger and differed appreciably from I. leleupi and so was placed in a new genus, Trog/o/e/eupia (a reference to both Dr. Leleup and the species' subterranean habitat), being named Trog/o/e/eupia eggerti. During a further study of the material from Tsumeb, the late Dr. Barnard of the South African Museum noted marked differences between some olthe specimens and concluded that the samples contained both males and females of the same species. However, in 1985 it was finally concluded that the smaller "males· were in fact a different species, subsequently named Stygobarnardia caprellinoides (a reference to the "stygian" habitat, Dr. Barnard's recognition of the differences between the amphipods and the resemblance of the species to the marine amphipod genus, Caprel/a). By 1986 there were therefore two species of Ingolfiellid amphipod known from groundwater in the Tsumeb area.

Amphipods of Dragon's Breath Lake. A number of amphipods were collected during sampling dives conducted at various sites in Dragon's Breath Lake. Although they were found in greater numbers in the silt directly below the cave entrance, numbers of amphipods were observed over the entire lake bottom in depths of up to 40m. They may well have occurred deeper, but no sampling was conducted during the deeper survey dives. These samples were sent to Dr. C. Griffiths at the Zoology Dept. of the University of Cape Town,

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 16

C·,-·

I

c

Fig. 1 Illustration of a new species of Ingolfiellid amphipod (Trog/o/e/eupia sp. nov.) collected from silt-covered rocks at the bottom of Dragon's Breath Lake in norther Namibia. (Note the complete absence of eyes.)

an expert on the systematics and distribution of amphipods in southern Africa; for study. He identified two species from the samples. One specimen of the smaller Stygobarnardia caprellinoides was collected and it appears that this species is fairly widely distributed in groundwater in the area. Of far more interest, however, was the presence in the samples of numbers of a very large species, differing in appearance from previously named Ingolfiellid amphipods. This species, illustrated in Fig. 1, also possesses far more sensory hairs and spines than previously named species and is, indeed, a new species of Trog/o/e/eupia apparently unique to Dragon's Breath Lake and still to be named by Dr. Griffiths.

Subsequent to the exploration of Dragon's Breath, Dr. Griffiths received a. sample of amphipods collected by Dr. J. Irish of the South West African Museum, from a cave pool at Arnheim, midway between Gobabis and Windhoek. This has also proved to be a new species of Trog/o/e/eupia and it therefore appears that this genus has also undergone an extensive radiative speciation to exploit groundwater habitats in northern Namibia, with separate species occurring in each of the samples collected in the area to date.

DISCUSSION. The tendency by the southern African freshwater amphipods to undergo rapid speciation provides an opportunity to study relationships between the species, as well as between the caves and streams in which they occur. For example, progressive development or simplification of appendages or sensory spines as speciation occurs can help to place species on a relative evolutionary time scale, indicating when each new species arose from its ancestor. The availability of live specimens can allow a similar series to be deduced from amino-acid sequences in body enzymes or proteins, or from nucleotide sequences in the genetic material. If species are restricted to particular caves or streams, this series can also indicate when these water bodies were joined or separated in the past. If actual ages can be attached to the relative evolutionary development series, for example, by the dating of fossil remnants of direct ancestors of the species concerned, then the hydrological and geological history of the area can be traced to some extent, with obvious benefits for the study of cave formation. With this in mind, research staff of the Zoology Department of the University of Cape Town, under supervision of Dr. Griffiths, recently initiated a detailed study of the relationship between the amphipods of the Table Mountain area.

The tendency for each cave in both the Transvaal and Namibia to contain different amphipod species provides a valuable opportunity to similarly study the relationship between these species and caves. Although it is fairly exciting in itself to discover a new species of "cave shrimp" in a cave pool, South African speleologists are in a position to greatly advance our knowledge of both amphipod evolution and cave-system development if these discoveries are documented in a systematic manner and accompanied by the collection of

samples from each cave. As a guideline to the systematic sampling of subterranean amphipod populations it is suggested that the following be attempted during future cave explorations:

1. Speleologists should attempt to compile a compre­hensive list of all cave pools and stream§.kff6wn to contain ·cave shrimps." This information coul~her be coordinated by members of the caving associations, or by research staff of museums or universities.

2. Attempts should be made to collect representative samples of amphipods from all cave pools and streams. Such sampling can be conducted during initial or subsequent explorations, in addition to the geological data and samples usually collected. Samples should be preserved in alcohol and forwarded to a museum for curation but it is suggested that research staff such as Dr. Griffith's be approached to coordinate the study of all samples collected.

3. Increased attention should be paid to the search for, and collection of, amphipod specimens during explorations of newly discovered cave systems.

There is no doubt that such coordinated research efforts by speleologists and biologists can greatly increase out understanding of the development of both caves and the unique creatures that inhabit this intriguing subterranean world.

REFERENCES Barnard, K. H. 1966. The occurrence of the genus Ingolfiella (Crus­

tacea, Amphipoda) in South Africa, with description of a new species. Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. 13; 189-197.

Botosaneau, L. (ed) 1986. Stygofauna Mundi: A faunistic, distribu­tional and ecological synthesis of the world fauna inhabiting subter­ranean waters (including the marine interstitial).

Griffiths, C.L. 1981. The freshwater Amphipoda (Crustacea) of South and South West Africa. Ann. S. Afr. Mus. 83 (5): 79-97.

Ruffo, S. 1964. Studi and Crostacei Anfipodi. 58. Un nuovo Ingol­fiellide delle acque sotterranee dell 'Africa di Sud Ovest. Boll. Zoo/. 31: 1019-1034.

__ , 1985. Un nuovo Ingolfiellideo delle acque sotterranee della Namibia: stygobarnardia caprellinoides. Atti. soc.ltal. Sci. Nat. Museo. Civ. stor. Nat. Milano. 126 (1~2): 43-53.

NITROGEN-OXYGEN MIXTURES AND CAVE DIVING - by John Crea

Cave divers are progressively staying underwater for longer and longer time periods, and wish to do so with the minimum amount of decompression that is safe. An answer to this question may be in the use of nitrogen-oxygen mixtures other than air. As we all know, the U.S. Navy tables are computed based on breathing a mixture of approximately 79% nitrogen and 21 % oxygen. It is the partial pressure of nitrogen at any given depth that this 79% nitrogen produces that determines the rate at which the inert gas (nitrogen) is absorbed into the bloodstream and then into the tissues of the body. And it is this inert gas that is absorbed that must be removed in a safe manner from the bady tissues if a diver wishes to avoid decompression sickness as depths and bottom times increase.

Thus, anything that can reduce the amount (partial pressure) of nitrogen presented tathe lungs will result in a lower partial pressure of nitrogen presented to the tissues, and thus a smaller amount of nitrogen will be absorbed by the tissues of the body during a comparable time period. If we can reduce the partial pressure of nitrogen breathed at any given depth, we can thus reduce the amount absorbed, and thus reduce the amount of decompression required for any given exposure at that depth.

We can reduce the concentration of nitrogen in our breathing mixture by two methods. First, we can replace it with another inert gas which has a different solubility than that of nitrogen. The most common inert gas used to replace nitrogen is helium. However, helium-oxygen mixtures involve many problems, the least of which is obtaining the mixture. The easiest way to

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. IS, No.4, p. 17

reduce the partial pressure of nitrogen in our breathing mixtures is to replace it with oxygen, a non-inert gas that is utilized by the human body in normal metabolism. Thus, oxygen is not stored in the tissues as nitrogen is, but is metabolized. This means that increased concentrations of oxygen do not increase the tissue partial pressures of gases, and thus do not contribute to the evolution of gas bubbles during decompression.

This results in several advantages. and one major disadvantage. First, by reducing the partial pressure of nitrogen, we reduce the amount of nitrogen that is absorbe~ at any given depth, and this will decrease the amount of nitrogen that we must remove from the body to be able to safely surface after a decompression dive. Second, by reducing the partial pressure of nitrogen of the gas mixture that is breathed, we will reduce the amount of nitrogen narcosis experienced at any given depth. By replacing some of the nitrogen with oxygen (instead of with other inert gases, such as helium), we do not . have to take into consideration the uptake of other gases that . we are not as familiar with as with nitrogen.

However, by replacing nitrogen with extra amounts of oxygen, we decrease the depth at which oxygen toxicity (of the central-nervous-system type) occurs. Thus, we cannot use nitrogen-oxygen mixtures with increased concentrations of oxygen at the deeper depths at which we are used to diving to when using air or helium-oxygen mixtures. However. there are many cave systems in which the depths are amenable to the use of oxygen enriched breathing mixtures (for example. the cave system at Madison Blue Springs).

The following are some of the common oxygen-nitrogen mixtures, and their maximum depths allowed:

• 60% 02 - 40% N2; maximum depth 55 feet seawater • 40% 02 - 60% N2; maximum depth 99 fsw (this is a great

mixture to use during decompression following extremely deep air of helium-oxygen dives)

·32.5% oxygen - 67.5% nitrogen; maximum depth 129 fsw

If depths greater than 129 fsw are required. then 32% oxygen and 68% helium has a maximum depth of 200 ft. (limit based on oxygen toxicity).

There are some tables for nitrogen-oxygen mixtures, but the standard air tables can be used. To utilize the standard air decompression tables with a nitrogen-oxygen mixture other than air, it is first necessary to calculate the EQUIVALENT AIR DEPTH (EAD). This is the depth at which air will have the same partial pressure of nitrogen as the mixture in question at the depth in question. The EAD is then used instead of the actual depth with the bottom times to enter the standard air decompression tables. Equivalent Air Depth (EAD) can be determined as follows:

EAD (fsw) = [A (0 + 33)/0,79] - 33 Where:

A", percent nitrogen in the gas mixture (expressed as a decimal) B '" deepest depth achieved during the dive (expressed in fsw)

Since partial pressure of oxygen also may be a limiting factor in nitrogen-oxygen dives, it is calculated as follows:

Partial Pressure Oxygen (ATA) = B (0 + 33)/33 Where:

B '" percent oxygen in the gas mixture (expressed as a decimal) D '" deepest depth achieved during dive (expressed as fsw)

An additional advantage of using nitrogen-oxygen mixtures witt".~duced nitrogen concentrations is an enhanced nitrogen removal during decompression due to both a larger difference between bloodltissue partial pressures and lung/alveoli partial pressures. and the "oxygen window" effect, which allows the blood to remove more nitrogen at a given decompression stop due to the removal of the dissolved oxygen from the blood due to metabolism. The decompression tables listed at the end of this paper are for standard air decompression. As you will be

decompressing using Nitrox I. you will have an enhanced nitrogen removal. and tnus a larger safety factor than expected.

Of course, the question arises: How do I mix Nitrox (or any other nitrogen-oxygen mixture)? The easiest way is to have it pre-mixed for you. However. the chances of this occurring are slim in today's legal-conscious world. The easiest way for you to mix your own Nitrox I is to use partial pressures. You must have an accurate tank pressure gauge to use this method, and should use the same gauge for all pressure readings taken during this mixing procedure. You must also measure all your pressures at the same temperature. All mixtures must be analyzed prior to use. To mix your own Nitrox I. you will start with a tank with 100 psi of air in it. Then you will add 420 psi of oxygen to his tank. bringing the total pressure to 520 psi. Allow to cool to room temperature. and add additional oxygen to get the total pressure to 520psi at room temperature .

Now, add compressed air to bring the total pressure to 3000psi. Allow to cool at room temperature, and top up with compressed air to a total pressure of 3000psi. This will yield Nitrox I. However, you must allow the tank to sit for 48 hours to allow the gases to establish a homogeneous state, and must have a sample analyzed for oxygen concentration. to ensure that this mix is 32% oxygen. as calculated. (The tank may be tumbled for 6 hours to assure total mixing. if time is a factor. These are U.S. Navy recommendations for mixing breathing gases.)

If you are filling your tanks to 3600psi. then you will start with 100psi of air in your tanks. add 500psi of oxygen to bring the total pressure up to 600psLAliow to cool to room temperature. and add additional oxygen to bring the total pressure up to 600psi at room temperature. Then. top up to 3600psi with compressed air. Allow to cool. and add additional air to make the final pressure at room temperature 3600psi. Again, the final mixture must be analyzed to ensure that the concentrations of oxygen and nitrogen are correct. Other mixtures of nitrogen and oxygen can be custom mixed to allow a minimal nitrogen uptake for the maximum depth that you plan to dive to. I will be happy to assist anyone in the calculations necessary to do this.

Following this article are some decompression tables for use with Nitrox I (nitrogen 60%/oxygen 32% mixtures). .It is extremely interesting to compare these decompression times with those that would be required for the same depth and bottom times if air was the gas breathed. These Nitrox I tables are taken from the NOAA Diving Manual. I recommend that all divers consult this fine addition to any diving library priorto undertaking any form of mixed-gas diving.

I do not recommend the use of Nitrox I at depths greater than 110 feet. due to the extreme exposure to oxygen partial pressures at this depth or greater that could produce Central Nervous System Oxygen Toxicity. However. there are many cave systems where extended penetration is possible with maximum depth of less than 110 feet. This will permit the use of Nitrox I. and allow the dive using this mixture to take advantage of the decompression savings and increased safety afforded by using Nitrox I.

In conclusion. there are many advantages in the use of nitrogen-oxygen mixtures (other than air) in the field of cave diving. These include:

1. Decreased decompression requirements for the same depth and bottom times.

2. Increased safety due to enhanced nitrogen removal during decompression.

3. Decreased nitrogen narcosis for a given depth. Disadvantages to the use of custom nitrogen-oxygen

mixtures include: 1. Difficulty in obtaining pre-mixed gas. 2. Potential for Central Nervous System Oxygen Toxicity at

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 18

I

I

I

Depth Dottom lime Decompression Stops (Fsw)

the extremes of the depths allowed with the mixtures. 50 40 30 20 10

3. The need for a highly accurate pressure gauge for use 90 ft. 50 10 in the mixing of these gases. 60 17

4. The need to analyze the final mixture prior to use. 70 23

(" The following table compares the no-decompression limits 80 2 31

when brealhing air versus Nitrox I. The gains are small but 90* 7 39 100* 11 46

noticeable, even with these limited bottom limes. However, the 110* 13 53 major advantages occur when we examine the decompression 120* 17 56 tables and compare the times between those require for air, and 130* 19 63 those required for Nitrox I- 140* 26 69

150* 32 77

Oepth Nltrox 1 Air 100 ft. 40 7 1 fsw) No-Decom. Limi ts . No-Oecom. Limi ts 50 18

40 310 60* 25

50 200 100 70* 30

60 100 60 80* 13 40

70 60 50 90* 18 48

80 50 40 100· 21 54

90 40 30 110* 24 61

100 30 25 120* 32 68

t 10 25 20 130* 5 36 74

120 25 15 110 ft. 30 3 130 20 10 t40 15 ·10 40 15

150 10 5 50 2 24 60* 9 28

NOAA Nitrox I (32~ 02/68~ N2) Decompression Tables 70· 17 39 80* 23 48

Decompression stops (fsw) 90* 3 23 57

Depth Bottom Time 50 40 . 30 20 10 100* 7 23 66 110* 10 34 72

50 ft. 210 2 120· 12 41 78

230 7 120 ft. 25 0 250 11 270 15

30 3

300 19 40 15

360 23 50* 2 24

(~ 480 41 60* 9 28

720 69 70* 17 39 80* 23 48

60 ft. 100 0 90* 3 23 57

110 3 100* 7 23 66

120 5 110* 10 34 72

140 10 120* 12 41 78

150 21 130 ft. 20 0 160 29 200 35

25 3

220 40 30 7,

240 47 40* 2 21 50* 8 26

70 ft. 60 0 60· 18 36

70 2 70· 1 23 48

80 7 80· 7 23 57

100 14 90* 12 30 64

120 26 100* 15 37 72

140 39 1110 tt. 15* 160 48 0

180 56 20* 2

200 1 69 25* 6

2/10 2 79 30· 14

360* 20 119 40' 5 25

480* 44 148 50" 15 31

720* 78 187 60· 2 22 45

--~~.~~. 70· 9 23 55

80 ft. 60 8 80· 15 21 63

70 14 90* 19 37 74

80 1U 100· 21 45 flO

90 23 • Oxygen Exceptional 100 33 Exposure

110 2 41 120 1\ 47 These tabtes are pmsonll.ld as an example for the readers 01 this

~[fh 130"- 6 52 article, and are not 10 be used in actual diving, The author 01 this ar

Ul;' 140* B !iii tido assumes no liability as to tho accuracy ollhese tablu!'., and relers

150* 9 61 tho reader to the NOAA manual for tables to use when diving with Nilrox.

160" 13 72' C\:i 1989 by John ema,

170" 19 79 "------

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1989, Vol. 15, No_ 4, p. 19

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JOHN HARPER - A LIVING LEGEND - by Sheck Exley

January 5, 1969. Joe Prosser and I were making our first dive at Florida's fabulous Hornsby Sink. While suiting up we spotted two divers hosing down a hug mastodon skull that they had recovered for the fine museum at Camp Kulaqua. I was impressed.

"Who are they?" I asked the camp ranger. "Frank Martz and John Harper, .. he replied. "Harper?/" I gawked at the slim, unassuming figure who

was the hero of most American cave divers, including myself. I had heard _ of his legendary exploits for years, and had supposed that he looked like Superman. Instead, I met a friendly, modest diver who happily answered all of ourquestions about Hornsby while quietly downplaying his own achievements. I could not have been more impressed if I had met Babe Ruth or the President of the United States.

Since the dawn of time, several hundred billion human beings have lived and died on this planet, experiencing various degrees of success at what they tried to accomplish. A few of them have been very good, perhaps one in a million has been good enough to have been labeled, if only for a fleeting instant, "the best." Rarer still are those who can maintain that pinnacle for a year or longer.

John Harper was arguably the best cave diver in the world for not just a year, but an entire decade. From about 1960 to

at least 1970 John dominated the exploration of underwater caves in Florida, perhaps exceeding even Germany's Jochen Hasenmayer's successes in "the world's most dangerous sport."

John grew up two miles from Lake Apopka near Orlando, Florida. While in high school he free dived in Gourdneck Spring in the southwest cornerofthe lake, attaining a remarkable depth of 60 feet after fighting his way through a narrow opening at 40 feet from which a powerful current issued. Intrigued by what he saw, the slender youth spent his first paycheck after graduation on a new tank ($30) and regulator ($40). Using a flashlight sealed in plastic, John continued his explorations at Gourdneck in the fall of 1958. At that time the world's longest penetration was less than 800 feet (at France's Port Miou and Florida's Wakulla Spring), the deepest depth in a cave was 250 feet (Wakulla), and no traverse had ever been made from one underwater cave entrance to another. John would soon change all of that.

John's first dive partner was Hoyt Roberts, a computer operator at Martin Marietta. With Hoyt, John made his first 100-foot dive at Blue Spring near Orange City, then in 1959 began exploring nearby Rock Springs. In 1960 John explored his first virgin cave, Blue Hole Pond north of Orlando. Soon afterward he saw an article in the paper reporting that Dr. Koehler of the University of Florida had drowned in a cave at Hornsby Sink. He and Hoyt promptly drove to Hornsby and got to dive there with their heroes, Bob Tucker and Ron Howard who had made the first nicad lights while working with John at

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 20

(

Martin Marietta. John fell in love with Hornsby, which at the time was uwaliy clear. "It had undisturbed, alien beauty and a floor littered with bones, including huge mastodon jaws." Nearly two decades and many caves later, Hornsby remains John's favorite underwater cave.

In 1961 John started diving with the Barnacle Busters, an FSDA club in Gainesville which included NSS member Dave Desautels. (John later joined the NSS himself, acquiring #8352, the lowest number of any current Florida Cave Diving Section member.) With Dave and others John dived Zuber Sink, Jugg Spring (where the first American scuba cave dive was made a decade earlier), and newly discovered Eagle's Nest. But John's heart was in Hornsby. Star athletes in high school had ridiculed John because he was too small for football and not coordinated enough for baseball and other team sports. Now, while most of the ex-jocks were dissipating in their sedentary jobs, John became determined to be the best in the world at the most dangerous thing in the world. WI had the right mindset. I was totally dedicated and professional in my approach, so I was totally confident and prepared for each dive. I felt like I could achieve anything."

Exploring upstream from Hornsby Spring with Hoyt Roberts and Larry Hylton in 1962, John became the first man ever to go further 1000 feet in an underwater cave. But later that year tragedy struck when Larry Hylton drowned. John was called on by helpless law-enforcement agencies for the first of many times to recover a body from a cave. Since there was no one else qualified to make many of these recoveries, John could have easily made a fortune charging for his services, but with a remarkable sense of civic duty, John always refused payment.

While Hoyt and others quit diving after Larry's accident, John's dedication to cave diving survived this sad event. His new diving partner was Joe Fuller, one of the owners of Florida Divers Supply in Orlando. They renewed efforts at Hornsby, culminating in a world-record traverse of 2109 feet on Dec. 1962. This was only the world's third underwater traverse, literally c!warfing the earlier two: 450 feet from Manatee Springs t.) Catfish Hotel and 175 feet from Devil's'Eye to Devil's Ear. John and Joe's dive was even more remarkable when you consider their equipment: two primitive lights each and absolutely no buoyancy compensation. The new SPG's from Sportsways were not used because of their reputation for inaccuracy and even exploding off the ends of their hoses.

Joe and Bob Brown SOld their dive shop to a neW diver named Hal Watts in 1963, so Joe and John became professional divers for Pan American Airlines' downrange missile support at Cape Canaveral, a forerunner of today's NASA.

Between dives to recover nose cones, John also worked as an electronic fabricator for the Pershing missile. But they still couldn't wait for the weekends. Two of the most exciting dives during this period were the first penetration through the restriction at Jugg Hole to discover the Third Room, and the discovery of the Big Room in Hernando County's Little Salt Springs, rrobably the most dangerous cave dive in the world at the time.

John was drafted and inducted into the U.S. Army on Jan. 4, 1964. One would have expected the government to use the best diver in the world as some sort of exotic assassin or secret agent in the Special Forces or the Seals. Instead John was designated a supply handler and spent most of his six months in Viet Nam amazing Gl's on leave in Saigon with his ability to hold his breath for four minutes at the bottom of a 26:foot-deep pool.

After being honorably discharged in 1966, John began diving with Hal's new exclusive deep-diving club, the Forty Fathom Scubapros. While occasionally trips were made to the Nest and even Wakulla, Hal's group usually dived at Zuber. On one of these dives, in 1967, Hall assigned a powerfully built

John Harper at Hornsby Sink, 1962.

diver named Randy Hylton to dive with John. Randy was Larry's younger brother, so John had some misgivings about Randy's motivation forthe dive. Everything went well, however, and the two quickly hit it off. "We had the same mentality," John says. "The rest of the Scubapros wanted to Zuber sit--deep dive straight down on old cars--but we were interested in caves."

John and Randy became by far the most successful dive team of the era. Th-ey extended exploration in Hornsby, Eagle's Nest, Peacock, Ponce de Leon Spring and Wakulla. They discovered the Florida Room in Little River, then set a world record with an 1800-foot penetration at Blue Spring near Madison in 1969. In June 1970, they connected Orange Grove Sink to Challenge Sink, then traversed 4693 feet from Orange Grove to Peacock, still another record. In 1971 John and Paul Havins made the first dive through the Cornflakes Restriction at Devil's Eye, then returned with Randy to push that fascinating system. By the end of the year they broke my new 2099-foot penetration record with a 2250 footer in Devil's Eye. Meanwhile, they connected Falmouth Springs to Aquarius Sink and thence to Cathedral Canyon. Occasionally Frank Martz or Jim Lockwood would join in on their projects.

In Feb. 1972, Randy died while solo diving at over 150 feet in the Nest. John's cave-diving activity virtually ceased with the death of his best friend. Maybe he felt no one was good enough to replace him. Perhaps he felt that there were no more worlds to conquer, having been the world's best cave diver for a decade. Or maybe he was just concerned over two recent

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 21

bends hits which had affected his inner ear and his equilibrium. At any rate, he retired from diving to take up bicycle racing, winning numerous races over the next 6 years and winning the Florida championship in the 35-40 age class in 1978 in both racing and time trials. The same year he placed 7th in the national championship.

But cave diving was never far from his mind. In 1979 John returned to help pioneer the scooter era in cave diving, designing several improvements with Jamie Stone and leading upstream pushes with me in Cathedral Canyon. The last exploration at Cathedral, to a penetration of 3440 feet, was the longest penetration in the world at the time at a depth in excess of 150 feet.

Since that time John has retired from 20 years' service as a firefighter in Orlando to buy a beautiful tract of land including Magnolia Sink, which may be connected to nearby Hornsby Sink. John is planning to make the world's first exclusive cave-diving resort camp on his property. With the determination that made John so superior at cave diving and bicycling, it is bound to be an enormous success.

ON THE DARKER SIDE ... This has been a rather bad summer. In additiontothe death

of trained cave diver, Bill McFaden, reported in the last issue of UWS and discussed in "We Lost Our Friend" below, at presstime several other cave drownings had also been reported, although information is still somewhat sketchy on some of the incidents.

1. Veteran dry caver and sump diver Roberta Swicegood drowned Saturday, June 18 at Arch Spring Cave, part of the Tytoona Cave System in Blair County, Pennsylvania. It is believed that she became lost off the line in low or nonexistent visibility while performing a difficult survey of the 2nd sump. She was diving alone on this dive, as safety considerations dictated, due to the technically advanced nature of the dive, poor visibility (likened to diving in 52-degree coffee) and restricted passage. When she failed to reemerge, her survey team member, John Schweyen, alerted the Rescue/Recovery team. At that time it was hoped that she might sti\l be alive somewhere in a dry portion of the cave, and sump rescue divers were called in, from all over the northeast and as far as Florida. Although Swicegood's body was quickly found approximately 700 ft. into the sump in 70 feet of water, it took recovery divers until Wednesday to successfully complete the recovery, due to the tight restrictions and bad visibility.

A participant in numerous technically advanced sump survey expeditions, lecturer at several cave--diving workshops, the moving force behind the Sump Diving Project, and editor of the proposed Sump Diving Handbook, Swicegood was a trained cave diver and an extremely accomplished cave explorer and sump diver. It is believed that she stringently observed all accepted safety practices for sump diving on the dive, and that-unlike most of our "open-water-type cave drownings"-her death was genuinely an unpredictable accident, the tragic penalty so often paid by those on the very cutting edge of Exploration. [The Editor sees only two differences between this and the celebrated Challenger Shuttle disaster: 1) unlike the handsomely paid astronauts, Roberta had to finance her own expedition, and 2) the State won't be coming out with a license plate to commemorate her death. In all otheH.espects she is just as much a heroine.] The first of many memorial tributes appears below.

2. James Coke reported on the June 9 body recovery of a non-cavern/cave-certified diver in Chacalal Cave in Mexico, the same site of the May 3, 1987 double fatality. In fact, the divers had gone into the cave "to find all of the SCUBA gear that was left from the accident of May 3, 1987: although they did not go into the same section of the cave. The divers did not have

cavern or cave training, had only one light apiece, were both using twin tanks yoked together with only a single outlet, and did not follow the proper air rules. The divers attempted to use a crude spool of nylon line in a very bizarre and unorthodox fashion, with the 2nd diver carrying the spool, and the lead diver hooking the middle of the line over his shoulder and pulling it along as he swam (I). The 2nd diver evidently panicked, pulled (or cut?) the line off the lead diver's shoulder, and exited. The lead diver was now lost, silted out, and subsequently ran out of air, panicking as he died ("fingers appeared to have clawed at rock").

Jim reports that he was notified at 5:30pm by an open- water instructor in the Kapulum Dive Shop that a diver with twin tanks was missing at Chacalal Cave. According to his official body-recovery report, at that point, witnesses felt that the victim was lost, with only a single weak light. but that he still had air. The rescue divers entered the water at 6:00pm looking for a rescue situation, but at 6:05 found a body instead, 200 ft. from the cave entrance. The recovery was performed by James Coke and Mike Madden, with Ernesto Sainz coordinating things topside, and Richard Ribb serving as a support diver. The next day the dead diver'S equipment was recovered and all lines installed in the cave since the May 1987 accident removed. The cave and lagoon are now closed to all divers.

3. A dead diver was discovered in Little River Springs, Suwannee County, Florida, on the morning of Tuesday, July 5, by two cave divers. So far, the only information the Editor has received is that he was not cavern or cave trained, and had accumulated a grand total of only 40 diVes between 1969 and 1988.

4. A textbook double drowning occurred at Madison Blue Springs, Madison County, Florida, on Saturday, June 11. A team of four open-water divers, comprising three Navy personnel (although not Navy Divers) and the teenage son of one of them, entered the cavern with standard open-water equipment, no line, insufficient lights, no Third's Rule air planning, no cavern/cave training, etc. When they were dangerously Iowan air, the teenage boy and one man (presumably his father), exited the cave. The other two evidently followed a jump line laid by cave divers back to the permanent line, ran out of air and drowned. The (presumed) father and son recovered the body of the first dead diver. The second body was recovered by the cave divers, who, upon completing their dive, came across a tank lying across their line. As the cave divers had had no prior arrangement to share the gap line with other cave divers nor was there a line clip, both of which are required by cave etiquette ",hen using someone else's gap line, and the tank was not properly rigged for staging, the cave divers began to look around and quickly located adead body up near the cave ceiling.

WE LOST OUR FRIEND - by Steve Gerrard

[Reprinted from NACO News, Vol. 20, No.3, May-June 1988.]

Sadly, most of you who read this never had the opportunity to meet Bill McFaden of Tallahassee, Florida. He drowned Sunday afternoon, May 15, 1988 at Little Dismal Cave System in Leon County, located in the Apalachicola National Forest. Certified full cave through the NACO and NSS-CDS, Bill's enthusiasm and love for cave diving was a growing desire ever since he made a cave dive, the traverse from Peacock to Pothole, during the early 1970's. Whenever one would bring up cave diving or caves in general his eyes would "light up" and a broad smile emerged, expressing his dedication and lust. A career-licensed land surveyor, Bill's ultimate talent not only existed with his hard, sincere work, but his great artistic ability to transfer a cave's mental picture into an accurate, story-telling

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p_ 22

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map. Member of the National Association for Cave Diving and the

National Speleological Society Cave Diving Section, Bill was Chairman of the NACO's Exploration and Survey Committee, and past President of. the Florida State University Cave Club, and provided extensive exploration and surveying of the Climax Cave System located near Cairo, Georgia. Bill also served as #1 support diver for the Sullivan Sink Connection project and was always there to help despite nasty, cold and rainy weather. He produced a Type 2 unpublished map of the connection and had just begun the survey work for the hole in the Wall Cave System in Jackson County. In Dec. 1987 he published his first underwater cave map of McBride's Slough Cave System that has brought raves from throughout the cave-diving community and beyond. Raised in Bainbridge, Georgia, Bill lived in Tallahassee for several years. 32 years old, divorced with no children, his life evolved around caves.

What happened? The last survey dive for the Little Dismal Cave System map, this dive collected the survey data for both the last bit of the upstream and downstream tunnels of what is called the 6th room, which is part of the deep section. Three different dives took place with Parker Turner and Shirley Bailey collecting rock samples for the Dept. of Natural Resources in the 1st room, Bill Gavin motoring ahead to the downstream tunnel to survey the last remaining line, while Bill McFaden and Bill Main swam to the upstream tunnel to finish that last portion.

Low in places and very silty, Bill Main led, laying new knotted survey line, while Bill McFaden took asmith readings with his compass and survey slate along with sketching. At one point the line got caught in McFaden's battery pack and Main swam back to help undo it. Shortly after that, the line got slightly entangled in McFaden's safety reel but was quickly fixed. Swimming a little bit further ahead, Main turned around and waited as McFaden surveyed and swam slowly toward Main. In certain parts of the tunnel the visibility got bad, which could not be helped since it was very low at several points. The depth was close to 220 feet.

You are probablY asking: Isn't that too deep for cave diving? No denial of the fact that depth is NOT good and that is why both Gavin and Main were asked to help with the survey project-because of their tremendous experience with deeper dives. McFaden, obviously less experienced, had done many, many deeper dives prior to this one.

In clear water, as McFaden got closer to Main, Main called the dive and gave the "thumbs up" twice. Everything going smoothly, both divers turned around to extt the tunnel. with Main leading. At several spots the visibility was zero and holding the line was necessary. Several times Main turned around to check on McFaden, who was following close behind. Finally, Main swam into clear water and was now in the 6th room and turned around for McFaden to swim through as done before. As moments went by, Main became concerned and was about to swim back into the low visibility to check on McFaden, but suddenly noticed Bill Gavin's light as he had just finished his dive surveying the downstream tunnel and was about to head for the 5th room. Main swam over to Gavin and communicated that McFaden was still in the upstream tunnel.

Gavin quickly swam over to the upstream tunnel with Main behind. Going into the zero visibility, Gavin followed the line and soon popped into the clearer water and found McFaden, who was apparently off the line but otherwise appeared fine. Both divers swam back through the bad visibility and into the 6th room where Main was waiting. Everything was OK. As all three divers headed toward the "Well," which is the bottom of the 5th room, Gavin quickly hooked up to his deep-modified DPV to begin the exit. Time was important not only because of the bottom time and decompression. but because valuable air was used during the delay to find McFaden. It was at this point that McFaden flashed Gavin and communicated he was out of

rur:. Instinctively, Gavin gave McFaden his long hose and they

began to share air. Gavin began to motor up the Well and started to vent his drysuit. Noticing that he was still rising. Gavin dumped more air but to no avail as McFaden was hanging onto Gavin's manifold and obviously had lot control of his drysuit and was very stressed. Finally, the two had stopped rising but were now in the bell ceiling of the 5th room at a depth of 100 feet. They had risen 80 feet in distance rather fast. At this same time, Main had swum over and grabbed McFaden's legs in order to help control his buoyancy. Gavin tried very hard to get McFaden to switch to Main's air but was unable to as McFaden would not release the manifold.

Now down to 1000 psig, Gavin realized they better start getting out. (It should be noted that for one person that is plenty of air to exit from the 5th room as the distance is less than 700 feet.) Cranking up the DPV, Gavin powered his way down from the bell ceiling of the 5th room with McFaden hanging on and Main trying to keep his legs down and reduce drag. Going through the 4th room, the shortcut and into the 2nd room, everything was in control, but McFaden was breathing hard and Gavin realized that this was going to be close. If only McFaden would gain control of his buoyancy and/or switch to Main's air.

A medical examination later revealed that McFaden had suffered an embolism in the brain! Was he hurt and unable to help himself? Did the stress cause him to hold his breath during the rapid ascent? Going through the duckunder from the 2nd room into the 1 st, again there was a sudden rise to the ceiling from 100 to 60 feet as McFaden still could NOT control his drysuit. Bill Main thought about knifing McFaden's drysuit but decided the sudden, cold water would startle McFaden and made things worse.

Reaching the balcony and entering the low bedding plane before the restriction area to exit the cave system, Gavin's regulator started breathing harder and harder. Gavin's thoughts were racing but still in control, thinking how ironic it was to be so close to getting out but still end up drowned. With his lungs burning, Gavin looked over at Bill Main and saw that he had only one regulator. Obviously, McFaden was now using Main's long hose and you had two people out of air within the three-diver team, and still a major restriction to negotiate.

Main realized that Gavin was hurting badly and quickly gave him his regulator. Taking three breaths, Gavin was numbed by the lack of air, stressed, and badly coherent. Suddenly, Gavin felt McFaden let go of him and it was as if someone had released a hammerlock. It was now quite clear that McFaden was unconscious and gone, and what seemed utter chaos was the task of getting their wit back together. Though breathing, Gavin was still convinced that he would not make it out alive. Main began pulling Gavin out through the restriction with minutes feelings like hours. Now outside the restriction, the two divers reached their decompression and 02 bottles, and began the very long decompression and to review the mental horror that had just taken place.

Retrospect and the Future: It's easy to look at this dive with hindsight and ask many "what if" questions. Bill McFaden had logged close to 40 dives in Little Dismal alone, with 15 of them at deeper depths. Plus, many dives at Cheryl Sink and Sullivan Sink all proved that Bill was a capable diver. Most people will say, "too much too soon." No argument there! A very small minority would perhaps harshly criticize this dive, but then, weakness of the emotional mind will dictate that flaw.

For the vast majority of cave divers whose understanding and comprehension of exploration, documentation and what cave diving is about for many, the grasp of this accident and what we can learn from it for the future is fully understood. No one is hurting more than Bill Gain and Bill Main, as not only an excellent diver had died, but a very good friend and person. We ALL lost a friend.

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No.4, p. 23

Is cave diving at Little Dismal or Sullivan Sink jeopardized? Apparently not. This was NO sneak commando dive as all divers involved had written permission to dive Little Dismal and gain access with a key to the property. A spokesperson for the U.S. Forest Service clearly understands the significance of the work, the goals, and the many puzzling questions that need to be answered about the Woodville Karst Plain and the vast hydrology that exists in Leon and Wakulla counties. It has been almost 8 years since the last trained cave diver drowned and it is roughly calculated that nearly 200,000 safe dives have been performed among the 2000+ active divers during that period of time. That is one hell of a safety record that the entire cave­diving community can be very proud of. We all understand the risk and realize accidents will occur.

The Dept. of Natural Resources clearly understands the importance of this project as with many others, and fully supports the hard work and dedication required, and the information provided. A letter from the Florida Geological survey is printed in this issue of NACO News [Vol. 20, No.3] to support the facts.

Will any lawsuits occur? Hopefully not. Bill's parents and sisters realized his love for cave diving and caves though, perhaps it will be difficult to understand.

It may take time, but future dives will probably take place and procedures and organization will be reevaluated and a new approach installed. There is too much to be learned and discovered in the depths beneath this tremendous and exciting karst area. Bill McFaden would loathe to see his death terminate or handicap all work and effort already gone into these explorations and documentations, much less the incredible future that lies ahead. Bill would want US to carry on and march forward as cave diving makes important contributions for science and research~ Gosh, we will sure miss Bill. The future has just begun!

ROBERTA HEATHER SWICEGOOD (July 31, 1951 - June 18, 1988)

- by Mary Garvin Roberta was that rare combination of powerful intellect and

physical prowess--curiosity coupled with capability. She was a scholar and a serious linguist with a Master's

degree in comparative literature, who made her living in the high-tech world of computers. She was also an outdoors woman who could fix her own car, maintain an elaborate garden, cook a gourmet meal, and haul 100's through knee-deep mud.

I met this gifted women at the CDS '85-86 Winter Workshop. She and Woody Jasper were teaching an impromptu class on how to find wet caves. I was impressed by her extensive knowledge of karst hydrology and geology, and her concise, yet gentlemanner. She and Woody worked well as a team, making the karst terminology interesting and easy to understand.

The next time I saw her was at the CDS 'S7 Spring . Workshop. Nancy Ballester and Terri Skiles, North Florida cave

divers, combed the crowd looking for someone I could dive with, and reintroduced me to Roberta. Nancy said to me recently she remembered Roberta's "determination, drive and boundless energy for cave diving," a description I have heard over and over from many of her friends.

I was thrilled to meet another single woman cave diver from the North. She had more experience than I had and was willing to share it. She was generous with her knowledge and patient with my lack of it. She analyzed my gear and my trim. I remember telling her I was having trouble trying to duplicate some of the gear configurations I had seen on more experienced male divers. Roberta explained in a matter-of-fact way: ·Women's bodies tend to be different.· She went on to

recommend changes based on that difference and on the types of cave systems in which I was interested. (She even insisted on calling a distributor she knew to assure that I got special treatment. )

Once I managed to drop my double 80s, and a small leak developed in the manifold during the dive. Roberta saw it right away and stayed within 20 feet of me. Afterward she apologized for not being closer. I was touched by how conscientious she was as a dive buddy and how easy it was to discuss the dive with her. That afternoon she insisted on tearing down my doubles for me and showed me some new tricks for fitting them together. We talked, dove, smoked cigarettes and reconfigured my gear well into that evening. Our last dive didn't start until the middle of that night at Madison Blue. The idea of beginning at that hour struck me as so outrageous that I woke up some sleepy diver to photograph us giggling in full gear as I pointed to my watch to document the event. Roberta, who was known for her inexhaustible energy, considered the whole thing just another ·shakedown" dive.

After my first few outings with her I returned to New York even more excited about cave diving. Over the next year, Roberta became an advisor, a confidante, and a friend. I came to respect her strength, her compassion and her humor. I felt empowered by her. As her mother, Mary, told me, "You had to succeed .. .for her sake, because she believed in you." I was only one of many people she believed in and guided through wet and dry caves over the years. Terri Skiles recalled a time in Puerto Rico when Roberta led her through a "technical waterfall cave. I didn't really have the experience to do that sort of thing, but Roberta's ability gave me confidence, and it was one of the most memorable experiences I will ever have .... Roberta was quite a person: she had an infectious love of caving."

Last summer, Roberta and I did some practice diving in a quarry in Virginia. Quite a few people there knew her, and as I listened to her catching up with some of her fellow explorers I realized Roberta had friends everyWhere.

Later that day we sat on the grass watching her good friend Tom Davis practice some vertical techniques-techniques she had taught him. While he clambered up and down the practice tree. we talked about our conception of the basic food groups­nicotine, chocolate, grease and alcohol.

In January Roberta took me on a guided tour to TeHord Spring io Florida. She went over basic cave formations, drew a map of the system in the dirt and pointed out where the formations would show up. The dive was like a three-dimensional text book. I have never learned as much about karst formations as I did that afternoon.

Roberta always juggled several major cave projects at once. One she was working on with Tom Morris, a biologist and cave explorer, she called the "Suwanneecoochee Study." It involved dye tracing, diving, and surface geological work in and around the caves of the Withlacoochee River and Suwannee River junction. Roberta wrote me once that,

"This kind of diving [exploring new caves and doing scientific work] tends to move the diver beyond the moment and beyond the simple fact of the dive. In fact, the dive itself is frequently only a vehicle for obtaining information. A spectacular dive that fails to bring back survey-or water samples-or biOlogical observations--becomes a failed dive. "

Tom remembered how much he learned from Roberta about dye tracing and other techniques to sort out the hydrology of the area. Roberta's mother told me her daughter often remarked on how much Tom helped her refine her diving techniques. Tom. echoing the sentiments of other colleagues, recalled her drive and enthusiasm. "It won't go as fast now that she's not around."

Most of Roberta's cave-diving projects were sump-diving projects. She said it best in a resume put together for a

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15. No.4, p. 24

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presentation in New York. "I was a cave explorer long before I was a diver, and I

obtained diving training with the express intent of becoming a sump diver, that is, to dive the flooded sections of passage within 'dry' caves (caves that contain an air space, which may be three inches!). The advice I got from experts was: become a good diver before you even begin considering cave diving, let alone sump diving. That made sense, so I marked time doing open-water diving in quarries (good training in terms of both visibility and temperature!), getting specialty certifications, and doing some diving in the Caribbean. "

Roberta completed her cave-diving training in North Florida. She was recognized as a competent and safe cave diver. But for Roberta, learning did not end with her certification; she was self-critical and continually reevaluated her sump diving techniques-as it was sump diving that could take her to new dry passage.

Some of her sump-diving projects this year included systems in West Virginia, Central Kentucky and Pennsylvania where she was trying to connect Arch Spring and Tytoona Cave. Kentucky diving, she wrote, "mostly resembles diving in refrigerated chocolate milk." She spent most of her weekends this year working on sump-diving projects with her friends and fellow explorers, John Schweyen and Jim Brown, who have been pushing sumps in the northeastern region nearly every weekend for the last three years. They are among a handful of active sump divers in this part of the country.

Roberta also worked on a project in the Rio Encantado Cave System in Puerto Rico, connecting the Juan Nieves, Rio Encantado and Escalera Caves into the Rio Encantado Cave System:-~resulting in the longest surveyed underground river in the world. ("A hokey world record, but a world record," she observed.) Six sumps had to be passed to achieve the connection. Kevin Downy was on three trips to Puerto Rico with Roberta. Kevin remembered that Roberta kept everyone up to date on where the surveys were heading. It was no small job, as the explorers were producing outrageous amounts of data. "She wouldn't sleep until she had reduced the data. You could drag in, hand her the data, and though she was also exhausted, she would start to work on it. You'd wake up to find her asleep with a finished line plot nearby."

Roberta also did. double duty handling the expedition's public relations with the remote village that served as their base camp. She was talked into kicking off a slide show by rappelling down the front of the town hall while hundreds of villagers watched. It proved so popular that she agreed to an encore the next year. But in a variation typical of her sense of humor, Roberta coated her boots with mUd, "leaving a distinct set of footprints on the front of the building," Kevin said.

Roberta was also the programcoordinator of the CDS Sump Diving Project and was working on a sump-diving handbook with John Schweyen, whom she described as "probably the most active sump diver in the U.S." Roberta spent a lot of time analyzing sump-diving techniques, exchanging information with British sump divers and rehearsing problem situations in controlled environments. Roberta's approach to sump diving was an open-minded one: "differences in conditions beget differences in 'the rules,'" she once wrote. She believed a proficient sump diver is able to adapt gear and technique to suit each sump.

Pete Butt, a North Florida cave instructor and water-resource technician, worked with Roberta on a sump survey. He was also impressed with her competence and crystallized an impression I heard from others when he talked about being "overwhelmed by her total gentleness [and) her total modesty."

Ron Simmons, a dry caver, sump diver and photographer, caved with Roberta for over six years. He made equipment for her and dove with her on many of her sump projects. He told

me Roberta was "a hard-core caver, a good solid caver, someone you could depend on ... a real go-getter. She would set her mind on things, then she'd really do it. Cavers were her family." Roberta's mother agreed, "The caving community and cave divers were her extended family."

I knew Roberta had a lot of friends, but I didn't realize how many until I started to write this. When I called one friend I would inevitably be given a handful of other names. I never got to them. all, but I am sure that other people will take the time to write down their memories and fill in the gaps.

Maybe I can still add a little bit, however. Roberta once recommended I read A Country Year - Living the Questions, by Sue Hubble. I happened to find that book the afternoon she died, and the Rainer Rilke quote that opens it reminds me of the way she lived. It goes:

• ... Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves.... Do not ... seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now.

"Perhaps you wiIL.gradually, without noticing it; live along some distant day into the answer."

A memorial scholarship fund has been set up for Roberta at the Smithsonian where she was initially a student and for the last six years, a teacher and tour leader. To donate to the fund send a check made ouUo the Smithsonian Institute, indicating on the check that it's for the RHS fund, to: Roberta Swicegood Memorial Fund, The Smithsonian Institute, c/o Dr. Daniel Appleman, Department of Mineral Sciences, Natural History Building 119, Washington, DC 20560

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR June 3,1988

Dear Editor: On May 28th, my dive partner, Steve Mann, and I attended

the Spring Workshop in Branford. I had the opportunity to sit in on the classes given by Mark Leonard and Lamar Hires. I have to admit that Idid learn more about cave diving than I had known up to that time. I was Basic Cave trained by Mark back in Oct. 1987, so I already had a very high respect for his ability as a cave diver and cave-diving instructor.

Anyway, to go on with the story, Steve and I decided to leave the Workshop about 12:30 pm and drive to Peacock Springs for a couple of good cave dives. It was quite crowded with cave divers, open-water divers, and non-divers-all having a good time.

Upon completing our dives at Peacock, we drove to Orange Grove Sink nearby just to see what was going on. We were tired ourselves and opted not to dive Orange Grove. No one was there.

I learned from Steve that he had dived Orange Grove with two other divers a couple of weekends earlier. They had witnessed an unusual incident with three other "diversM (for lack of a better word) while descending into the sink.

According to Steve, one "diver" was rapidly ascending with a pony bottle in one hand and the regulator out of his mouth. Two other "divers" were ascending behind the first "diver" with one scuba tank between them .and each breathing from two regulators attached to the single tank. None of these "divers" was wearing any scuba equipment, other than masks and fins!

Steve and his friends surfaced to find out what had occurred and if everyone was all right. The "diver· with the pony bottle was coughing, but they soon· confirmed that he had not embolized--fortunately.

It was learned that the one "diver" with the pony bottle had run out of air while below and had made a mad dash to the surface. One of the other two "divers" sharing the scuba tank had attempted to grab the quickly ascending "diver" by the leg,

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY. July/August, 1988. Vol. 15. No.4. p. 25

but missed. He indicated to his two "buddiesw that he was glad they had not stopped him, due to him being out of air.

Steve and his friends attempted to discuss with these wdiversw the dangers of diving Orange Grove without being properly equipped or trained. These so-called wdivers" responded by threatening bodily harm to Steve and his friends. They did not pursue it at this point.

Fortunately, this incident did not result in a triple fatality at Orange Grove. With the recent fatality at Orange Grove and the double fatality at Peacock, who knows what effect three more fatalities would have had on the Peacock system.

The statement that ·Caves do not kill divers. Divers kill divers" is very, very true.

Because of persons like these three "divers, W cave fatalities will continue to occur to the untrained diver. Each fatality will bring more negative public outcry towards the cave-diving community.

As trained cave divers, it is our responsibility to rontinue to discourage the untrained diver from entering a cave, and to hope that the untrained diver will respect us as trained cave divers, and to respond by not venturing into an underwater cave without proper training and proper equipment.

The closing of the Peacock system and nearby systems because of continued fatalities would be a blow to the cave-diving community.

Frank R. Lavalle, Brandon, Florida

April 29, 1988 Dear Editor,

As cave divers, we advocate the use of a "long hose" for our back-up or secondary regulator. The move was to the 5-foot hose, then to the 7-foot hose, with scooter divers going to 9-foot hoses and longer.

At the same time, as we dive deeper and work harder, we insist on regulators that perform better and better, and incorporate those high-performance regulators into our standard equipment configuration.

There is no question that the USe of a long hose can be a life saver when you need to exit through a major restriction after a total air failure.

However, I wonder how many cave divers (especially those who advocate that you use your long-hose regulator as your primary) realize that these longer hoses can and do degrade the performance of our favorite Whigh-performancew regulators.

The way that gas flows through a hose can be described by the use of Poiseuille's Law: FLOW is indirectly proportional to the RADIUS to the 4th power multiplied by the DRIVING PRESSURE divided by the LENGTH. FLOW «R"t,APIl, where R = radius, delta P = driving pressure, and L = length.

This means that as we increase the length of our octopus hose, we decrease flow through that hose at the same driving pressure (first-state intermediate pressure). If we double the length of our hose (standard length is 28"), then we decrease the maximum flow through that hose by 2. If we triple the length of our octopus hose, we will decrease the max flow by 3.

What does this mean to us as cave divers? When we dive at depth, or work vigorously, we place high demands on our regulators. If the regulator cannot deliver the volume of air that we need, then we are in trouble. This will allow carbon dioxide to build up, which can increase our sensitivity to nitrogen narcosis, and lead to a vicious cycle of increasing respiratory demands on a regulator that cannot deliver. So we breathe harder and faster, and things continue to get worse. If the carbon dioxide levels get too high, this can act as a general anesthetic leading to unconsciousness (possible cause of Deep Water Blackout).

Using high-performance regulators and normal length hoses, this can be minimized. However, what would happen if we needed to go onto our backup regulator with its handy 7 -foot

hose? In effect, we have switched to one of the many low-performance regulators on the market, and if the situation had led to a condition where one needs plenty of air in a hurry, IT CANNOT DELIVER!!!!

What can we do to rectify this problem? If we will refer back to our original relationship, we see that flow is directly proportional to the radius of the hose (to the 4th power). The standard octopus hose has an inside diameter of 0.25". If we could increase the inside diameter by as little as 25%, we can increase the maximum flow by a factor of almost 2.5. This almost makes up for the drop in flow that develops when we go from· a 28' hose to an 84' hose (flow drops by a factor of 3).

A 25% increase in inside diameter would result in a hose with an inside diameter of 5/16·. Such a hose is available, and is available in a hose that has been certified for USe in breathing systems.

So, if you dive deep, or work hard while diving, should your back-up regulator be able to meet your breathing demands? CAN YOURS???

John T. Crea. (© 1988 by John T_ Crea III)

NEW INSTRUCTORS CERTIFIED Patton E. Watson, Marc W. Eyring, and Charles R. Bohrer

successfully completed the NSS Cave Diving Section's Cavern Instructor Institute held July 15-17, 1988 at Branford, Florida and are now fully certified NSS-CDS Cavern Instructors. Congratulations, gentlemen!

COMPUTER SUBMISSIONS FOR UWS The Editor is gratefully accepting newsletter submissions on

computer diskette. Our format at the present time is IBM XT, using 5-1/4" floppies containing 360K. The preference is for text in WordStar 3.3 or lower, or standard ASCII. Please send along a paper printout of your text.

50 tell me about this new sirlfriend of yours.

WHEN SHOULD A CAVE DIVER RETIRE? - by Milledge Murphey, Ph.D.

June 19, 1988 was an historic date for many reasons, not the least of which was the announcement by William H. Main (following his leadership of the world-rerord-setting, nationally televised Sullivan Project) of his retirement from active subaquatic speleological exploration. While this is difficult to believe in light of the retirement of such notables as Sugar Ray Leonard and other athletic luminaries, Bill may well have officially resigned his national leadership role in advanced exploration of sUbaquaticcaves. However, there are many who believe Bill may occasionally rome out of retirement on a permanent basis in order to check out a promising lead in some

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as yet undiscovered cave system. Perhaps the "retirement" or cessation of active participation

in advanced cave-diving exploration is a question which should be asked and considered carefully by cave divers. It is probable that no cave diver plans to simply quit, rather, most probably plan to merely gradually lessen the nature and extent of cave dives as they experience the inevitable decrements of age. In Main's case, he has recently obtained the end of the line in Manatee Springs (North American distance record) and as of June 19, 1988, is the co-holder of the world's longest and deepest traverse. Further, Main and the other divers on the Sullivan Project (Lamar English, Bill Gavin, and Parker Turner) were recognized by the State of Florida Department of Commerce Merit Award, the National Association for Cave Diving (NACO) Wakulla Award, and the NACO Special Exploration Achievement Award. Thus Bill Main is at this moment at the very apex of a stellar cave-diving exploration experience. His career has included accomplishments too numerous to list here, and throughout his entire cave-diving experience he has remained a friendly, helpful, approachable man who has maintained a low profile with a consistent display of non-self-centered competence. Further, Main has developed and maintained the cleanest and most advanced equipment-maintenance and development program of any cave diver. Finally, he embodies the essence of what a cave diver should look like when geared up. All divers would do well to emulate Main's equipment constellation. Should he retire at this point he can do so without apology.

When someone has his name immortalized via an organization being named in his honor, he may well consider retirement. In Main's case this has happened as he is the Patriarch honored by the formation of the Order of Hogarth Cave Diving Society. This group presently consists of a group of cave divers interested in the perpetuation of the Main legend via affiliation.

Is it age, experience, the combination thereof, world records, receipt of awards, or other element(s) which lead one to retire? To date, no one knows exactly; however, considerable speculation is possible. Among the more frequently heard speculations are those concerned with age producing a wisdom which precludes cave diving. This is

(L to R) Bill Gavin, Park~r Turner, Bill Main, and Lamar English following their world-record Sullivan Project dive, -June 19, 1988. Photo by Milledge Murphey.

almost certainly a valid reason why some persons choose (0 n~) longer cave dive; however, Joe Dabbs, Rob Millott, Hemv Nicholson, the author, and numerous other mature persons sti'" do cave dive (some are instructors). Beyond the fact that age may produce wisdom (via experience acquisition) which enables one to choose tocontinueto cave dive orto quit, it (age) is accompanied by. physical decrements which affect cave-diving performance and are sometimes exacerbated by cave diving. Rather than list these decrements herein I will refer interested readers to an article I wrote for Undercurrent a year or two ago, which does detail this area. Suffice to say, short-term memory, hearing, bone weight, and many other factors are impacted; HOWEVER, the decrements of age do add an additional positive dimension to cave diving-one must (if one continues to cave dive sLiccessfully) accomplish more diving skill(s) with less physical capability. Having less physical resilience in the demanding subaquatic speleological environment might seem to some a foolhardy undertaking; however, consider the increase in challenge produced when one experiences age-related losses (i.e" for example, presbyopia-inability to focus the eye on near objects due to accommodation loss in shape and elasticity of the cornea). Such changes make cave diving different than it was when one was younger, but not necessarily more hazardous or less enjoyable. Rather, they may present a greater challenge and thus increased enjoyment from cave diving, Consider a low-visibility scenario wherein the mature cave diver is near air minimum but due to presbyopic changes. cannot read the pressure gauge, A problem obviously worth considering prior to cave diving in the presence of visual inacuity resulting from the changes imposed due to normal aging,

Another common yet less-discussed idea postulated in the effort to explain retirement is that with age comes an enhanced level of prudence which results in the mature cave diver reaching an age-induced realization that subjecting the body to the vigors and absolute hazard of the underwater-cave environment is simply not worth the risk. This reason is without question one which impacts'persons whose personalitytype(s) were not originally precisely aligned with the sport. For instance, the husband or wife, friend or acquaintance of a "hard-core" cave diver who enters the sport not for personal

goals or reasons, but rather to insure that more time is spent with the cave-diving aficionado, Such persons often retire following a close call or a first bends hit. This in the author's view is a totally acceptable, and in fact may be a wise, "reason to quit." Answering the question, "Why do I cave dive?" could solve an unpleasant dilemma for many who are uncomfortable or afraid while cave diving, If one can't answer, "Because I enjoy it," he might consider retirement as a viable option.

Another reason for cessation of cave diving with age is often related by the person who is retiring as being ''that once one has repeatedly dived all of the dwindling available cave- diving sites there is nothing left to see,· and such persons may simply change hobbies, Accompanying this line of thought is that

'j~ ~~~-;:'~~~ip%Oerz ~~ite~:o~:!~

UNDERWATER SPELEOLOGY, July/August, 1988, Vol. 15, No_ 4, p. 27

frequently to be an economically reasonable investment. Having "dived them aH," one 'might be tempted to sell it, buy a kayak or ultralight, and pursue another form of high-hazard recreation. On reflection, this seems an entirely reasonable behavioral choice, i.e., to continue to pursue a personality-gratifying need to experience controlled risk, yet remove oneself from the most alien terrestrial environment known (outer space being equally hazardous),

Finally, while there are numerous other potential andlor real reasons for retirement, including legal liability (for instructors), simple loss of interest, injury, increase in family responsibility, job demands on time, religious conversion, and many others, some persons· who have been at one time or another world-record holders or otherwise notables in', cave diving, finally overcome the ego drive to be the best and willingly give the reiOS" to the younger generation of underwater cave explorers. Diminution of the ego drive may (and many times is) accompanied by the knowledge that the depths and distances imposed by record or virgin cave-diving experiences today may include' risks beyond those which it is prudent to take given the losses imposed by age. Multiple decompression-sickness experiences, the sheer work involved in setting up a "big dive," and numerous other considerations may result in this reality-based decision to "cut back" or "give it up" entirely.

To end where I began, I must say in all candor that I'm looking forward to my next dive with the "retired" Bill Main. As he "winds down" to participation in "grins dives," perhaps even an old guy like me will be able to enjoy his company more frequently,

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NSS Cave Diving Section P.O, Box 950 Branford, FL 320C'S-':::S::S':'

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HAND:SIGNALS FOR ,"

CAVE DIVING n (~

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(Poinled (II side of --' (~J (landowner 01

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New "HAND StGNALS T-SHIRT' now available. Navy blue printing on gray, men's MEDIUM to EXTRA LARGE. To order, send a check or money order for $9,50 per shirt to NSS Cave Diving Section, P.O. Box 950, Branford, FL 32008-0950.

Bulk Rate U.S. Postage PAID Permit No_ 849

·Miami,FL

LEE ANN HIRES 27993 <5/89) p.o. BOX 3308 LAKE CITY, FL 32056 *'

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