Category — Cave survey

Just before I went on vacation I taught a cave course with Mark from England who had recently moved to Playa del Carmen in his armoured car and Meril a French pilot extraordinaire. In the last days we also had the pleasure to be joined by Anneleen who had done her training a couple of months earlier and now came in to practice a little.

The first days we had Etienne with us who is assisting towards becoming a Cavern Instructor and Mauro who did his last assistance before his Intro to Cave Instructor evaluation which he passed later with flying colours…Congratulations again.

As always we started of with a bunch of training in the open water to get used to the equipment, the configuration and the local environment. Once they felt comfortable it was time to start with the cave related training which meant a bunch of zero visibility exercises first on land and then underwater to prepare them as good as possible for running through those exercises later in the cave.

Both of them did great and it was amazing to see their progress from day to day. It really always impresses me how steep the learning curve is in the first couple of days. I think the key to success is to introduce new skills and new information always step by step and let the student master the one before moving on to the next. I compare cave diving to a juggling act while riding a mono cycle. The main idea is first to learn how to juggle lets say two balls, then three, then more. After that learn how to drive a mono bicycle and then combine the two. Some people maybe will need first to learn how to juggle on a normal bike as a step in between and so forth.

In any case we had great fun and always a good spirit even if the days were long and the weather horrible.

At the end we did some really great dives and even as a team of three they rocked through multiple out of gas scenarios combined with zero visibility, restrictions and anything else a cave dive could possibly through at you!

After that I took some time off first to go exploring down in Tulum with Kim and after that was off to Austria to meet my baby nephew Lorenz for the first time. I spent three wonderful weeks with my family far away from the jungle and dark water filled holes. Of course being a true cave diving addict I had to at least spent an hour a day on you tube checking out some cave diving videos =)

Back in Mexico I started right off with Ivan who did his technical cave diver training with me some time back and this time came down for some multi staging and a basic DPV course. Since my schedule is still not that busy he decided also to always take some time off in between which worked great for me as it gives me the time to go down to Tulum and explore some more.

Since some time now I really have the great pleasure to be in a project with Kim a cave diving Instructor who lives down in Tulum. 

 Kim found what he first thought was a virgin cenote in an area he was long interested in. Being super happy about the discovery he decided to call the cenote Lycka which is Swedish and means happiness. While freediving  it he found that there was already a guide line in the entrance from a previous exploration team. He enquired with Jim Coke at the QRSS and no data was reported from any team about any cave in that area.

 We then decided to make a joint effort of resurveying and retrieving the data and also while doing that, to look for further possible exploration. Now after we connected other Cenotes (one of them named Lorenz after my nephew) it already turned into Sistema Lycka =)
So far we make great progress and I am enjoying the time a lot. The cave is really very different with unique characteristics and colours. So I am sure not to get bored on my days off, thanks to Kim!!!

I make sure to keep you posted on the progress.

Happy diving

Most cave divers may wonder at the beauty of cave maps and may even use them for cave dive planning but few have learned how to make cave maps. I recently taught yet another survey and cartography cave course with Dirk from Germany. We both used CCR Rebreathers as our primary breathing device during the survey portion of the training program. The goal at the end of the program is to have a published map in your hand, made from your survey data.

cave cartography

Most people would think cave map making and the process of surveying is only for cave explorers but if you have a cave in your neighborhood that is already explored, if there are already permanently guide lines installed but no cave map does exist you many want to consider a survey and consequently producing a cave map. Permanent guidelines do not have to be taken out in order to conduct a re-survey. Knotted line can be used for the distance measurement or fiberglass tape for greater accuracy. The NSS-CDS published a great book called Underwater Cave Survey by John Burge with all the details needed to survey and cartography.

Besides cave divers for dive planning there are other parties who may show interest in cave maps might be the land owner for him to see what he has and locations of potential wells, local governments to decide where certain installations such as gas stations and landfills may not be placed, developers to decide where not to construct due to danger of collapse and environmental agencies for natural reserve planning just to name a few.

cave cartography

A cave survey is a slow process and there are at least two ways to go about it 1) survey in and 2) survey out. 1) During the survey in technique the first diver is laying the survey line and the second diver is taking the survey data. The big advantage on this technique is that in case there is a problem the team can exit much faster than entering the cave and no survey data is lost. The survey in technique is a team effort and requires at least two divers. 2) During the survey out technique the line is laid on the way in and the survey is done on the way out resulting in a delayed exit and if the dive needs to be aborted then the survey is ‘hanging’, meaning the survey date is not connected to the starting point. The only advantage of the survey out technique is solo diving situations, with all of their particular advantages and disadvantages.

A cave survey as well has the potential for negative impact onto the cave environment as the dive is very slow and we need to get very close to the survey stations (tie off) as well as the line in terms of potential entanglement or breaking the guideline. Very good buoyancy, trim and propulsion techniques are a must for a cave survey. If a cave map does already exist for a particular cave one should not conduct a resurvey of the cave in order to protect the cave environment. There is no reason to fuck up a cave just to get the survey data and destroy what we love so much.

cave cartography

Once the survey data is collected the data needs to be saved on paper (my favorite) or electronically, or both. Line maps or stick maps can be produced in free software programs such as Compass. The data then can be imported into software programs such as Corel Draw and the map can be produced electronically.

cave cartography

My favorite way of making a cave map is the traditional drawing technique as I see the map as a artistically expression of the cave surveyor and cartographer. The first step is to draw a working map with all the cave information drawn onto milimetric paper. The second step is to draw a copy onto onion paper with all the cave information drawn onto the paper. The third step is to print out all the information shown on a cave map such as names, locations, index, scale, symbols and notes. The last step is to go to a copy shop and have your map copied and ready you are to publish your art work. You even can send a copy of your cave map to the NSS-CDS as they do a yearly competition for the most beautiful cave maps.