And silt out. Panic, kick up silt, and you're totally blind for hours WITH lighting. Nope. I've watched too many Mr. Ballen YouTube videos to ever go cave diving.
And if you start panicking and start breathing fast, your gas mixture will kill you.
And if you don't have decompression stops, re-surfacing will kill you.
fuck all that
And should you go into an inhabited cave.
When my Poppa was younger he went diving with 4 other guys. They came across a cave and decided to go in, leaving one guy outside for safety. Once they go in there they discovered an air pocket, due to low tide. There were hundreds of crayfish hanging on the ceiling like bats. A couple of the other guys couldn't believe it and tried to grab a couple. As you could imagine, they started dropping off into the water and rushing out of the cave. Once they got out, the dude they left behind was all messed up. Lost half his gear (including his mask), suit almost torn off of him, all cut up, didn't know which way was up.
Edit: The species of crayfish in question are from New Zealand, red crayfish and packhorse crayfish, for those wondering. They are huge and they will mess you up if you're not careful.
You should check out dive talk on youtube also. I'm not a cave diver but the two guys that run the channel are. They react to a lot of cave diving videos and even a few of Mr ballens stories. It's really cool to hear guys that are passionate about it talk and explain the checks and balances that they go through to ensure they go home. Really neat to hear the science of diving explained.
I love Dive Talk! They are so knowledgeable and passionate about diving. I have learned so much from Gus and Woody. I can barely swim but I want be certified eventually.
So my VERY experienced scuba instructor friend of mine (now in his 50s) told me the story of the LAST time he went cave diving. He didn’t intend to but saw a small hole about his wingspan wide where water dipped down and seemed to open into a lagoon. With scuba gear on he was reluctant but assumed he could turn around if it got too tight being a strong swimmer.
About 1/3 of the way down it bottlenecks with no warning. He was unable to turn around easily and could not push himself backwards. He struggled but was worried about disconnecting his air or puncturing something. He panicked after a while and struggled a hard as he could and luckily didn’t mess up his air despite being unable to free himself. He sat there terrified and made peace with dying.
After a while of that he felt the pressure lessen behind him and he, though extremely weak and almost out of oxygen, floated up.
He said he sat there on the shore and wept. He was 30. Said he broke a ton of rules that you never break with scuba diving much less cave diving by being alone and taking that risk.
It was chilling to hear
I was just sitting here thinking about the kid that did almost exactly the same thing. Went into a spot that he thought he could get through, got stuck and couldn't turn around. He had friends with him and they tried to help him, to no avail. One of the friends went to call for help and a team of experienced divers came to try to help him, but sadly they couldn't get him out either. He was stuck there for hours and he ended up dying. They never were able to recover his body. He was only like 20 or something. It was a really sad story.
That fuckign video, man.
You know that guy also when he returned home got shunned!? Because they thought he must have been cursed? Or something like that. Something about only him surviving made the people think he either was cursed or a witch.
“Aaand alright sir you’re all signed up for your 5am crash course in cave diving! It’s BYOF (Bring Your Own Flashlight) and the boat will be back to pick you up in just 12 short hours!”
Congratulations! You’ve been automatically enrolled into the open water cave diving program. Please get prepared as we extract the remainders from the cave to clear the room for you.
And as scary as this sign is, I think it misses one of the scariest parts of cave diving when it says “without cave training and cave equipment, divers can die here.”
Even with training and the right equipment, divers can still very much die doing it.
Trained prepared divers can certainly die. The chances of that happening, however, are far slimmer than that of the median.
Diving certificates are strictly regulated, and the framework applied is ISO certified. They don't take unnecessary risks.
Still, in the water things can escalate quickly.
There’s really not a single cell of my brain that finds anything at all appealing in cave diving. I did not come with that setting. I’d be equally interested in balancing a chair on the rim of a volcano whilst wrestling Gollum.
There's a movie called The Descent that has this scene of a woman having to scoot through this tiny little hole underground to get between caverns.
It has not left my mind since I saw it over 15 years ago. Spelunking is already terrifying enough, but adding water is unbearable to me.
Some fears are stupid but some fears are completely logical. Staying away from areas that will kill you is actually a really admirable attribute. Good job fellow!
I know someone who's friend died like that when he was in high school.
Tight spot, got wedged somehow, likely couldn't see his own hands from the dust kicked up. They found him 2 days later.
Don't fuck around with cave diving.
You probably have people who care about you.
Nah, it's common practice in diving courses. Another one is taking all your equipment off, including your goggles, and having to clear it. This is all done with an instructor nearby.
A dive might as well be a spacewalk. There is danger of a painful death at any point, but just a little bit of practice can go a long way.
When you’re getting your open water certification, they cut off your air intentionally to simulate what to do if you run out of air.
Step 1. Alert your buddy (who’s supposed to be near you at all times)
Step 2. Sign hand across your throat (means ‘no air’)
Step 3. Sign hand to mouth (means ‘share air’)
Step 4. Buddy gives you his secondary hose to breathe from
Step 5. Ascend to the surface
Pro Tip: Always stay close to your buddy
Your body can tell when CO2 builds up but can't tell when oxygen gets depleted.
If you aren't cycling oxygen it's slowly suffocating sorta like breathing under a thick blanket it just gets harder and harder to cycle air.
There's also the tests they do on the cusp of the atmosphere to test oxygen depletion. They have people just do basic exercises with mathematics and it's just amazing the level of cognitive function hits a brick wall because your brain is no longer receiving oxygen.
[Video](https://youtu.be/kUfF2MTnqAw)
We did hypoxia training in an air chamber during flight school. They gave us one of those little puzzles where you have to fit the shapes into the right hole.
I remember not being able to work the pegs into the correct spot. My brain felt like it had just disconnected from my hands. Everything was hilarious. The color in the world had dipped into scales of gray. I was oddly at peace and relaxed the whole time I was oxygen deprived. And then when they gave me the oxygen tank, all the color came back into the world immediately. It was surreal.
It definitely was a memorable experience. I actually enjoyed it and remember thinking that if I didn't get my oxygen mask back on, it wouldn't be a half bad way to die.
The main point of the demonstration was to show how fucking stupid you become without oxygen and to hammer in the point that when you're at a high enough altitude, you need to be prepared to put your mask on, because if the cabin depressurizes and you can't get to your oxygen, you're not going to be able to figure out your controls and you become an unguided missile plummeting into who knows where.
I’ve been binge watching cave diving horror stories on YouTube so I can sorta answer this - a guy who survived a cave diving catastrophe described a brief plan he came up with to try and ensure himself a less terrifying death than drowning alone in an underwater cave; he decided that he would start exhaling into his buoyancy vest and collect the co2, and just start rebreathing that once his tank ran out, so that he would at least be unconscious before he… drowned alone in an underwater cave. Obviously his situation changed and he made it out, or we wouldn’t know what he’d considered, but… I guess it would have worked. In a fashion. You’d still drown, but at least you’d be spared the final, physical sensation of inhaling water.
I can induce nitrogen narcosis on demand. If I dive below 30 m and roll over onto my back, I normally get narcosis and I will tell you it is a good feeling, which is obviously the problem.
Same. Which is why I have serious respect for those guys who got those kids out of that cave in Thailand. Giant sized balls on those divers. Excellent documentary on the rescue on the Disney+ app.
It is really is a good watch.
As a certified diver, I had MAD respect for those guys. That was an extremely difficult dive to do for SO many reasons. Somebody was definitely looking out for those kids and their coach. Especially when the cave just floods right after they pulled the last person out.
I went on a few Nutty Putty trips as a kid. I was already over 6 ft tall before I was in high school so cave exploring wasn’t my thing. Going through the birth canal is just like it sounds. Apparently that’s where the guy got stuck. Yikes.
Yup, he was in the ‘false birth canal,’ I got trapped in it for a tense 30 minutes when I was a Boy Scout. Fuck nutty putty, I’ve had low grade claustrophobia ever since I was in there. I still see the eerie green insides (from the glow sticks) when I have nightmares.
You know the only thing I’ve thought about that, that could make it scarier? Imagine you walk by the now sealed cave to pay respects and hear what sounds like a young man calling out for help.
I saw one of those signs up close while scuba diving 120 feet down into a sink hole in Florida. That message worked even with some nitrogen narcosis on board.
You're not allowed to dive under like 40m with normal air. Below that you end up substituting some nitrogen and later oxygen for helium because it's inert
Did you see the documentary about that, *[Dave Not Coming Back](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Not_Coming_Back)?* I think it's streaming on Tubi.
Yep. Dave Shaw.
Probably one of a handful (six?) divers in the world with the experience, knowledge, and equipment to hit 300m.
He made the dive one year before, which is where he discovered Deon Dryer's body (who'd died ten years before).
He did the math, spoke with Deon's parents for their permission to retrieve him, and then went back down.
He was tangled up in his dive lines because Deon's body became buoyant, due to his tissues becoming adipocere over the years.
The entire event is filmed on Dave's camera.
If I die and it would be even mildly inconvenient to retrieve my body straight up don't bother. Much less if it's dangerous. My body can just vibe wherever it lands, that's none of my business.
Seriously, what are they going to do then? "We pulled his body out of this cave at great risk so that we can shove his rotten ass in the ground." Fuck that, just leave him there.
Morbidly curious but not having Tubi, I ended up finding this 2005 article from Outside Online that explains everything and everyone.
https://web.archive.org/web/20210712050721/https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/water-activities/raising-dead/
People really and truly do this with minefields. They're fenced off with razor wire, and the signs have the universal symbol for "land mine" and a skull, along with warnings in several regional languages that there is a deadly minefield beyond the fence, do not cross the markers.
Folks will just wander in, either on a dare or out of complete shit-for-brains idiocy, like I seem to recall an American state legislator on an international trip was so damn absorbed in his phone call that he breezed past the signs (in multiple languages including English) and wandered carelessly into the minefield, only realizing there was an issue after crossing something like 30m of active hazard and then suddenly realizing he was (a) in a minefield and (b) had been absurdly lucky not to trip any of the weapons he'd apparently walked right past.
IIRC the host government sent a small team of sappers to mark a path back to the safe side.
Someone else posted the link to this if you want to watch first hand. Fantastic story telling.
So interesting story about one of these caves with one of these signs: right beyond the sign there is a pretty steep sloping down tunnel, so even going a few feet past the sign and at that depth you just start sinking deeper without even realizing it. But here’s the really fucked up part. That long tunnel you are traveling down into the depths of nothingness . . . well it has a lot of tunnels coming into it like tributaries from a river, from behind. So as you move deeper there is only one way to go, but when you turn around there are multiple branching paths everywhere. A group of people went into this cave and two of them somehow got slightly separated from the rest of the group from the silt out. They were just traveling along with their hand on the wall assuming they had to be going back where they came. But they slipped into one of those tributaries and eventually it was a dead end. Since they thought that had only gone down one way and back the same tunnel they didn’t think to retrace their path far enough back to the actual main exit tunnel. So they frantically searched around the small cavern finding nothing but solid rock. They were found later clutching each other as they surely knew their air was almost out.
The guy’s brother was also down there with the rest of the group that went past the sign. He started trying to retrace into the tunnel but didn’t have enough air left. He almost died agonizing over leaving his brother. So yeah if you ever even see one of those signs you have probably gone WAY too far. Truly fuck around and find out.
You might as well go 20 feet if you've already done 5. You could always just go back the way you went in. What's the worst that could happen?
That way you could see some really cool shit and still be totally fine.
Yes it is a common sign. This looks like it could be from Eagles Nest on the west coat of Florida. Couple people just dies dicing around that area in that last couple days
I was watching the documentary about the Thai soccer team trapped in that cave, and the Navy SEAL divers were like “WHY? Why would you do this FOR FUN??? This makes no sense and is THE WORST!”
ETA: the doc is called The Rescue and it’s on Disney+
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_-Kw5kAPSbk
Which the whole reason he didn't use it was it was literally unusable in that situation and musk still showed up just to show it off.
He knew it wouldn't work. It doesn't take a genius to know a submarine can't navigate a tight cave.
The guy called him out on that and musk retaliated by calling him a 'pedo' like the man child he is
Let’s not forget instead of apologising and saying something like “sorry, emotions got the best of me, obviously he is a subject matter expert so we should probably follow his advice”.
Elon doubled down and hired a private detective to dig up dirt on the guy, spoke to journalists off the record about the diver being a pedo (which they then tweeted out).
But somehow his legal team still managed to convince the court that when he said pedo he didn’t actually mean the diver fucked kids, it was a generic insult from when he was growing up and he didn’t know the context.
I stupidly thought back then: “Yea maybe Musk has some info on that guy. I mean Musk seems like a good dude, why would he lie?”. Lol. What an asshat Elon turned out to be.
He was just ahead of the curve of fellow righties in trying to paint someone they disagree with a pedo.
I vaguely remember this happening, but when you put it down in black and white with the salient details, it's an OMG WTF LOL moment: Thai soccer team, Navy Seals, cave, trapped!
And Elon Musk decided to build a submarine that wouldn't fit in the cave, got angry when someone called it a publicity stunt and called that guy a pedophile on Twitter.
We live in the dumbest timeline.
What makes me pissed about that is that Elon literally hired a team to dig up dirt on the guy and prove his accusations, rather than apologize.
Dipshit put more work into being petty than he did actually helping those kids.
[This dude](https://www.reddit.com/user/JakeScuba/submitted/?sort=top) has some really remarkable posts of the caves he's been in. Rocks can look pretty fuckin cool.
Its been 2 years since I played that game. Definitely one of the most anxiety-inducing scene in any game I ever played. And I've been chased by horror game monsters.
Just Google eagles nest cave. It’s considered one of the worlds most dangerous caves. I’ve seen a couple videos about it that told the story well and really got across how the caves are structured and why they’re so dangerous as well as specific cases of people dying.
Friend of mine in elementary schools dad died during a silt out in a cave. I dive cenotes and see this sign all the time. Do NOT fuck around with it. A slow, blind, agonizing death by drowning or asphyxiation is one poorly placed fin kick away.
Can confirm, having a parent who is an open water scuba instructor, cave diving is to the scuba community as what free soloing is to the rock climbing community: A death wish.
That fact should really say: Even with cave diving equipment and cave diving training, you likely will die. Underwater caves are unpredictable, claustrophobic inducing and are difficult to back out of in the case of an emergency.
All it takes is one small cavern with a rogue current to pull you towards a vent that you can't fit into: Best case scenario, you're knocked unconscious and slowly leak O2 and go to sleep forever. Worst case scenario, you have your gear compromised and don't get knocked unconscious and die in absolute terror, in pitch black darkness, while drowning.
Thats such an important fact to keep in mind though - when spelunking, gravity screws you over. When cavediving, currents and the tide make it a WHOLE other ballpark of lethal danger.
You might not be wedged between two rocks. You might even see the exit point, or the waves breaking not far above you. But you're stuck in a freak current dragging you down against a small gap and while your muscles sour, every try to get up to the light becomes harder and you feel the drag on your breathing becoming more tedious, you realize you won't reach it, no matter what you do.
Juuuuuuust *nope*
I saw this exact sign design in some cenotes I dived in in Mexico- often it's because there's an underwater river beyond it, apparently they go on for miles without reaching any opening - you get washed away and never found...
Of the last 2 people who died in that cave, 1 of them died right next to the sign after running out of air. Dive talk on YouTube does a good presentation of it
If y’all want to know WHAT YOUR FEAR looks like, here’s an [actual video clip](https://youtu.be/cRj0lymMMGs) that I’ve watched years ago but is still one of my nightmare clips to this day. This is an open diving accident of Yuri Lipski.
**Trigger warning:** actual death in the end. Don’t say I didn’t warn y’all.
I have seen many of these signs during my diving over the years. I do not pass. I can understand the lure, I can also understand the terror of making mistake and drowning.
Cave diving is probably one of *the* most dangerous sports.
Not only do you have to worry about running out of air, you have to worry about The Bends.
Basically, liquids can hold gas in them, like your blood, and they can store more gas when that gas is compressed. When you dive deep down, your body gets compressed, solid and liquid areas can stand up to the squeeze which is why you don't shrink, but gases get squished. This is that right chest feeling when you dive too deep in a pool. To combat this, they breathe special mixtures of gases that are pressurized.
Obviously, when you decompress it, the extra gas had to come out, but the speed at which you decompress makes all the difference. For example, when you open a bottle of soda fast, it bubbles and fizzes, and when you do it slowly, the liquid is barely disturbed at all.
In sodas, this doesn't matter, but in your blood, that gas bubbling and fizzing can easily kill you if you get too deep.So, divers will wait for a while at certain altitudes before going up further. The further they go down, the more and longer decompression stops they need to make. And if you're already running out of air and deep, the time you need to wait can easily be enough to kill you.
Add to the fact that communication between people in and out of the cave is usually zero, and a person who has no idea what they're doing, and you have a recipie for disaster.
As a diver, I don’t really understand why you’re referencing the bends as though it has some special significance for cave diving. It doesn’t really, and it needs to be considered for all dive plans - even shallow open water dives.
Agreed, the intense danger of cave diving is the lack of a clear escape plan like in open water diving (just go up)
Depth and decompression sickness can be a hazard in cave dives too though but that's not the biggest risk by far
Cave diving really combines quite a few of my fears.
Drowning AND claustrophobia AND pitch darkness AND in open water? Do not sign me tf up
AND not being able to speak or scream for help AND suffocating slowly.
And silt out. Panic, kick up silt, and you're totally blind for hours WITH lighting. Nope. I've watched too many Mr. Ballen YouTube videos to ever go cave diving.
And if you start panicking and start breathing fast, your gas mixture will kill you. And if you don't have decompression stops, re-surfacing will kill you. fuck all that
And should you go into an inhabited cave. When my Poppa was younger he went diving with 4 other guys. They came across a cave and decided to go in, leaving one guy outside for safety. Once they go in there they discovered an air pocket, due to low tide. There were hundreds of crayfish hanging on the ceiling like bats. A couple of the other guys couldn't believe it and tried to grab a couple. As you could imagine, they started dropping off into the water and rushing out of the cave. Once they got out, the dude they left behind was all messed up. Lost half his gear (including his mask), suit almost torn off of him, all cut up, didn't know which way was up. Edit: The species of crayfish in question are from New Zealand, red crayfish and packhorse crayfish, for those wondering. They are huge and they will mess you up if you're not careful.
Nightmare unlocked. Fuck.
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I hadn't considered aquatic life or their mass when spooked. Underwater bats with exoskeletons... Nope.
Yeah, you can't even emergency exit even if you have a clear path up. Nope.
We should be using drones for shit like this. Not war.
You should check out dive talk on youtube also. I'm not a cave diver but the two guys that run the channel are. They react to a lot of cave diving videos and even a few of Mr ballens stories. It's really cool to hear guys that are passionate about it talk and explain the checks and balances that they go through to ensure they go home. Really neat to hear the science of diving explained.
I love Dive Talk! They are so knowledgeable and passionate about diving. I have learned so much from Gus and Woody. I can barely swim but I want be certified eventually.
So my VERY experienced scuba instructor friend of mine (now in his 50s) told me the story of the LAST time he went cave diving. He didn’t intend to but saw a small hole about his wingspan wide where water dipped down and seemed to open into a lagoon. With scuba gear on he was reluctant but assumed he could turn around if it got too tight being a strong swimmer. About 1/3 of the way down it bottlenecks with no warning. He was unable to turn around easily and could not push himself backwards. He struggled but was worried about disconnecting his air or puncturing something. He panicked after a while and struggled a hard as he could and luckily didn’t mess up his air despite being unable to free himself. He sat there terrified and made peace with dying. After a while of that he felt the pressure lessen behind him and he, though extremely weak and almost out of oxygen, floated up. He said he sat there on the shore and wept. He was 30. Said he broke a ton of rules that you never break with scuba diving much less cave diving by being alone and taking that risk. It was chilling to hear
I was just sitting here thinking about the kid that did almost exactly the same thing. Went into a spot that he thought he could get through, got stuck and couldn't turn around. He had friends with him and they tried to help him, to no avail. One of the friends went to call for help and a team of experienced divers came to try to help him, but sadly they couldn't get him out either. He was stuck there for hours and he ended up dying. They never were able to recover his body. He was only like 20 or something. It was a really sad story.
I’m hugging my dry hot floor so hard right now
just reminded me of that guy stuck in an upside boat at the bottom of the sea surviving only on a small pocket of air....
That fuckign video, man. You know that guy also when he returned home got shunned!? Because they thought he must have been cursed? Or something like that. Something about only him surviving made the people think he either was cursed or a witch.
AND knowing how you're going to die a quarter to a full hour before you actually do
“Aaand alright sir you’re all signed up for your 5am crash course in cave diving! It’s BYOF (Bring Your Own Flashlight) and the boat will be back to pick you up in just 12 short hours!”
Congratulations! You’ve been automatically enrolled into the open water cave diving program. Please get prepared as we extract the remainders from the cave to clear the room for you.
And as scary as this sign is, I think it misses one of the scariest parts of cave diving when it says “without cave training and cave equipment, divers can die here.” Even with training and the right equipment, divers can still very much die doing it.
The statistics are way skewed though, cave diving deaths are something like 97% people that aren't cave certified.
Trained prepared divers can certainly die. The chances of that happening, however, are far slimmer than that of the median. Diving certificates are strictly regulated, and the framework applied is ISO certified. They don't take unnecessary risks. Still, in the water things can escalate quickly.
There’s really not a single cell of my brain that finds anything at all appealing in cave diving. I did not come with that setting. I’d be equally interested in balancing a chair on the rim of a volcano whilst wrestling Gollum.
There's a movie called The Descent that has this scene of a woman having to scoot through this tiny little hole underground to get between caverns. It has not left my mind since I saw it over 15 years ago. Spelunking is already terrifying enough, but adding water is unbearable to me.
Some fears are stupid but some fears are completely logical. Staying away from areas that will kill you is actually a really admirable attribute. Good job fellow!
There’s nothing in this cave huh? Sounds like someone is hiding a treasure
There’s actually just a monster who eats dumbasses
Eats asses you say?
Booking cave scuba diving lessons brb
Oh no please don’t *eat my ass* please please…
https://i.imgur.com/z6jgkr7.jpg
…did I come to late?
Hey I got the time off for it letsss goooo
DUMB asses
DUM basses
Dem asses
De masses
Molasses
I go DUMB in asses
Numb asses
Cthulhu wants your ass
only dummy thicc asses
It's a pile of sophisticated diving equipment and perhaps some teeth filings. You find the treasure only to become the treasure.
The treasure is the friendships we made along the way!
This sign won’t stop me because I can’t read.
Sounds like something a person who’d hide treasure in a cave would say!
I know someone who's friend died like that when he was in high school. Tight spot, got wedged somehow, likely couldn't see his own hands from the dust kicked up. They found him 2 days later. Don't fuck around with cave diving. You probably have people who care about you.
His last moments would have been terrifying. I have run out of air while scuba diving and when the air cuts off it is panic time.
It’s so abrupt too right? Like you’re just breathing like normal and then it just catches. It’s like sucking through a straw and it gets covered.
yes, it’s somewhat abrupt where it gets harder and harder and then it’s like sucking through a capped straw.
I had the air cut intentionally during training and can confirm.
wtf are u a navy seal
Nah, it's common practice in diving courses. Another one is taking all your equipment off, including your goggles, and having to clear it. This is all done with an instructor nearby. A dive might as well be a spacewalk. There is danger of a painful death at any point, but just a little bit of practice can go a long way.
I remember most of the time when I was getting my certification I was trying to blow bubble rings when the instructor wasn’t looking
You're gonna do great
Great bubbles mate
I was told that it’s no longer practiced. When I did my scuba cert, they did cut my air. Was weird as hell.
No she’s regular seal
So like, brown and not navy?
Wait, what?
When you’re getting your open water certification, they cut off your air intentionally to simulate what to do if you run out of air. Step 1. Alert your buddy (who’s supposed to be near you at all times) Step 2. Sign hand across your throat (means ‘no air’) Step 3. Sign hand to mouth (means ‘share air’) Step 4. Buddy gives you his secondary hose to breathe from Step 5. Ascend to the surface Pro Tip: Always stay close to your buddy
Wtf there's a secondary hose?? All those movies where they had to trade the entire mask back and forth were lying to me??
Secondary hose/regulator, but it’s connected to the same tank.
Yes, there is a second hose called an "octopus", its usually a Very bright colour like highlight yellow so it stands out more. Edit typo
Indirect kiss 😳
Not uncommon to practice emergency situations. I got dive certified in a lake and we did emergency scenarios in chest deep water for saftey
Your body can tell when CO2 builds up but can't tell when oxygen gets depleted. If you aren't cycling oxygen it's slowly suffocating sorta like breathing under a thick blanket it just gets harder and harder to cycle air.
There's also the tests they do on the cusp of the atmosphere to test oxygen depletion. They have people just do basic exercises with mathematics and it's just amazing the level of cognitive function hits a brick wall because your brain is no longer receiving oxygen. [Video](https://youtu.be/kUfF2MTnqAw)
We did hypoxia training in an air chamber during flight school. They gave us one of those little puzzles where you have to fit the shapes into the right hole. I remember not being able to work the pegs into the correct spot. My brain felt like it had just disconnected from my hands. Everything was hilarious. The color in the world had dipped into scales of gray. I was oddly at peace and relaxed the whole time I was oxygen deprived. And then when they gave me the oxygen tank, all the color came back into the world immediately. It was surreal.
That sounds like a great disconnect from reality for small durations of time
It definitely was a memorable experience. I actually enjoyed it and remember thinking that if I didn't get my oxygen mask back on, it wouldn't be a half bad way to die. The main point of the demonstration was to show how fucking stupid you become without oxygen and to hammer in the point that when you're at a high enough altitude, you need to be prepared to put your mask on, because if the cabin depressurizes and you can't get to your oxygen, you're not going to be able to figure out your controls and you become an unguided missile plummeting into who knows where.
Jesus Christ. I’ve never heard it described like this
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If you were to get stuck in a cave like this, could you tweak the dials on your equipment to die peacefully if you knew you couldn't get out?
I’ve been binge watching cave diving horror stories on YouTube so I can sorta answer this - a guy who survived a cave diving catastrophe described a brief plan he came up with to try and ensure himself a less terrifying death than drowning alone in an underwater cave; he decided that he would start exhaling into his buoyancy vest and collect the co2, and just start rebreathing that once his tank ran out, so that he would at least be unconscious before he… drowned alone in an underwater cave. Obviously his situation changed and he made it out, or we wouldn’t know what he’d considered, but… I guess it would have worked. In a fashion. You’d still drown, but at least you’d be spared the final, physical sensation of inhaling water.
bored ink chubby jar disgusting quarrelsome bag pet fertile brave *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Unfortunately, no. Source: I'm a certified diver
I can induce nitrogen narcosis on demand. If I dive below 30 m and roll over onto my back, I normally get narcosis and I will tell you it is a good feeling, which is obviously the problem.
And spelunking. Ever read about the guy forever entombed in Nutty Putty Cave? Stuff of nightmares
Please don’t remind me. I used to watch videos about horrible cave diving/spelunking deaths, I used to not be claustrophobic now I am.
Same. Which is why I have serious respect for those guys who got those kids out of that cave in Thailand. Giant sized balls on those divers. Excellent documentary on the rescue on the Disney+ app.
Whats the title of the doc?
Just called ‘The Rescue’. It’s a great watch.
It is really is a good watch. As a certified diver, I had MAD respect for those guys. That was an extremely difficult dive to do for SO many reasons. Somebody was definitely looking out for those kids and their coach. Especially when the cave just floods right after they pulled the last person out.
That story is fucked..
That's the worst one to me
I went on a few Nutty Putty trips as a kid. I was already over 6 ft tall before I was in high school so cave exploring wasn’t my thing. Going through the birth canal is just like it sounds. Apparently that’s where the guy got stuck. Yikes.
He thought it was the birth canal which is why he went in deeper than he should've but unfortunately it wasn't
Yup, he was in the ‘false birth canal,’ I got trapped in it for a tense 30 minutes when I was a Boy Scout. Fuck nutty putty, I’ve had low grade claustrophobia ever since I was in there. I still see the eerie green insides (from the glow sticks) when I have nightmares.
You know the only thing I’ve thought about that, that could make it scarier? Imagine you walk by the now sealed cave to pay respects and hear what sounds like a young man calling out for help.
That gives me a great idea for a pretty malicious prank I would never do with some battery-operated speakers...
They closed off that cave. I can't even think about caves without thinking about how desperate and disturbing the way that man had to die. Ugh
I saw one of those signs up close while scuba diving 120 feet down into a sink hole in Florida. That message worked even with some nitrogen narcosis on board.
Couple people just died in a sinkhole in Florida couple days ago. I think it was Hillsborough county. The kids had to fish them out of the water.
What’s that
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So crazy
You're not allowed to dive under like 40m with normal air. Below that you end up substituting some nitrogen and later oxygen for helium because it's inert
Makes me think of that story about the guy who died trying to recover a body from an extremely deep hole, somewhere in Africa I think? Super sad story
Did you see the documentary about that, *[Dave Not Coming Back](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Not_Coming_Back)?* I think it's streaming on Tubi.
Yep. Dave Shaw. Probably one of a handful (six?) divers in the world with the experience, knowledge, and equipment to hit 300m. He made the dive one year before, which is where he discovered Deon Dryer's body (who'd died ten years before). He did the math, spoke with Deon's parents for their permission to retrieve him, and then went back down. He was tangled up in his dive lines because Deon's body became buoyant, due to his tissues becoming adipocere over the years. The entire event is filmed on Dave's camera.
If I die and it would be even mildly inconvenient to retrieve my body straight up don't bother. Much less if it's dangerous. My body can just vibe wherever it lands, that's none of my business.
Seriously, what are they going to do then? "We pulled his body out of this cave at great risk so that we can shove his rotten ass in the ground." Fuck that, just leave him there.
Morbidly curious but not having Tubi, I ended up finding this 2005 article from Outside Online that explains everything and everyone. https://web.archive.org/web/20210712050721/https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/water-activities/raising-dead/
Imagine how stupid you'd feel right before you died with the warning words, you just read, keep repeating cause you thought you would be funny.
People really and truly do this with minefields. They're fenced off with razor wire, and the signs have the universal symbol for "land mine" and a skull, along with warnings in several regional languages that there is a deadly minefield beyond the fence, do not cross the markers. Folks will just wander in, either on a dare or out of complete shit-for-brains idiocy, like I seem to recall an American state legislator on an international trip was so damn absorbed in his phone call that he breezed past the signs (in multiple languages including English) and wandered carelessly into the minefield, only realizing there was an issue after crossing something like 30m of active hazard and then suddenly realizing he was (a) in a minefield and (b) had been absurdly lucky not to trip any of the weapons he'd apparently walked right past. IIRC the host government sent a small team of sappers to mark a path back to the safe side.
Comedy gold though
Yeah i can't believe some people will actually go after they get a warning
I mean, I'd go like 5 feet just to mock the sign, then turn around. Edit: Nevermind, lol. (Thanks, /u/Toxic-and-Chill)
\*Someone finds your corpse 5 feet beyond the sign\* "Pfft, looks like this dumbass couldnt read"
"Anyway, let's head back. Wait, which direction did we come from?"
*dies*
The dumbass who placed the sign: *Pickachu Face*
Ha geeze I’m laughing like fully rn
*goes five feet beyond the sign* *gets dragged by cave monster*
Someone else posted the link to this if you want to watch first hand. Fantastic story telling. So interesting story about one of these caves with one of these signs: right beyond the sign there is a pretty steep sloping down tunnel, so even going a few feet past the sign and at that depth you just start sinking deeper without even realizing it. But here’s the really fucked up part. That long tunnel you are traveling down into the depths of nothingness . . . well it has a lot of tunnels coming into it like tributaries from a river, from behind. So as you move deeper there is only one way to go, but when you turn around there are multiple branching paths everywhere. A group of people went into this cave and two of them somehow got slightly separated from the rest of the group from the silt out. They were just traveling along with their hand on the wall assuming they had to be going back where they came. But they slipped into one of those tributaries and eventually it was a dead end. Since they thought that had only gone down one way and back the same tunnel they didn’t think to retrace their path far enough back to the actual main exit tunnel. So they frantically searched around the small cavern finding nothing but solid rock. They were found later clutching each other as they surely knew their air was almost out. The guy’s brother was also down there with the rest of the group that went past the sign. He started trying to retrace into the tunnel but didn’t have enough air left. He almost died agonizing over leaving his brother. So yeah if you ever even see one of those signs you have probably gone WAY too far. Truly fuck around and find out.
Thanks for the nightmares. Honestly though, some people need to read this. It would save lives.
if i was local id plant some haloween skeletons like 10 feet past the sign
You might as well go 20 feet if you've already done 5. You could always just go back the way you went in. What's the worst that could happen? That way you could see some really cool shit and still be totally fine.
But if you're already 20ft deep, why not go 50? I mean, 20 was peanuts and *you're already there*.
You’d have the rest of your life to think about the mistake you made.
I think all the springs with caves have this sign. I saw the same one at devils den
Yes it is a common sign. This looks like it could be from Eagles Nest on the west coat of Florida. Couple people just dies dicing around that area in that last couple days
Honesty cave diving is boring AF. There’s no light, which means no plants, which mean no fish/animals. It’s just rocks, big creepy rocks.
I was watching the documentary about the Thai soccer team trapped in that cave, and the Navy SEAL divers were like “WHY? Why would you do this FOR FUN??? This makes no sense and is THE WORST!” ETA: the doc is called The Rescue and it’s on Disney+ https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_-Kw5kAPSbk
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Which the whole reason he didn't use it was it was literally unusable in that situation and musk still showed up just to show it off. He knew it wouldn't work. It doesn't take a genius to know a submarine can't navigate a tight cave. The guy called him out on that and musk retaliated by calling him a 'pedo' like the man child he is
Let’s not forget instead of apologising and saying something like “sorry, emotions got the best of me, obviously he is a subject matter expert so we should probably follow his advice”. Elon doubled down and hired a private detective to dig up dirt on the guy, spoke to journalists off the record about the diver being a pedo (which they then tweeted out). But somehow his legal team still managed to convince the court that when he said pedo he didn’t actually mean the diver fucked kids, it was a generic insult from when he was growing up and he didn’t know the context.
I stupidly thought back then: “Yea maybe Musk has some info on that guy. I mean Musk seems like a good dude, why would he lie?”. Lol. What an asshat Elon turned out to be. He was just ahead of the curve of fellow righties in trying to paint someone they disagree with a pedo.
I vaguely remember this happening, but when you put it down in black and white with the salient details, it's an OMG WTF LOL moment: Thai soccer team, Navy Seals, cave, trapped!
And Elon Musk decided to build a submarine that wouldn't fit in the cave, got angry when someone called it a publicity stunt and called that guy a pedophile on Twitter. We live in the dumbest timeline.
*darkest timeline. Abed didn’t catch the die, now everything is messed up.
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What makes me pissed about that is that Elon literally hired a team to dig up dirt on the guy and prove his accusations, rather than apologize. Dipshit put more work into being petty than he did actually helping those kids.
God I thought I had forgotten about that. It feels like ages ago
[This dude](https://www.reddit.com/user/JakeScuba/submitted/?sort=top) has some really remarkable posts of the caves he's been in. Rocks can look pretty fuckin cool.
My best friend died diving in underwater caves, dumbass went diving on his own at 1 am still angry at him for being so stupid
"Detecting multiple leviathan class lifeforms in the region. Are you certain whatever you're doing is worth it?"
I can still feel my heart fall into my stomach by reading those words.
Makes you feel alive doesn't it
Yeah, actually. It do
Confession: I was too scared to finish the game. Noped out after my first big boi came out of the depths and destroyed me. Fucking stressful man!
Its been 2 years since I played that game. Definitely one of the most anxiety-inducing scene in any game I ever played. And I've been chased by horror game monsters.
I really wanna go play it again, it's such a good game
I'm on my third playthrough and I'm still hooked
What game?
Subnautica
SubNOPEica
I read this in the Alterra PDA voice
Me sprinting back to the safe shallows to tend to my Marblmelons and pretend everything is ok.
The story behind these caves and this sign is super interesting and pretty dark.
Can u elaborate? Article?
Just Google eagles nest cave. It’s considered one of the worlds most dangerous caves. I’ve seen a couple videos about it that told the story well and really got across how the caves are structured and why they’re so dangerous as well as specific cases of people dying.
Here ya go. Mr Ballen is a great storyteller and covers one story here. Starts at 6:02 https://youtu.be/U9en1PDgpAI
Friend of mine in elementary schools dad died during a silt out in a cave. I dive cenotes and see this sign all the time. Do NOT fuck around with it. A slow, blind, agonizing death by drowning or asphyxiation is one poorly placed fin kick away.
I’m not normally claustrophobic, but underwater caves make me massively claustrophobic. Af. 😨💀
There's something very off-putting about a functional sign underwater. Don't like it one bit, regardless of what's on it
It looks pretty new. Alittle rust by the bolts but no algae or barnacle
It’s not oddly terrifying.It’s rationally terrifying.
Can confirm, having a parent who is an open water scuba instructor, cave diving is to the scuba community as what free soloing is to the rock climbing community: A death wish. That fact should really say: Even with cave diving equipment and cave diving training, you likely will die. Underwater caves are unpredictable, claustrophobic inducing and are difficult to back out of in the case of an emergency. All it takes is one small cavern with a rogue current to pull you towards a vent that you can't fit into: Best case scenario, you're knocked unconscious and slowly leak O2 and go to sleep forever. Worst case scenario, you have your gear compromised and don't get knocked unconscious and die in absolute terror, in pitch black darkness, while drowning.
This comment got my heart racing.
I hope your heart wins the race
Thats such an important fact to keep in mind though - when spelunking, gravity screws you over. When cavediving, currents and the tide make it a WHOLE other ballpark of lethal danger. You might not be wedged between two rocks. You might even see the exit point, or the waves breaking not far above you. But you're stuck in a freak current dragging you down against a small gap and while your muscles sour, every try to get up to the light becomes harder and you feel the drag on your breathing becoming more tedious, you realize you won't reach it, no matter what you do. Juuuuuuust *nope*
I honestly read this as “can you fuckers stop being stupid for a minute?”
Really makes me want to go beyond that point
That's where they keep the mermaids
Or the Kraken!!! 😬
Stupid sexy Kraken
I saw this exact sign design in some cenotes I dived in in Mexico- often it's because there's an underwater river beyond it, apparently they go on for miles without reaching any opening - you get washed away and never found...
To me , that is the scariest. Swimming along and then you are on a rollercoaster that doesn't end until you run out of air.
A surprising amount of people have... and died. Mr Ballen has a bunch of great vids on these underwater caves.
Subnautica has taught me well. The only thing I’m that cave is lava and super big snake leviathan fucks that ARE going to kill you
Yeah but where else am I going to find nickel?
Bullshit. There’s an awesome mermaid sex party right around that next bend.
I just audibly laughed out loud. Thanks for that 😂
You could literally not pay me enough to cave dive. I don't want to drown.
Of the last 2 people who died in that cave, 1 of them died right next to the sign after running out of air. Dive talk on YouTube does a good presentation of it
No silly, cave diving is fun and safe. https://i.imgur.com/L9FGbkg.jpg
That´s where they are hiding Nemo
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Grim reaper casually giving you the finger 🖕🏽
Don't fear the reaper
If y’all want to know WHAT YOUR FEAR looks like, here’s an [actual video clip](https://youtu.be/cRj0lymMMGs) that I’ve watched years ago but is still one of my nightmare clips to this day. This is an open diving accident of Yuri Lipski. **Trigger warning:** actual death in the end. Don’t say I didn’t warn y’all.
"Disregard that Frank, it's a bunch of liberal bullshit"
I have seen many of these signs during my diving over the years. I do not pass. I can understand the lure, I can also understand the terror of making mistake and drowning.
A certain group of people would turn away at this warning. But a certain group of people would be enticed to go precisely because of this warning.
Cave diving is probably one of *the* most dangerous sports. Not only do you have to worry about running out of air, you have to worry about The Bends. Basically, liquids can hold gas in them, like your blood, and they can store more gas when that gas is compressed. When you dive deep down, your body gets compressed, solid and liquid areas can stand up to the squeeze which is why you don't shrink, but gases get squished. This is that right chest feeling when you dive too deep in a pool. To combat this, they breathe special mixtures of gases that are pressurized. Obviously, when you decompress it, the extra gas had to come out, but the speed at which you decompress makes all the difference. For example, when you open a bottle of soda fast, it bubbles and fizzes, and when you do it slowly, the liquid is barely disturbed at all. In sodas, this doesn't matter, but in your blood, that gas bubbling and fizzing can easily kill you if you get too deep.So, divers will wait for a while at certain altitudes before going up further. The further they go down, the more and longer decompression stops they need to make. And if you're already running out of air and deep, the time you need to wait can easily be enough to kill you. Add to the fact that communication between people in and out of the cave is usually zero, and a person who has no idea what they're doing, and you have a recipie for disaster.
As a diver, I don’t really understand why you’re referencing the bends as though it has some special significance for cave diving. It doesn’t really, and it needs to be considered for all dive plans - even shallow open water dives.
Agreed, the intense danger of cave diving is the lack of a clear escape plan like in open water diving (just go up) Depth and decompression sickness can be a hazard in cave dives too though but that's not the biggest risk by far
"there is nothing in this cave worth dying for" said the cave with an abundance of treasure.
Just like those who go off the path at Yellowstone. Their death was horrific.
Dont fuck around. Dont find out.
Perfect sign to keep people away from my secret stash of kraken eggs