this post was submitted on 16 May 2026
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[–] The_Terrible_Humbaba@slrpnk.net 9 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago) (1 children)

I'm a diver but not that qualified, and far from an expert, but the fact that five (supposedly experienced) divers died, and now even a rescue diver has died, tells me this is in big part to do with the location itself rather than failure in the divers part.

I don't remember the names, but some caves have water currents pulling in, and others pushing out. Out are the safest ones because it's easier to get out. In are the most dangerous, because you might be going further than you realize and to come back you have to swim against the current - you won't have enough air to make it back. That said, usually even experienced cave divers stay far from those caves, precisely because they know how dangerous they are. Also, if you are diving in a foreign place, you should really go with a dive guide who knows the area. AFAIK, there was no guide.

So even then, there was probably some type of mess up on the driver's side. Because it seems they should not have been performing that dive, much less with no dive guide.

And statistically, the majority of victims of cave diving deaths were people who are not certified cave divers.

I'm saying all this because I've seen so many people talk about how dangerous it is, but statistically if you are qualified it's safer than free diving. But no one complaints about that being dangerous.

EDIT: I should also mention I could not read the article, I got paywalled. I'm having to go just by the title.

[–] partofthevoice@lemmy.zip 5 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

Cave diving is pretty dangerous. It’s as dangerous as diving, as well as caving.

[–] The_Terrible_Humbaba@slrpnk.net 0 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

It depends on what you mean by dangerous. Of course it is by definition a dangerous sport, but if you have the proper training, you prepare properly, and you don't go being your skill or what you planned for, the chances of death are actually not high.

Like, rock climbing is dangerous. If you go scale a huge mountain with no training or proper gear you'll die. But with training and proper gear and planning you should be fine.

Plan for your level, and dive the plan. Like I said in the other comment, most deaths are from people who didn't have the training.

[–] partofthevoice@lemmy.zip 1 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago) (1 children)

I watch a lot of Scary Interesting on YouTube, friend. I do want to go cave diving, one day, but by this point I’ve seen hundreds of videos of experts getting lost in silt outs, getting stuck under falling rocks, getting lost after guide ropes snap, nitrogen narcosis, … so much shit. If you have to breath helium to survive, you’re somewhere the Earth doesn’t want you to be bro.

[–] The_Terrible_Humbaba@slrpnk.net 1 points 4 minutes ago* (last edited 3 minutes ago)

Right, there are a lot of accidents and deaths, but it's still unlikely to happen. Both things are true. And a lot of those deaths are from unqualified people who dived into a cave anyway. It's sort of like saying "flying a plane is dangerous, I've seen a lot of videos about crashes and people dying - people were not made to fly". As long as the pilot has proper training and the equipment is in proper condition, it's not really that dangerous.

There are a lot more deaths caused by free diving (even in percentile), for example, but those stories aren't as interesting and don't make for good videos, so they don't get talked about much.