 |
Diving under the ice and in dark
cold caves For some divers the SCUBA-hobby don't stop with the open-water dive, they want more, they want bigger challenges in the dives. Many divers who lives in the cold areas of the world dives in the winter season, both in the cold water or down under the ice. The cold water gives a very large visibility, much better than the one in the summer time. Cave diving is an other form for big challenge dives, the diver goes down in to large cold and dark caves, not for 1 hour, but in many time for 4-5 hours at a time.
|
||||
In
many cold parts of the world, diving in the
winter can be difficult, the water is very cold
and maybe it's even frozen to ice, the diver has
therefor to prepare better for the dive than in
the summer time. The diver has to take classes in
ice-diving, for learning how to react in this
special conditions. If an emergency occurs, it's
not always possible to go direct to the top, the
diver must find the hole in the ice. There are
several common troubles in a ice-dive, the
regulator can freeze, both on an open or a closed
position, the valves on the suit can do the same,
and if the inlet valve freezes in open position
the diver can be send to the surface with a high
speed, with no time for decompression. The
equipment have to be approved for 
cold water-
and ice-diving. The suit use for this type of
diving is a drysuit with dry gloves. and dryhood.
The suit can be either a neoprene, trilaminate or
rubber. The neoprene suit got a great insulation
special if the divers isn't go to deep into the
water, the pressure will then squeeze the
material and the insulation the be minor. The
shell type suits, (trilaminate or rubber) can of
course also be used, and is it very often
,special if the diver have to wait at the surface
after a dive, the water in the neoprene will then
freeze up and make the suit stiff. Often a full
face mask is used, it will keep the cold water
away from the divers face and made the dive more
safe and comfortable. The diver on the pictures
is just under the ice-surface, dressed in a
neoprene drysuit and a Poseidon full face mask,
called 'monkey face' by reasons obviously to
anyone seen it.
