REFLECTIONS
Underwater caving is an activity that involves the exploration of flooded natural cavities. I believe a brief description of these cavities is necessary to understand the environment in which cave divers find themselves. These cavities can vary in size: wide or very narrow, with clear water or, as often happens, with visibility reduced to a few centimeters. What they all have in common is complete darkness, interrupted only by the flashlights and spotlights the cave diver carries attached to his helmet. It's an activity that, if practiced without the proper technical and practical knowledge and understanding of one's own limitations, can prove dangerous for a variety of reasons: you're proceeding underwater, which in itself is not a normal situation; you find yourself in a cave (an environment that causes symptoms of claustrophobia in some), forced to follow a fixed path fraught with many hidden dangers.
The cave's morphology presents dangers, such as narrow passages that are difficult to overcome on the way there but perhaps even more difficult on the way back, unstable landslides that can block the passage, unexpected currents capable of sucking the cave diver away, and toxic gases beyond the siphons. The problems don't stop there, but can also be caused by the materials used: air vents that continuously deliver air, lamps that burn out, and the Ariadne's thread, the only accessory that allows us to find the exit, which, if used incorrectly, can get lost, tangled, or broken, with obvious consequences. It's sad to think that technical and practical evolution has made giant strides towards safety in recent years, especially reflecting on the deaths of cave divers who, being part of a small circle, are often friends. Another range of accidents can be attributed to natural physiological reasons resulting from staying in cold waters, the depths reached, dehydration, and breathlessness due to exertion. There is no shortage of psychological incidents in the case history: stress, overestimation of one's limits, fear and panic. However, underwater speleology is an activity that has the great allure of adventure because it often allows you to go where no one has ever gone before, discovering and seeing things and places that few, if any, will ever see. In these environments, one's physical and mental abilities are constantly put to the test. However, one should not think that this is just an adventure in itself, as it can actually yield unique knowledge in various fields including geology, hydrology, archaeology, biology, etc. One of the factors that qualify cave diving is that it is done alone for at least two reasons: the first is determined by the environment in which you find yourself: it would be impossible to bring help to a companion in difficulty, because due to the reduced visibility we might not see that he is in a dangerous situation, (the more people are in the siphon, the lower the visibility), because the air consumption autonomy standards used provide safety only for one cave diver and there would not be enough air for two people to return, because you could be involved in the accident of your friend who, if he were in a panic situation, would be impossible to control, or if you were unable to help him, you could develop dangerous remorse at the moment with the risk of losing your head and succumbing in turn, because if you get stuck in a narrow passage, your companions following you not only cannot help but remain stuck behind and, being underwater, they cannot survive beyond the autonomy of their tanks which, depending on the size and depth, varies from a few minutes to a few dozen minutes. Following the analysis of accidents caused by these and other inconveniences, it is common for cave divers to think that "one cave diver = one death, two cave divers = two deaths". The second reason is that, given the danger of the overall situation and the progression, the cave diver must be alone to be able to concentrate fully on the cave around him, on the operations he must perform, on the equipment he is using, and on the sensations that pervade him. The presence of anyone else would distract him and this could be a dangerous element. Often, when diving with friends, to avoid appearing inferior, people continue diving even when they want to stop. This leads to a dangerous situation that, if combined with any other problem, can escalate into tragedy. Solitude allows the cave diver to concentrate, control his breathing, which must always be calm, follow the flow of emotions, curiosity, doubts, and fears that gradually emerge as he proceeds, and, if the slightest problem arises, he can decide to return without having to answer to anyone else.
The assumption that one must be alone thus becomes a necessity and a habit for those who can tolerate it, fostering an awareness of how one can rely solely on one's own abilities, an awareness of one's self-determination. This begins from the moment one prepares the equipment for exploration: from the simplest check that all the equipment is in order and functioning, to preparing the tanks filled with air in the simplest case, filled with gas mix in the more complex case of deep dives. Above all, preparing the mixes is a delicate and specific operation, self-managed by the cave diver. No one better than the cave diver, at that moment, knows the objectives he wants to pursue, and how to manage the specific setup of his equipment. Perhaps someone with equal experience can advise on solutions and choices, but in the end, the final decision rests with the diver.
Responsibility for one's life, one's own, is an action decided in the solitude of consciousness. The moment of the dive approaches: final checks are made, final analyses of one's health and the external environmental conditions; by now one has made up one's mind, and even if the little worm of fear of the unknown gnaws at some part of one's being, one pushes it into a dark corner, deep down. When one is ready, fully dressed, with the right equipment in the right place, one looks once more at the body of water that in a moment will hide one from all view, and one sets off. At this point, the justified fear that allows us not to underestimate the smallest details recedes to activate vigilant control of situations as one progresses: one chooses where to attach the Ariadne's thread, one observes the shape of the environment, one monitors the increasing distance separating one from the exit, the depths one reaches, the air one gradually consumes. Loneliness truly lies in the feeling that we can rely solely on ourselves, on our abilities for who we truly are, without any possibility of deception. The outside world is psychologically light years away from us, because communication with it is completely denied. As we advance, however, curiosity about what appears to us, the constant monitoring of the functioning of the material, and the subtle perception of the many emotions that pervade us, surround and block the wave of loneliness seeping within us. When the decision to return finally takes hold, whether for external contingent reasons or sometimes because the flow of our own thoughts dictates it, then the feeling of loneliness grows like wildfire. The return journey seems longer than the outward journey, because we are no longer focused on searching for the best passage, on seeking the unknown; we now wonder why we push ourselves so far, or so deep, into increasingly hostile environments where the slightest inconvenience can cost our lives. Near the exit, or during decompression, the desire to resurface among the faces of friends waiting unaware becomes urgent; the awareness of having to be alone, deprived of communication for a certain period, transforms this same time into an infinite interval. The obstacles of the outward journey have now been overcome, the problems have largely been faced and resolved, the perception of oneself also becomes the need to communicate, but communication, at least for the moment, is denied. Until we resurface from the water, nothing is certain yet, not even that, once finally outside, we will be able to smile and tell something to those curiously waiting for us, who, for the moment, know absolutely nothing of the situations and thoughts that are within us.
passing around. Fortunately, the end of the dive puts an end to much of that solitary awareness, which had been maturing and growing since the moment we decided to undertake the exploration. From the moment of resurfacing, especially in deep-sea dives or long-term stays that are still experimental, we remain focused for several hours until we are sure that everything went well. What remains is the slice of solitude that is part of our inaccessible depths, that slice of sensations that we are unable or perhaps jealously unwilling to reveal to others. For me, Luigi Casati, in particular, a terrible experience of loneliness was determined following an accident that happened to me at the beginning of my activity as a cave diver (1987).
Some friends and I had gone to France to try to continue exploring a spring that descends vertically to a depth of 50 meters, through a shaft, and then continues horizontally for about 20 meters. The known route stops at a narrow passage. I go second, about 20 minutes after the first, who was and still is my instructor (in addition to teaching me techniques, he helped me mature psychologically: a key component of cave diving). We meet in the shaft that descends into the darkness, illuminated by our flashlights. We say hello, and he continues ascending while I descend. I reach the end of the Ariadne's thread laid by my friend, which stops about two meters from the narrow passage at a depth of 53 meters. I look at the narrow passage and decide to approach it to see if it's possible to pass through. The visibility, which up to that point was about 5 meters, deceives me, and I make the mistake of detaching myself from the line within those two meters. I look at the narrow passage, thinking it's possible to get past it. I turn to ascend, and an unpleasant surprise awaits me: visibility, due to the bubbles dislodging the clay from the ceiling and the movement of my fins, dislodging it from the bottom, has been reduced to a few centimeters. Fear, for the duration of a few breaths, takes hold of me, but reason tells me I must calm down, breathe as little as possible to maximize the short autonomy allowed by the type of tanks I'm using on that dive (uncontrolled breathing would exhaust the tanks in a few minutes) and also to be able to react as best as possible with clarity. I feel alone because no one can help me. It's not easy to know that I could die and try not to think about it. In these moments, I think of the friend who has surfaced and who, not seeing me, might come back for me, but I know that's not possible, both because of problems related to the dive (saturation) and because by the time he realizes it, it will be too late for me. You can't scream because no one here can hear you. Then I think about the mistake I'd made, which I knew in theory, and while I search for the line that will allow me to surface, I get tangled in old, broken pieces of line left by other cave divers; in addition to having to search for the line, I also have to free myself from these others.
As the sum of these problems complicates my state of mind, which, as the minutes pass, sees the air pressure decrease on the pressure gauges, I begin to lose concentration and fear takes over my thoughts. After more than ten minutes of this mental torture, I find the thread that allows me to trace the decompression stops: I only have a couple of minutes of life left. During decompression, waiting for the moment to emerge, my thoughts were fixed on the moment just passed, on having come close to death over a trivial act and having narrowly avoided being captured by it, in the solitude of those moments and in an environment that, to me, is beautiful but harsh towards those who do not respect the rules. Upon exiting the dive, I didn't speak to anyone about my accident, preferring to reflect. Only after some time did I confide in my partner and later in friends. Deep down, I felt sick for at least three days, constantly thinking about those moments when, alone, you put yourself in dramatic situations and have to resolve them alone, about death, which at that moment I was consciously resigning myself to accepting alone because in the end, when you die, you are alone. This experience changed my way of acting and thinking a lot. I had other accidents, but no longer as traumatic. In 1992, I had to search for a friend who was missing underwater in a cave: after carrying out an initial reconnaissance, in the evening, as soon as I heard the news, I found him lifeless in the water. (He had run out of air in his tanks, probably due to an error in underestimating the environment.) The night helped me concentrate on what to do, given the difficult conditions in which I had to operate. The following day, I made three dives to be able to strip him of his equipment and allow him to pass the initial narrowing of the siphon, tie his arms close to his already hardened body, and carry him tied behind me through the narrow, tortuous meander to the bottom.
outside. The worst feelings I had were out of the water when I was concentrating alone on the actions I would take in the water because, alone, I had seen it and therefore only I knew what was best to do. In the water, my focus was on the work, not on my dead friend. It was a moment when solitude transformed into anguish: the solitude of the action contrasted with that of a friend who had faced death alone and whose solitary actions had now become eternal. At the usual moment of resurfacing, I, the rescuer, would still be able to communicate and break my solitude; the other would only be the subject of the solitude of those who had waited for him outside and had failed to realize that the dialogue was ending forever.
Reproduction of the text and photos in this article, even partial, is strictly prohibited without the author's consent.
