One diver has died and two have been rescued after getting into trouble in the Twin Caves system in Marianna, Florida.
Jackson County Sherrif’s Office received an alert at around 1.15 pm on Tuesday, 18 March informing them of overdue divers at Twin Caves. A rescue operation was launched and two divers were rescued but a third was found dead within the system.
Among those participating in the rescue was cave instructor Mehdi Zinetti of nearby Cave Adventures dive shop, who said he first encountered a female diver who was trying to locate her missing friend.
After the woman had safely left the cave, Zinetti returned to search for the missing diver in ‘complete zero visibility’ conditions, according to renowned cave diving expert and owner of Cave Adventures, Edd Sorensen, who had been called to participate in the rescue but was not in the local area at the time.
Sorensen told local Florida media station News 13 that while Zinetti had begun the rescue wearing a rebreather, when he returned to search for the missing man after seeing the woman exit the cave, he had switched to open circuit scuba.
He was able to find the missing diver – who was wearing a rebreather – ‘by feel’ in the zero-vis conditions and brought him out of the system. Medics attempted to perform CPR on the diver but he was declared dead at the scene.
It is unclear how the remaining diver of the three that were declared overdue made their way out of the cave.
Twin Caves is a popular cave diving site located within Merritt’s Mill Pond, a 202-acre manmade lake popular with swimmers and divers, boaters and fishers.
The system has several openings with tight passages in places, and is prone to heavy silting. There are several hundred metres of tunnels which descend to around 30m of depth at their deepest.
An investigation has begun into the cause of the diver’s death.
