SLOVAKIA 2001 - TRIP REPORT 1

On 5th of October we left into the heart of Slovakia to begin our expedition around Slovakian Caves. Early Saturday morning we arrived at first site: Brzotinska cave. Here we prepared for our trip under ground.

Plan was to get to the end of the cave through chest deep water and
mountains of mud and clay. We would then submerge into the spring coming out and explore the cave beyond. This cave was a part of exploration about a 20 years ago and since than there is only one photographic documentary of the cave. A few people have tried to make a video from this spring but poor diving skills and equipment result into un-usable material.

The journey began at 9 a.m. Water temperature was 8C-49F and air temp was a constant 8C-50F. Our team was 4 divers (one cameraman) and 5 support personal. Progress in the cave was very difficult. Several inches of clay made it tough to walk straight. We were carrying double 40cf cylinders and a few pounds of lead to help sink our dry suits.

To our surprise, few of the support team members were wearing wet suits, and one was wearing just Kevlar cave suit with no thermal protection. In 8C-49F water it was amazing that more than 2 hours did result in severe hypothermia.

After about 45 minutes of progress we arrived to the last part of the cave, where water began to be too deep for our support crew to continue. After a short break and adjustment of the equipment four of us continued. I was on the second place with the camera to document our progress. The water through our earlier part of the trip was virtually "ice coffee" quality.

Cold with no visibility at all. After a few strokes in deep water the visibility drastically improved. We went from 0 to 80ft visibility with Florida like conditions (except for the temperature). The passages were narrow, however big enough to swim through with almost no difficulties. We continued for about 190m-600ft until we reached the end of the line. Our maximum depth was 16m-53ft.

After we turned around the visibility went back to zero. The divers behind of us didn't have any skills knowledge for swimming in a silty environment, so as we begun working our way back to the air source it was a literarily hand over hand progress. It took us twice as long to exit the cave as to get in. the bottom time was only 30min but it felt like infinity.

When we rejoined our support crew we began our trip out. All of us were frozen to the bone - divers because of submersion and slow motion, and support crew because of the waiting with almost no motion. Within the first five minutes everybody (except the guy in NO wet-dry suit) were sweating. It was very tiring to go through the same mud and clay back to the exit but it was rewarding to see a sunlight after a more than 2 hours of dark and cold. Our tanks and suits were covered by clay and our faces too.