No injured cavers recorded.
In late September two groups of divers were at Little River Springs in Florida. One was a NSS-certified group, the other, poorly equipped, was not. The NSSers tried to warn the open-water trained group about cave diving but with little success. The NSS group had done its dive and was decompressing when the four others entered. After a while the four surfaced and three decided to go in a second time. At 'Table Rock' they realized they were low on air-gauge readings; between 400 and 900 psi. They reportedly headed out 'every man for himself.' At the end of the permanent line one swam up into a dome area instead of turning right to go out of the cave. One NSS diver was still in compression in ten feet of water when he observed 'an enormous silt cloud' preceding the retreating divers. One surfaced with no air, the other with 50 psi. It wasn't clear in the silt that only two had exited, but the victim party knew and one went right back in with the fourth man's tank and soon came back out with the body of the third diver.
The victim group was not equipped for cave diving. They had only one light per man, didn't run a continuous guideline and didn't plan their air supply properly. Worse, they laughed at warnings. In areas like Florida, perhaps it would be possible to make cave training part of a diver's overall certification? Landis suggests 'the no-light rule for open-water divers acts as a natural deterrent, preventing penetration into a cave beyond one's ability and training.'
A poorly equipped group of cave divers ran out of air leading to one fatality, despite warnings from a more experienced group.