Basic Cave Diving: A Blueprint for Survival

by Sheck Exley

ppbk manual

Genres: Nonfiction

46 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1986

Reviews

[Rolands Jegorovs · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's not really possible to rate the book that was used as basis for safe cave diving that we know today. The cultural influence of this book merits the 5 stars.

Reading Sheck Exley's book was more out of curiosity for what he advocated already back in 1979. There's plenty of books that are much more useful nowadays when it comes to practical and latest theoretical knowledge about cave diving and diving in general from authors like Jill Heinerth, Stratis Kas, Gareth Lock. Though, admittedly not all of them delve into details of accident analysis and prevention. Something that Basic Cave Diving focuses on. I do suggest Close Calls by Stratis Kas for more about this topic.

What I did enjoy from this book was that each chapter had an accident analysis. I wish every diving book would follow such approach showcasing what could happen. Some of the accounts are just unfathomable for todays cave diving but occasionally someone with no experience or poor skills still decides to venture into a cave somewhere. I know one firsthand account of a scuba diving instructor that died in a simple, short sea cave. He did not have cave diving training. It was totally preventable.

All in all, a fun read.

[Ciaran · Rating 5 out of 5]

How does one begin to assess the quality of a safety manual like this? Sheck Exley set out to make an informative booklet to help instruct his fellow cave divers in best practices, and I'd argue he nails it. I have no experience in the field myself (I find it interesting, and the stories are more than a little harrowing), but I can put myself in the scenarios that Exley cites and take the lessons to heart.

If you're interested in cave diving to any degree, you owe it to yourself to read this one. The National Speleological Society Cave Diving Section has provided it for free on their website (nsscds dot org), and you can find it on the internet archive as well.

[David Syzdek · Rating 5 out of 5]

Classic guide on how not to die while cave diving. This book came out in 1979 and is very relevant to my recent cave dive training and covers the basics in enough detail to get you to think about how to plan for inevitable mistakes and failures. This book is like a distillation of many NTSB Reports on airplane crashes — this is what happened and here is how to prevent it from happening again.

This book is a must read for any cave diver.

[Scot Parker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Written in the 70s by possibly the greatest cave diver of all time, this book has helped cave divers dive safely ever since. This book remains wholly relevant today; if you are interested in cave diving, you should read this. It also will likely be required reading for your full cave course.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

More of a pamphlet than a book, it covers the 7 most popular ways to die inside of a cave, what happens when, how to deal with it, and how to prevent it, by analyzing actual cave accidents.