Dean's Blue Hole

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Dean's Blue Hole (2011)

Dean's Blue Hole is located in a bay west of Clarence Town on Long Island , one of the islands of the Bahamas in the North Atlantic. With a depth of 202 m, it is one of the deepest blue holes in the world.

Emergence

The 202 m deep funnel is circular and 25 to 30 meters wide. After a depth of 20 meters, the actual cave begins with a diameter of up to 100 m. This is the second largest known underwater cave and the ninth largest cave in the world. There are several hypotheses about how this cave came about: One says that seeping rainwater reached and reacted with cracks in the limestone floor of the sea during the last two ice ages around 15,000 years ago .

Another assumption is that an even larger underground cave collapsed, creating a smaller one.

Diving

William Trubridge freediving at Dean's Blue Hole

Due to its large number of corals and reef fish as well as its good accessibility, Dean's Blue Hole is a popular destination for recreational and freediving divers .

William Trubridge , the world's leading apnea diver in the constant weight without fins (CNF) discipline, has opened his own diving school on Long Island called Vertical Blue Freediving especially for apnea training. This also organizes the annual Vertical Blue competition, VB 2012 , VB 2013 , etc. Every apnea diver needs safety divers to practice his sport. If he is planning a record attempt, official referees from the International Freediving Association AIDA must be present. During the days of the VB competitions, this infrastructure is available to every diver, which reduces the costs and organizational effort for a record attempt for the participants. The competition is correspondingly popular among elite athletes, and many world records have been set here.

  • In September 1992 Jim King was the only one who managed to dive to the bottom of the cave with special breathing gases.
  • On April 25, 2010, Constant Weight (CWT) discipline , Herbert Nitsch (Austria) set a new record with 124 m.
  • William Trubridge set a new record in the constant weight without fins (CNF) discipline with a depth of 101 meters, which he improved by another meter to 102 meters in July 2016.

In a record attempt that took place here on November 17, 2013, the freediver Nicholas Mevoli had a fatal accident.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Dean's Blue Hole , Atlas Obscura (English)
  2. ^ Morphometry and hydrology of Dean's Blue Hole, Long Island, Bahamas. Journal of Science. Vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 10-14. 1994.
  3. ^ Caribbean geology: into the third millenium . Transactions of the Fifteenth Caribbean Geological Conference
  4. ^ Website of the Vertical Blue competition
  5. ↑ Youtube video , accessed on August 11, 2016.
  6. ↑ Freediving: Deans blue hole - Bahamas , accessed August 11, 2016.
  7. ↑ Nicholas Mevoli: Death of a Freediver. Spiegel Online, November 18, 2013.

Coordinates: 23 ° 6 ′ 23 ″  N , 75 ° 0 ′ 31 ″  W.