Scuba Geek

Turner Sink update from WKPP July 31, 2006

Posted by Andy Carroll in : CaveDiving , trackback

I was browsing through the GUE website as you do and saw this recent report from the WKPP exploration of Turner Sink during June. Turner Sink is seen as an important part of the continuing exploration of Wakulla Springs and it is hoped that exploration of this system will lead to more answers about the cave systems in the area. Casey McKinlay begins his report by describing the long wait the WKPP have had to endure for the conditions to be right;

Precious few assaults had been mounted against the labyrinth of Turner Sink; the cave had only seen two notable exploration pushes in 15 years. The first exploration was conducted by Gavin, Irvine and English in 1992 and the second by Irvine, Jablonski and Mckinlay in 2002. This enigmatic sink was the last of the big caves in the WKP to clear; this together with a heavy emphasis at Wakulla Springs and difficult logistics at Turner discouraged regular exploration. This was a long time to wait for a shot at serious exploration. Turner Sink is the southernmost entrance to the Leon Sinks Cave System; exploring south would help to answer important questions being asked by a range of state and federal managers. Over the years, Turner had come to represent both the key to unraveling the secrets of the Woodville Karst Plain while also epitomizing exploration in the WKP.

The exploration dive went extremely well and after a bottom time of 210 minutes at 280ft, the team decompressed for a further 10 hours before finally surfacing after 900 minutes or so. An awesome dive! We’ll let Casey have the last word though;

The operation was tremendously successful and confirmed without a doubt the trending direction of the Leon Sinks Cave System. The compass indicated a general southeast direction with the majority of shots between 50 and 130 degrees. Data provided to Chris Werner and Todd Kincaid was immediately plotted on the map indicating a clear trend towards the southwest section of Wakulla Springs. Straightline distance between the P-Tunnel area and the end of the line in Turner is 15,000ft. Objectives going forward will be to identify an incoming north tunnel in Wakulla and explore north while continuing to push Turner south if conditions hold. Turner gave no indication that it plans to come up to a sinkhole and continues to get larger. If we can knock out the connection and answer 50+ years of speculation we can then focus on planning the 50,000ft swim through from Turner to Wakulla.

Special thanks to my dive partners Jarrod Jablonski and David Rhea. A few words come to mind but “solid” seems to sum it up best.