Re: [Texascavers] RE: Dangers of caving
We always hear the base rates for these things. For example, the CDC ( http://wonder.cdc.gov/wonder/PrevGuid/m0052833/m0052833.asp ) says an average of 82 people died from lightning in the US between 1980-1995. But we don't know how many man hours outside was required for this. If during the same time the US average of 250 million people or so spent an average of 10 minutes outdoors in thunderstorms per year (low estimate), this would be 25 million thunderstorm man hours per 82 deaths and the risk of death would be 1 death per 300,000 thunderstorm man hours. This would be the important statistic governing the dangerosity of lightning because it estimates how much risky behavior (exposing oneself to lightning) results in each death. I'm guessing these data just to show how the calculation is done. To estimate the dangerosity of caving, we'd need to know how many man hours were spent underground for several years and the corresponding number of fatal accidents. To be useful, we'd also want to separate out horizontal vs vertical caving, cave diving, and caving by non-cavers. As in ALL cases involving injury, it is also obligatory to separate out factors like drinking, though in my experience this is not as common as, say, drinking and driving, which produces something like a 20-fold modifier in the number of deaths per driving hour or driving mile. You need to do the same thing to assess the danger of driving vs flying (also do per mile), comparing traveling abroad vs in the US or comparing the risks of living in certain cities, and other things that people talk about a lot. I know I once tried to work out flying vs driving. Per hour, it seems that flying is more dangerous. Per distance, cars are. For something like smoking that causes an accumulated risk of early death, it may be more useful to compare time smoked to time lost. (It's 4:1.) Speaking of flying and caving, I once was going to go on a flying trip in a single-engine plane, but my pilot was on the cave-rescue call list in Bloomington, Indiana and was called out on a search. They found the lost boys drunk in the back of a cave, burning their shirts for light. It was Y2K morning. They'd gone out to celebrate the millennium. SO, obviously, drinking and Y2K can (via caving) cause not flying. I'm sure the base rate and the per flight rate of this is very small. Gregg - Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com
[Texascavers] RE: Dangers of caving
Chris Vreeland said: caving, it falls somewhere between Soccer and Golf on the scale of dangerosity. This doesn't include cave diving, which would skew the numbers, as diving appears to be quite a bit more dangerous. I really like dangerosity! :-) Even the kind of dry caving you do, and where you do it, greatly affects the risk. The original statement concerned caving in Austin, which must be on the safer end of all types of caving. For example, there are few vertical drops and flooding is generally not much of an issue, although it can be in certain cases. The caves, with a couple of exceptions, are not very long or complex and they are relatively warm. I can think of many more dangerous places to go caving. As they say, the most dangerous part of a caving trip is the drive there and back! That probably applies to soccer, golf, and most other sports as well. Lyndon Tiu said: People get injured or killed playing golf?! Killed probably not, but injured, sure. Golfer's elbow, for example. What about being hit by an errant ball? Here's a case of both: http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200704/s1898186.htm I'd stay underground where it's safer! ;-) Mark Minton
Re: [Texascavers] RE: Dangers of caving
People get injured or killed playing golf?! Killed probably not, but injured, sure. Golfer's elbow, for example. What about the risk of being struck by lightening while playing golf? That is probably more likely to occur than having a caving accident. And of course there is the threat of drive by shootings while on the golf course. And then there is the dreaded fashion mistake of wearing seer sucker shorts before Memorial Daywhich can lead to a lifetime banishment from the country clubforcing one onto to Municipal Courses adjacent to the civic zoo which might lead to an escape by dangerous animalsand one encountering a tiget on the 13th hole. Personally, I will take my chances undergroundas I have no desire to walk around a field with a lightening rod in my hands.
RE: [Texascavers] RE: Dangers of caving
Golf is a good walk spoiled. Mark Twain From: John P Brooks [mailto:jpbrook...@sbcglobal.net] Sent: Thursday, November 01, 2007 11:01 AM To: Minton, Mark; texascavers@texascavers.com Subject: Re: [Texascavers] RE: Dangers of caving People get injured or killed playing golf?! Killed probably not, but injured, sure. Golfer's elbow, for example. What about the risk of being struck by lightening while playing golf? That is probably more likely to occur than having a caving accident. And of course there is the threat of drive by shootings while on the golf course. And then there is the dreaded fashion mistake of wearing seer sucker shorts before Memorial Daywhich can lead to a lifetime banishment from the country clubforcing one onto to Municipal Courses adjacent to the civic zoo which might lead to an escape by dangerous animalsand one encountering a tiget on the 13th hole. Personally, I will take my chances undergroundas I have no desire to walk around a field with a lightening rod in my hands.
