Gigi CASATI
- SPELEONAUT -
Activity
WHO I AM:
I was born
in Lecco on 28th June 1964.
My life as
a scuba diver began when I was 14 years old. After about 5 months of swimming
pool training, I passed my first level course of
recreational
scuba
diving issued by ANIS and PADI. I remember that I bought my diving equipment
piece by piece, starting with a second-hand single lined wetsuit which, with the
various attached patches, accompanied me on all my dives for the first 6 years.
I did most of these dives in Como lake, in all seasons, often reaching the
diving sites on my moped. I left home with the gear bag between my legs and a
single 18lt cylinder on my back! At 19 I succeeded in taking the frogman course
in ComSubIn entered the ComSubIn (the Italian’s Navy combat frogman force)and
took the frogman course and, at 21, I begin to attend the Lecco Caving Group. I
never imagined that after such a short period of time I would have progressively
abandon open water diving in favour of cave diving.
Everything
began in 1986 with a chance encounter with two Swiss cave divers. One of them,
because of the unforseen impossibility of reaching a sump in a cave located in
the area of Varese, asked the local cavers if they knew of a suitable
alternative in any of the caves in the surrounding areas. So they contacted
Paolo Cesana, our caving group’s chairman, who suggested a location in the Lecco
area and offered him our help. Very shortly after, we met the Swiss Patrick
Deriaz at the Fiumelatte cave site where we helped him to carry the necessary
equipment for the dive. I was shocked when Patrick, ready to dive with two
little 4lt cylinders, said that we would see each other again after about 4 or 5
hours. I, with my little experience, considered this cave dive to be like any
other normal dive, but now I realized that the possibility of finding dry spaces
to explore beyond the sump gave the dive different and intriguing prospects.
Since the
sump had a vertical development, Patrick came back to the surface a short while
after, saying that, since he was only a novice, he preferred not to go to a
depth beyond -20m. So he proposed returning there with a friend of his, who had
more experience of deep dives. In fact, the following week, Patrick arrived at
Fiumelatte site with Jean Jacques Bolanz. For the records, Jean Jacques went
down to a depth of -60m and then stopped in front of a fault that effectively
ended his progress.
These two
characteristic people shared my passion for diving but used a completely
different mental approach. For example the dive was carried out solo and the
equipment was fully adapted to suit that kind of dive which required solving
problems connected with that environment. This approach gave me the motivating
force to increase and broaden my knowledge. Our paths joined: at first I tried
to learn as much as I could following Jean Jacques step by step, then I started
to explore various sources and sumps, first the easier ones, and then gradually
increasing their level of difficulty.
This
passion allowed me to travel a lot around Europe in search of new cave sites to
explore. This not only gave me the opportunity to broaden and deepen my
knowledge in this fascinating activity of cave diving, but also helped me to
come into close contact with the inhabitants of the places I visited, and in so
doing, share my life with people who were different from me in customs and
culture. These contacts enriched my human and cultural perspectives, expanding
my horizons.
WHAT I DO:
Underwater
Speleology (the term derives from the Greek words “spelaion”= cave and “logos” =
discourse) is the scientific study of
caves which are
partially or fully filled with water. The activity of exploring flooded caves is
also named underwater speleology but it is more commonly known as cave diving,
which is the union between two particular and complex activities: caving and
diving.
The
combination of the two elements, earth (the caves) and water (which floods the
caves), not only amplifies the problems of understanding and safely dealing
with them, but also involves a range of fields of knowledge closely connected
with such environments. In fact, my explorations go beyond the purely sporting
aspect. They also want to provide a bringing in of data to a lot of scientific
studies such as the geology, hydrology, biology, palaeontology, archaeology,
etc. and in particular to the studies about the environment I am very interested
in: the Karst caves.
Cave
diving is an activity much more closely connected to the scientific world than
just to an exquisite sporting one, because without placing scientific support
before and after the explorations, it would be limited to itself and little
different from many other sporting activities. It is known that, only a few
cavers and even fewer cave divers are from the academic field, but it is also
true that their work directly on the sites and their constant contact with
professors, university researchers, etc.. have helped to resolve some
uncertainties and to make important discoveries. Currently, the cave and flooded
cave explorations have reached such a level of specialisation that to arrive at
the most distant and at times deepest points requires very experienced people.
The
sporting aspects of cave diving is also very important because it allows you to
get the general understanding of the cave morphology; topography gives us a
clear idea about the direction and tilt of the cavities; the reports documented
with photos and films show us particular places. However, to complete the
knowledge of a Karst system we need a scientific study that comes from
developing this data and this in turn will enable us to realise the different
variations of the system itself in depth.
ENVIRONMENT:
Cave
diving includes different types of explorations: the most evident, for those who
are not in this field, is the exploration of sources; more discreet and more
connected to the speleological world is the exploration of sumps inside the
caves; while the exploration of sea caves is more linked to the scuba diving
world. Beyond these, there are the rarer dives in lava tubes, and those in the
so called “moulins” that are channels of water which plunge down holes or tubes
deep into the bowels of the glacier.
MOTIVATIONS:
The driving
force, at least for myself, is the curiosity to see places that no one has ever
seen before, the desire to be the first to penetrate, with all due respect, in
perfectly unknown environments, the searching for my personal psychological
limits and resistance to fatigue, cold, etc…
Cave diving
has allowed me to experience deep and indescribable emotions, to see galleries
with bizarre and unimaginable forms of erosion, to dive huge and completely
flooded voids, to enchant myself at the sight of underwater concretions
(stalactites, stalagmites, columns, crystals, etc.) which illuminated by the
lights, create very suggestive patterns of light and shadows, to learn about
small animals who live in this peaceful world, to find archaeological remains
such as those from the period of the Maya in Mexico Cenotes, or, in Greece, to
see, in an underwater subterranean lake, Neolithic artefacts, and to discover
bones of animals which existed 35,000 years ago.
DIDACTICS:
I organize
Course PSS (Nitrox, Trimix and Cave) and Rebreather; I'm the Author of the book
"Manuale di
Speleologia Subacquea" Ed.Olimpia
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