LooseBits

Peacock Springs is an underwater cave system located in North-central Florida. It is one of the largest underwater caves in the contenintal United States with over 28,000 ft of explored passageway. The cave system consists of seven major springs and sink holes, six of which are located within Peacock Springs State Park. Peacock Springs is a popular destination for cave divers all over the world and is extensively used to train new cave divers.

Springs and Sink Holes

Peacock I Springs

The Peacock I Spring is the most accessible and most popular sink hole in the system with a elevated walkway and stairs leading to the sink hole. There are three passageways that converge on the sinkhole called the Pothole tunnel, the Peanut tunnel and the Peacock II tunnel. Each of these three tunnels has a permanent guidline (called a gold line) placed in it to ease navigation by cave divers. As of 2006, these guidelines start just within the cave system so they cannot be see by snorkelers or open water scuba divers.

Pothole Tunnel

The Pothole tunnel, named for the sinkhole 450 feet down the tunnel from Peacock I, is the deepest of the three tunnels with a maximum depth of 65 feet. It contains large open passage ways, relatively high ceilings and a silt bottom. The walls are often covered in silt but occasionally the silt will be blown away by floods exposing the white limestone underneath.

Peanut Tunnel

The Peanut tunnel is a relativly shallow and narrow tunnel. It is named for a section that resembels the two lobes of a peanut. Its depths range from 20 to 60 feet. At approximately 500 and 1000 feet into the tunnel, crossover tunnels connect the Peanut tunnel to the Pothole tunnel.

Peacock II Tunnel

The Peacock II tunnel leads to the Peacock II spring.

Pothole

Pothole is a small inline sink approximately one third of the distance between Peacock I and Olsen. The sink hole has a very small entrance into the Peacock Springs cave system and due to the steep sides, it is inaccessable to cave divers.

Olsen

Olsen is a small inline sink approximately 1500 feet from Peacock I down the Pothole tunnel. There are two small entrances into the cave system at Olsen dropping into the same tunnel. Being central to the cave system, Olsen was once a popular entrance for cave divers as it allowed easy access to much of the cave. To prevent errosion, cave divers are no longer permitted to enter at Olsen sink although it remains a popular place to temporarily surface durring a dive.

Orange Grove

Orange Grove is a large terminal sink northeast of Peacock I. With a raised walkway and stairs leading into the sink hole, it is a popular entrance into the cave. Two winding tunnels extend from the sink hole called Lower Orange Grove and Upper Orange Grove. Lower Orange Grove is a deeper tunnel extending down to 180 feet. As a very advanced dive, it is not as popular as Upper Orange Grove. Upper Orange Grove is a winding tunnel in all three dimensions starting at 70 feet deep and becoming as shallow as 40 feet. The tunnel extends outside Peacock Spring State Park to Challenge Sink.

Challenge

Challenge is an inline sink, the northen most sink hole in the system, and is the only sink hole outside of the Peacock Springs State Park. Steep sides makes entering and exiting Challenge difficult. It is a popular destination for divers entering Upper Orange Grove

Contraversy

There are several issues concerning the Peacock Springs cave system that have sparked much debate amoung the cave diving community. First of all is the arragement of the permanate guide lines in the system. The extension of the lines in the Peacock I Spring to within several feet of open water is one of the more debated issues. Proponents of extending the lines all the way to open water include local cave divers who feel that doing so would ease access to the system by not requiring divers to lay their own temporary lines to connect to the permanate lines. They also point out that extending these lines would reduce damage to the cave for the same reasons. Proponents of moving the lines further back into the system argue that as Peacock is a popular location for the training of new cave divers, bringing the lines all the way into open water makes the task of teaching the skills needed to lay a temporary line more difficult. They also argue that having the lines in open water tempts divers without sufficient training to enter the cave and would lead to more fatalities. Another issue that has caused some contraversy is the ban on diver propulsion vehicles in the cave system requiring divers to swim under their own power making sections of the cave inaccessible to many divers. The justification for this is that as the Peacock cave system has relatively little current, there is no need for DPV's and prohibbiting them will help save the cave system from damage caused by inexperienced DPV divers.