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My friend Geoff Yeadon, who has died aged 75, was one of Britain’s leading cave divers.

An extraordinary explorer, in 1979 he and his fellow diver and friend Oliver Statham completed a treacherous 1.8km underwater swim in the North Yorkshire cave system connecting the Kingsdale Master Cave with Keld Head – at the time the world’s longest cave dive in a single direction.

The feat was recorded for posterity in a Yorkshire Television documentary, The Underground Eiger, which, when broadcast shortly afterwards, was watched by an astonishing 20 million viewers – giving both men, with their rock star looks and long hair, minor celebrity status for a time.

Just over a decade later, in 1991, Geoff completed, with Geoff Crossley, what was then another world-record breaking traverse of more than 3km through the flooded tunnel (sump) between King Pot and Keld Head. Requiring decompression stops because of its great depth to prevent an attack of the bends, the dive took more than six hours.

Born in Skipton, North Yorkshire, Geoff was the son of Thomas, a civil engineer, and Gladys (nee Pearson), a Post Office manager. His fascination with caving began at Skipton grammar school, where he joined other pupils on summer expeditions to unexplored caves that were led by one of his teachers, David Heap.

During his early 20s he moved on to the relatively new discipline of cave diving, and soon became one of its leading exponents, refining its techniques and developing new equipment that allowed him to go further and deeper than anyone had been before.

One early milestone was his discovery of the China Shop, a glistening array of fragile, straw-like stalactites beyond a long sump at Boreham cave in Littondale in the Yorkshire Dales. With Statham he also discovered Chamber 24 in Somerset’s Wookey Hole complex.

He and Statham had set up a pottery business together in Skipton, using the proceeds to fund their caving trips. But shortly after their big televised dive in 1979, Statham took his own life, leaving Geoff devastated – and without a diving partner.

By the early 1980s, by which time Geoff was working as a gas fitter and plumber, he had developed a new diving alliance with Crossley, a fire service officer. Together they found the long-sought link between Gaping Gill, a huge open shaft on Ingleborough Hill in North Yorkshire, and Ingleborough Cave in the valley far below. They then went on to essay their traverse between King Pot and Keld Head, which remains the longest undertaken in the UK, and has never been repeated.

The president of the Cave Diving Group from 2003 until his death, Geoff was awarded the British Empire Medal for services to cave diving in 2020. Even in his 70s he seemed to be indestructible, and twice a week continued to look for new caves as part of an informal group he dubbed “the chums”. He continued to work as a gas fitter and plumber until four years ago.

Despite his adventurous, roving spirit, Geoff was a devoted family man, having married Deborah Whinray in 1983. Deborah died in 2008; he is survived by their daughters, Elizabeth and Emily, and by Sarah, Deborah’s daughter from a previous relationship.