Danger? It's Not Over Until It's Over
"Diving is not easy. For people who have never done it, it will be difficult, unlike diving in a swimming pool, because the cave's features have small channels."
"If something happens midway, it could be life-threatening."
Thai Interior Minister Anupong Paojindaa
"[There were] complications and problems. They [British divers] were having to swim against the currents and pull themselves along the walls."
"The visibility wouldn't have been very good."
Bill Whitehouse, spokesman, British Cave Rescue Council
"Any attempt to dive the boys and their coach out will not be taken lightly because there are significant technical challenges and risks to consider."
"[The boys are] located in a relatively small space and this would make any potential drilling attempt as a means of rescue [as an alternate escape route] very difficult."
British Cave Rescue Council statement
Hoping to discover an alternate escape route other than the one currently being considered which would include guiding the twelve boys and their coach underwater through the cave system to safety, rescuers have been looking elsewhere for promising potentials, searching the side of the mountain to determine whether passage could be found into the caverns below. Backhoes and drilling equipment were put in place but the logistics of creating a large enough shaft to enable extracting the boys would be seriously complex and time-consuming.
Not that the alternative is much less so. The problem seems insolvable for the moment. The option of leaving the group where they are, on their dry, cramped shelf space above the flood waters and delivering food and any other supplies deemed necessary while the wait continues for the waters to subside either naturally or through pumping efforts -- or until another exit can be found is also complicated, fraught with danger, and time-wasting. Alternatives are few to offer simpler solutions.
The diving option would be the fastest solution but yet perhaps the most dangerous in hopes of extracting the group safely. "Trying to take non-divers through the cave is one of the most dangerous situations possible, even if the dives are relatively easy", warned Anmar Mirza, national coordinator of the National Cave Rescue Commission in the United States. It took the two British divers who managed to reach the stranded boys and their coach three hours underwater. Hardly an adventurous option for novices.
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| None of the boys can swim. Picture: Thai Navy SEALs via Getty ImagesSource:Getty Images |
The divers, Rick Stanton and John Volanthen, first to reach the boys and their coach within the Luang Nang Non Cave on Monday came across them almost by accident, when Volanthen was placing guide lines in an effort to close the gap toward the missing group. Running out of line, he was forced to the water's surface. And there, to his amazement, sat the boys on a ledge, watching him, illuminated by his head lamp. The drama of the search and the wearying wonder whether the boys and coach remained alive was concluded.
But left was the dilemma of how they could be rescued. The ten kilometres of narrow passageways and wide, lofty chambers under the mountainside with the rocky, muddy ground and elevation alterations represent extremely difficult terrain under any conditions. Flooded and an estimated 800 metres below the surface, around 2 kilometres into the cave, the circumstances are acutely difficult. The rainy season lasts through October, and heavy rains are forecasted to continue into the weekend.
There is the potential with heavy rains due to continue through to July ten, for water to steadily rise in the cave again, further complicating the supply missions, let alone any possible extrication at this point. But the possibility of the boys requiring diving gear to swim out of their predicament is a real one with no option but to be brought out through the complicated route their rescuers entered to find them; in murky waters impairing vision, close quarters requiring hand propulsion, and a three-hour duration.
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| The boys may have to be tethered to rescue divers during the operation. Picture: AFP PHOTO / Ye Aung ThuSource:AFP |
Among other details being discussed is the very real possibility that alternately, the group will have to be confined where they are for weeks, even months. They've been described as healthy and well looked after, with seven members of the Thai navy SEALs present with them, including medics. In stable condition, they are being served high protein liquids. According to SEAL commander Rear Adm. Arpakorn Yookongkaew, there was no particular rush to haul them out; where they remain is safe for the time being.
"We have given the boys food, starting from easily digested and high-powered food with enough minerals", assured Mr. Arpakorn. "They are very weak and very skinny", noted cave diver Ben Reymenants, assisting in the rescue effort. He was, he said, "very surprised obviously that they are all alive and actually mentally also healthy". A doctor and a nurse have both offered to stay with the stranded group of boys for the duration of their ordeal, even if it does, in the end, take months. But the situation could change at any time and a decision made to proceed with a dive.
"[The boys would have to undergo] immediate and intensive training [if they were to stand any chance of exiting the cave alive]."
"Normal cave diving requires skills that go beyond what 99 per cent of the world’s divers have ever seen, which is why it is so very hard to become certified to dive in caves. The diving required in this cave, however, is not normal cave diving, and the rescuers are not normal cave divers."
"The greatest enemy to a diver is panic. Students who are accustomed to the normal mishaps of swimming, like accidentally getting water in the mouth or eyes, will usually have no trouble, but for people with little swimming experience, such a minor event can lead to irrational panic."
"Most of the Thai team members are nonswimmers, and the culture there has a common belief that swimming is extremely dangerous. That starts any training in a serious deficit."
American cave diving expert
Labels: Caves, Floods, Rescue, Thailand, Trapped Boys
posted by Pieface @ Thursday, July 05, 2018
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