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| A leisure caving that quickly turned into survival scenario. Java Indonesia |
Disclaimer: I am not
a cave-diving specialist. The fiction
narrative below is based on my experience as a Scuba Dive Master, limited wreck
and cave-diving experience, and a few spelunking (caving) trips – including 1
major trip in Java where my team got lost for 6 hours with no map, guide and
extra provisions. And although part of
mountain and water - Search & Rescue team, hands-on experience are mostly
reef-diving related.
*
Invite me to participate in the Thai cave rescue and there
will be no second thoughts to say NO! Or
I’ll think 100 times, 99% saying No. That 1%? – It’ll be ”If there’s no other choice”
and/or a loved one was trap in there. It
will be a big life risk – equally, if not more dangerous than climbing a high-altitude
mountain ridge with a sudden squall.
Caving alone is dangerous, but mixed with diving will be something
else. Further mix it with a complex task
to rescue teenagers – that’ll be a perfect recipe for disaster. There’s very little margin for error, if at
all.
Now, inspired by Discovery Channel’s feature - here’s to provide a (fake) story to give some
audience a ‘feel and glimpse’ of what it could be like for the rescue divers….
The fear, the daunting tasks, the thankless job.
There’s no other choice! (fiction)
Incidentally on a business trip in Bangkok (naks) and after
hearing the news – going to the incident site – Chiang Rai, could be a good
side trip for an adventure-tour. The
place was chaotic as expected with more than 60% people having no direct
relevant skills for the actual rescue.
Mostly with good intent to help of course.
International cave-dive specialists, and local military
divers (who in my guess are not cave specialists as well – as it’s usually
expensive for military personnel to get extra certifications and so much more to get a professional license) take turns in the difficult task to setup the ‘route’
with guide rope, safety tanks along the route, underwater light markers,
provisions for the survivors including specialized full-face mask and scuba
units. The full-face mask should
eliminate the primary issue of breathing thru the mouth (vs. naturally thru the
nose), although will most likely fog up the mask making the near-zero
visibility route – miserably invisible.
Constant breathing of compressed air will consequentially bring
large amount of ‘air bubbles’ in one’s system forcing each diver to take a long
rest to ‘gas off’. A rescue diver
cannot just dive forever lest he risk DCS or decompression sickness which could
lead to paralysis or death. Use of
special gas like Nitrox may lessen the risk.
(Discovery feature kept mentioning ‘oxygen tank’ – this may have been
used for recovery breathing post-dive, or used in the survivors’ chamber
(unlikely?) but note that rescue divers cannot use pure O2 lest they risk
convulsions due to O2 poisoning).
Down to few more ‘available divers’ and the growing risk of
further flooding shortening the safe window for the survivors – I convinced
myself to volunteer and help (naks).
i.e. After lingering for 3 hours and hesitating for like – forever. It is a scary job. But there’s a higher principle here.
The rescue command lead hesitated to accept new volunteers
especially someone who has not gone thru route familiarization dive (in real
life, they will not take the risk, he he) – but believing in short
‘qualification narrative’ he reluctantly gave in.
As a rescue diver, one needs to be 100% familiar with the
route – at least via map, distance estimates, known points in the route (air
chamber, safety tanks, narrow points, current surge points, etc.) and 100% familiar with your equipment, gears
and what-nots, equally important is the dive procedure and communication. Even in a near-zero, if not zero
visibility. Military divers will have an
advantage in the darkness as they are trained to operate without artificial
light.
Getting inside the non-submerged cave was already difficult
with tight wetsuit, booties with insufficient sole thickness to tolerate sharp
limestone rocks, with heavy scuba unit (BCD, tank, regulator), helmet (required
to avoid hitting stalactites or other sharp stones), while also carrying your
fins, lead weights, 3 torches (at least), dive knife, and in my case – a spare
tank for the paranoid. A spare air tank
could be a size of a big water bottle carried on the side for emergency, with
small mouth regulator attached to the top-end to suck in air on demand.
If you’re claustrophobic, or just a bit – this will be a
nightmare scenario.
Reaching the submerged section – heart skipped 2 or 3 beats
out of fear and anxiety. Even navy seals
would have felt a little scared.
The first 5 to 10mins will be the most crucial. It will tell you what kind of shit you’re in
– and give you doubting question on why the hell did you even go there.
The water temperature was (I"m guessing) 27 if not 26C. COLD for a tropical Asian guy especially if
he’s wearing 3mm neoprene wetsuit.
Submerging, you were suddenly enveloped in darkness, with little light
reflection from the lead diver.
Adjusting the ‘zoom’ of the torch to high beam revealed a murky, turbid
water – instantly bouncing back white light (think car headlight’s high beam on
a foggy road), and forcing one to switch back to low beam mode. With little navigational use in a very dark
cave.
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| This is a reef dive in Mabini, with bad (5m) visibility. 5x better already than cave diving! |
The first 5-10 minutes is like a ‘test and adjustment’ –
building self-confidence and comfort in a dangerous environment. There will be an air packet not far from the
start – so there’s a possible ‘adjustment point’ for failing gears, or to
recover from built-up fear. Large
bubbles blobbed here and there making the eerie environment a bit lively – but
also a bad indicator of hyperventilation – out of fear and discomfort. Control!
Contrary to popular belief, even professional divers have
their own ‘fear reminders’ from time to time.
Stop-think-act. Don’t just react
in panic. Be in control. Easier said
than done.
With usual 6lbs of lead weight, I favored 8+2lbs to ‘sink well' and avoid hitting the sharp ceiling, the +2lbs is for the survivor in case
he becomes a bit buoyant.
Reef diving in darkness is pleasant, with night creatures
all around. But doing it in a tight cave
is a total nightmare, with no surface to ‘surface to’ in case of
emergency. One just need to accept and
resign to this fact, a mental process.
After like forever, the lead diver swam up and surfaced to
the first (and maybe last in the route) air chamber.
The monsoon rain was still flooding the cave system filling up other potential rest-points. Quickly followed -and relieved that you made
this far. A big milestone! And it was probably just 1/5 or ¼ of the
entire route, just going in! I removed
mask to ‘relieve my nose’ and breath thru it.
Mask is always my problem, exhaling thru the nose will fog it up, a
little leak will send trickle of water in one’s nose causing panic or at least
discomfort. Control! Exhale thru the nose if there’s water to
displace it and clear the mask. I
quickly composed myself and ask the lead diver “You good?” Here’s a tip:
Always ask this question first to show that you are the braver one! The reality could be – that both of you are
shit-scared!
Put back the mask and “reg” and started the short descent to
the next section, anxiety never seems to go away. There’s several kilometers to go. The ‘torpedo’ - propeller-aided swimming device
was a help in the long swim section, especially when there was a backward surge
(current). Still, both of you are in a
dangerous place with no choice but to reach the survivors’ chamber no matter
what.
Started to relax a bit more, controlling breathing while
silently singing “and now, the end is near, and so I face….”, consequently
producing smaller bubbles doing blop-(pause)-blop-(pause)-blop. One needs to always conserve his/her air supply by doing continuous but controlled breathing. The little trickle of water in the mask
didn’t seem to bother anymore even. It’s
probably the only section of the entire dive that was ‘ok’ generally. Going back will be different.
Finally, the distance counter (if there’s even an underwater Magellan
version) or rather, the last underwater marker was visible from a short
distance. It was a blinking red
light. A bad choice for bad viz, but a
welcome news anyway.
Surfacing and finally reaching the last chamber – it was predominantly
a feeling of relief mixed with forced triumph.
“Hello! Swasdi!” - then answered with a chorus of the same words. 4 more boys left and the one in line was a
frail-looking 13 year-older who seemed to have lost 10 lbs of weight. Relaxing a bit, and giving many words of
comfort (critical for any face-to-face rescue effort), the words of comfort
were like 3 positive adjectives for every noun.
“Such a great-looking, confident, brave boy you are” – but which were
briefly translated to 2 words in Thai by another local diver.
While this was happening, you start the notice the poor
condition that the survivors had to endure for +10days! Unthinkably miserable! With urine and poops mixing with the environment
– it was an added misery and health risk to everyone. Not counting the large
presence of CO2 (toxic if inhaled) and the depleting amount of oxygen. Elon Musk could have donated a space-X’s portable
CO2 absorber, or better a portable algae-based CO2-to-O2 recycling system used
by NASA.
Back to the survivors - establishing connection, via
glove-less touch and/or eye-to-eye will be crucial to build trust. Doing a long, clear pre-dive briefing is
extra important. The medical team
somehow administered a ‘relaxant’ drug so the boy didn’t seem to be overly nervous. But that doesn’t
remove the risk, just lessen the possible panic.
Instantly on a rescue mode, professional training comes back
and you were down to task-by-task effort.
Put on the gear on the boy – in 1,2,3 manner, making sure an important
step is not missed. Then re-checked. While still giving
words of comfort to bring up the confidence.
You can never say “we might die if you don’t do this”, you have to give
it a spin to come up with a positive version.
A few tests in shallower water will bring a bit of
confidence. Then finally, we all
submerged. With great anxiety. One failure in the deep, middle section will
prove catastrophic not just for the survivor – but to both divers as well. "This is it!"
The lead diver has a more critical task. To closely monitor
the situation, constantly checking any signs of problems, side-flashing his
light to see the boy’s eye (a wide-eye scenario is a panic scenario that needs
to be controlled immediately). Given the
near-zero visibility, a momentary blinding light is the only option to check
the survivor’s eye. He flashed an “ok”
sign, and the boy seems to respond the same. Good so far!
Lead diver will be more exhausted as he ensures that their
leash was a bit tight, constantly giving a good, controlled pull to aid the
boy’s swimming. With extra exertion - a
sudden cramp attack in this environment is another nightmare scenario waiting
to happen. Failing to notice signs of an
impending cramp could lead to panic, to disaster.
Now as a safety, rear diver – you have to watch for both lead diver and
the boy, constantly flashing torch to check for any signs of problems. It was a tiring task to closely and constantly
monitor what was going on, in a very dark place.
Underwater. Inside a freaking
cave!
Pulling in to check from the side, all gear parts seems to be
ok. Air gauges also indicated good amount of air left, enough for the trip back. The expected large and frequent bubbles
indicated a heightened sense of fear or anxiety, although didn’t seem to be out
of control. The movement seems relaxed
enough with no signs of constant, violent struggles. Perhaps the sedative was taking a good
effect. I hope it doesn’t have a
long-term effect on his system – being young and in a bad state for so long.
The same, long submerged section seems to be quiet and
uneventful – and you started to relax.
Somehow you felt comfortable now that this seems to be working as planned! That
you will all survive!
And just as you prayed, you finally reached the air pocket
section, almost celebrating that you’ve succeeded. The
tight section proved to be a difficult going however. You wished that Mr. Musk really did fill his technology or opportunity
gap and made a good drill to make use of that capsule-gamow bag. In my mind – if that was designed to have a
flexible, segmented, non-rigid hull – with Bot-controlled navigation equipped
with infrared and sonar, and small battery to drive a small propeller – that
will be a superb rescue tool! Actually, all these techs are already available – just a
matter of assembling them in a useful unit. (I should get a sales commission for suggesting this).
But that was ideal, reality is that – you go back to basics,
old-school if you call it – to win the day!
Finally, the last submerged part was reached, and the
stand-by cave rescuers were all but excited and ready to continue the next
rescue effort. 6 to 1 ratio will be
ideal for typical surface rescue – and there are hundred non-divers ready to
help. They quickly snatched the survivor
and move in a quick rescue motion – professionally done in all manners. No one seems to even notice you or your lead
diver. The task was done. You were no longer the focus. You have a mixed feeling, of triumph, and of
incompleteness – you’d want to see it thru, to bring the survivor to his
family, or at least to the medical van.
But that is not the procedure. You break the difficult effort into chunks.
And your chunk was done. Great job! Now
be quiet and rest.
It’s after all, a thankless job.
No award, no rewards, not even a TV interview. :) But to the men and women who directly contributed to the rescue effort –
they are silent heroes. Deep in their
hearts, they know they did well, spectacularly well.
They risked their lives to save others. The boys will be more famous than any of
them. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is that – the 13 boys
survived. It was a sad incident to lose
a rescuer– but all other rescuers selflessly risked their lives and
succeeded. Good job!
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