https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/02/world/asia/thailand-boys-rescued.html

It's nice to see "good news" stories every now and then. I thought they'd all be dead.

Alive, yes. Rescued, no. It's going to be hairy getting them out of there. The tunnels are now flooded and they'll have to wear diving gear to get out. More heavy rain is expected the next few days so the water will come up, not go down, even though they're pumping like crazy. They have to wear scuba gear and crawl through some narrow tunnels to get out. Some can't swim. The rescuers will have to train them on the spot. A panic will likely mean a dead kid. The news yesterday said they figured they only had 1 day to get them trained and out before the water level got too high to save them.

How did a boy's soccer team wind up in a flooded cave to begin with?

Amazing story, hope they come out soon.

one dumbass

American SOF guys are there assisting. Problem solved, partying in Thailand to follow, happy endings for all.


mike r

I just read that they are planning on bringing in 4 months worth of food and waiting for the monsoon season to end. They also said they will try to teach the boys to swim, in case they need to get them out.

Crazy

I've been in caves where there was a guy posted outside to watch for rain.

Had communication to the lead party, because the low part was toward the entrance to the cave.

These guys probably need sleeping bags, food and water. Wait it out.

More of an inconvenience than life threatening, be worse to try and take em out underwater.

It can be a real PITA to move supplies through a cave.

They’re like three kilometers from the entrance. Many kudos to the divers who entered those murky, moving waters to find ‘em.

So, more rain wont flood them?

I don't know this cave, but it's probably mapped, so the rescuers know they're above where a flood would happen.

They crossed a low point in the cave, from what's reported a narrow area, which can mean a lotta things, but this area was apparently a low point where water flows after a rain.

The kids could be 100 feet above that point, in no danger of flooding, but can't come back to the entrance because they can't cross the submerged area.

Rain that falls on hollow hills, like we have in the Ozarks, can take weeks to percolate through the rock. That's why they can't just pump out the low area.

And every day it rains pushes back the day their return will happen.

People always worry about caves collapsin, but that rarely happens. Cave's been there for thousands of years, it ain't gonna fall in.

Most problems concern losin light sources, bein turned around, or traversin a mud hill that then gets too slippery to come back up.

There are a number of possibilities on how they'll do the rescue. Here's a WAPO article that outlines some of them. Who knows what the final decision will be. SOCCER TEAM

No need for them to know how to swim. Swimming is something you do on the surface to keep access to air. They would have scuba tanks on. Keeping them from panicking, that's the issue.

This is a wild story and it does remind me of the trapped Chilean miners. Well, Thank God they found the young yard-apes and can now provide them with food, medical care etc.

They were found by a team of Brits, and we have US teams over there so they are surely getting the Best and the Brightest to help.
I would not be surprised if they wind up drilling a hole and bringing them up that way like the Chilean miners. Trying to get a bunch of kids, who can't swim, out with scuba gear is a daunting challenge.

Goddam I'm glad I'm not stuck in that hole I would be having a raging fit of claustrophobia.

Yard-apes? OK buddy - head back to your trailer. Maybe reflect on why you are so angry at people who had nothing to do with your downfall.

I call all children yard-apes including my nieces and nephews, right in front of their parents.
It looks like you are the one who is angry I suggest you call your psychiatrist, hopefully they will put you through even though it is the Fourth, tell your Doctor that the Prozac isn't working and you need something a little stronger.

Good luck, and hang in there, hopefully you will get through this OK.

unfortunately link is unreadable

It opens fine for me and I don't have a subscription for the site. Here's a cut & paste.

SINGAPORE — They’re alive and in relatively decent shape, given their ordeal, but many challenges remain for 12 boys and a soccer coach who so far have survived 10 days inside a flooded cave in Thailand and are still a long way from seeing daylight.

Divers who braved murky ­water and strong currents found the soccer team Monday on a dry ledge more than a mile from the mouth of the cave. The team remained there Tuesday, no longer alone and with food, water and medicine, as authorities tried to figure out how to extract them safely.

This is the season of the monsoon, with two inches of rain forecast to fall through Sunday. The monsoon lasts until the end of summer. The water in the cave is expected to rise.

The boys and their coach are not in danger of drowning. But the floodwaters cut off their path of escape. None of the boys can swim. Officials are considering giving the entire group a crash course in cave diving so that they can swim through flooded passages.

The joyous news that the soccer team was found alive has been coupled with vexation over what to do next. A thousand people at least are involved in the rescue effort, with help coming from around the globe, but technology is struggling to overcome the geology of the Tham Luang cave complex.

There is no simple way to save the trapped team.

Engineers have drained water from portions of the cave, but it is a vast subterranean cavern fed by a broad watershed. There is no sign that the efforts have lowered water levels to a point that would allow an extraction on foot.

Officials said Tuesday they might try to bring some of the boys out within a matter of hours, but they also said they do not want to take unnecessary risks. At one point Tuesday, officials suggested that the rescue could take months.

“We will not rush to take the lads out of the cave,” the governor of Chiang Rai province, Narongsak Osoththanakorn, told reporters, according to the BBC.

The boys range in age from 11 to 16, and are with their 25-year-old coach. They went missing on June 23 while exploring the six-mile-long cave, which is in a park in northern Thailand near the Myanmar border.

The world’s attention has been riveted to their story, which echoes the tale of the 33 Chilean miners who were trapped for 69 days nearly half a mile below the surface in 2010. Engineers there eventually drilled a vertical hole to reach their chamber, and all the miners were pulled to the surface one by one while a global audience watched on live television.


The members of the Thai soccer team were discovered Monday by two British divers, Rick Stanton and John Volanthen. In a video posted by the Thai navy on its Facebook page, the boys are seen huddled on a rock in mud-stained T-shirts and shorts surrounded by water.

“How many of you are there — 13? Brilliant,” a member of the rescue team, speaking in English, said to the boys. “You have been here 10 days. You are very strong.”

When one of the boys asked if they could leave the cave, the rescuers replied that they couldn’t yet but that many people were coming for them.

“Navy SEAL will come tomorrow, with food and doctors and everything,” the rescuer said.

The British divers described their three-hour round-trip into the cave as challenging because of the murkiness of the water. The rescuers had to fight a current as they pulled themselves through narrow, flooded passages by gripping the walls.

[Meet the British ‘A-team’ divers at the center of Thailand cave rescue]

Members of the British cave-diving community say that Stanton and Volanthen have been involved in a number of high-profile rescues. Thai authorities called on them to help.

“I said from the outset, if anybody is going to find these kids, it will be these two divers, who are arguably the best in the world,” Andy Eavis, a spokesman for the British Caving Association, told The Washington Post. “Compared to what Rick and John are normally doing, this is extremely easy diving, the only complication was the flow of the water,” he said, referring to the current.

Volanthen, a computer engineer, told the Sunday Times in 2013 that the secret to cave diving was keeping a cool head. “Panic and adrenaline are great in certain situations — but not in cave diving,” he said. “The last thing you want is any adrenaline whatsoever.”

A limestone cave complex is like a giant sponge, said Amy Frappier, a professor of geosciences at Skidmore College who has done extensive research in caves. She said that when the water table is low, you can walk throughout the complex, but then the air holes fill up as the water table rises after heavy rains.

That appears to be what happened here: The boys and their coach walked into the cave, and then the rain came. They could not go back the way they had come because they would have had to swim through flooded passages.

[A boys’ soccer team trapped in a flooded Thai cave has been found alive — nine days later]

Options for extracting the soccer team include drilling from the surface to create another exit. But experts have warned that this could take a long time.

“Caves are these complicated three-dimensional environments, so you don’t necessarily know from the surface where you can drill a hole to get to a passage,” Frappier said.

The boys and the coach are no longer alone. They’ve been visited by a doctor and a nurse who accompanied five other divers, and they’ve been given high-
protein liquid food, Thai navy SEAL commander Rear Adm. Arpakorn Yookongkaew said, according to the Associated Press. The boys are being entertained, and a phone line is being installed to permit them to speak with their families, the BBC reported.

The fastest way to get them out would be to have them use diving gear. That’s obviously risky. Yookongkaew said authorities “have to be certain that it will work and have to have a drill” to make sure “it’s 100 percent safe,” the AP reported.

Khaosod English, a Bangkok-based news organization, reported that officials are calling for donations of small diving masks that would fit the boys, as regular diving equipment could be too dangerous.

Officials say they have performed an informal medical evaluation and determined that most of the boys are in stable condition. No one has any critical injuries, said Chiang Rai’s governor.

The boys and their coach did not know what day it was when the divers found them.

“After that many days, their normal circadian rhythm would start to break down,” said Frappier, the scientist. “It will seem very bright when they come out into the sunshine. They may try to bring them out at night.”

I wonder how far below the surface they are for drilling ?, seems like they would be popping a hole thru by now instead of thinking about a solution still.

They would have to take in account the stability of the cave. The Chilean miners were in a hard rock mine, likely this cave is in limestone or some much softer rock.

"The group was found about three miles from the cave entrance."
There is also the question of pressure. If the pressure inside is too high, due to the rising water pressure, the boys and coach will have to go through decompression after being removed one at a time buddy system with a professional diver.

Has anyone heard how large a space they are in. I havent heard anything about suffocation risks.

.
"....Of the evacuation options, drilling to reach the boys is the least viable, as getting the necessary drilling equipment to the mountain atop the cave would be daunting and the process time-consuming. Despite more than a week of searching, no other entry to the cave has been found....."

Looks like very rugged terrain for setting up mining equipment, my son works in the drilling division for Halliburton and the technology is crazy...they can go sideways and thread needles with those things.

Seems like popping the balloon with a hole, might allow the water level to rise where the boys are too....they'll need oxygen soon tho.

I haven't read how far below the surface they are. If it's fairly shallow, cracks could allow air to get in.

From what I've read, they are in limestone caverns which will fill with water as the water table rises. Pressure should also be going up, as water compresses the air. I suspect they will use the scuba option and tandem dives with professional drivers. It is the only open option at this time besides waiting out the rains.

Actually it would let air out, allowing water to rise faster.

Agreed, that's what I was saying about popping the balloon...if the air is being compressed with water volume, drilling a hole may fill the air void with water,,,thus eliminating the pocket the boys are surviving in.

There isn't going to be any air compression.

This is a typical sinkhole cave.

There is a continuous supply of air falling through the cave, which is why no one is freaking out.

As the air cools, through day/night cycles if nothing else, it will be pulled down into the sinkholes above the cavers, and as it further cools inside the cave, it will move lower, displacing other air in the cave.

Other, warmer air will rise at the same time. Basically a "live" or "active" cave, such as this one, is breathing.

It's not unusual to feel a slight breeze while inside a cave, which is a good sign that there's lots more cave ahead of you.

And, you can find a cave by feeling the cold air running downhill from it, even though you can't see it at that moment.

The need for decompression will depend solely on the depth of the water, not the circumstance that it is in a cave, or its height ASL. Exactly the same as open water diving.

They were found @3ml from the entrance, however the caves are not level, and vary in reports from 6-7 miles in length. There might be a higher chamber where they could drill while being above the flood level, but drilling is really thier last choice due to the difficulty and time.

Not according to the Doc in charge:
" He said each rescue diver would take one child and would almost certainly use a harness to keep a grip on the child, whose regulator, a breathing device, would most likely be attached to the tank worn by the rescue diver.

One serious concern is the possibility that the boys could be at risk for decompression sickness, or the bends, if the air they have been breathing in the cave has been under pressure from the rising water.

In that case, the best solution, Dr. Lavonas said, “would be to bring a portable hyperbaric chamber to the mountainside by helicopter, or to place the children on oxygen and move them quickly to a hyperbaric chamber.”

This ^^^

When they're sayin the largest risk is the bends, I'd say the air is being compressed by water...expecting rain the next 10 days.

The air ain't bein compressed.

The doctor, like you, don't know much about caves.

This appears to be a pretty popular and developed cave.

https://www.thousandwonders.net/Tham+Khao+Luang+Cave

Wouldn't be that popular unless there was plenty of air flowin through it.

lol, I'm going by the experts on site...maybe you should head over to tell them what's up.

No, a dumbass liberal like you is goin by propaganda got throwed inta your head, rather than usin common sense, as usual.

The same propaganda piece says that more rescuers are joinin the kids up in the cave.

Would they be doin that if the air supply was a problem?

Hard to tell which is trapped deeper, them kids or an intelligent thought in your head.

It's telling that they's tryin to rescue the kids.

Thought in your head been left for dead a long time ago.

That would depend on their elevation. Inside the cave the very well could be above the water level. I kind of go with that rather than air pressure holding the water back.

Wow, all of that because I read the provided link ?...fill a bath tub and invert an empty glass in it, maybe you'll learn something douchenozzle.

I suspect some of it is above the water table (as I already said) but it would not be drawing fresh air in through cracks if the water level is rising. The water will not compress, the air will. Water rising will push air out.

To think this cave is sealed I can't go with. Even if through micro fissures air can escape. This is not some hole in the ground, this is a big cave

It appears they have every specialist from miners to SEAL team there, if it was simple they'd be done by now...big cave with 1 entrance.

A Brit "rescuing" something from Thailand is laughable.

Let me put this situation in simple terms you are familiar with.

When you put those gerbils up your ass, they die from suffocation, cause there's no more air.

The kids in Thailand got more air.

Bwana_1, arguing is a waste time and effort. Fubarski appears to be an expert in tunnels, (though I assumed only the ones in the ground, until his gerbils comments changed my mind. That speaks of prior experience, ) the mere fact that nearly half of a 6-7 mile long cave system is under water now, and the water is rising, doesn't matter. Neither does the fact that the available volume of air MUST shrink as the water advances, unless, of course the walls of the cave are made of rubber and just keep expanding like a giant balloon) which of course is ridiculous. Fubarski knows that 13 human beings working together (by breathing) will completely use up ALL the available air in the entire remaining 3-4 miles of caverns and tunnels in 10 day or less, and then die, THEREFORE, since they are NOT YET DEAD, then they failed in thier valiant attempt at self-destruction, and will unfortunately be saved by other means.
Since the gay comments, and the absolute knowledge that" they MUST be dead if I'm wrong " are both liberal concepts, coupled with the obvious anger issues complete with emotional overtones that have NOTHING to do with the discussion at hand, I suspect Fubarski is actually a liberal plant at the Fire, and you have just ferreted him out.
Congratulations. (TIC)


Ever use a water level? If the ends are blocked, it's useless. The water displaces the air and seeks it's own level, always. But you never get more air into the water level, unless the water recedes, or unless pressure of one type or another is applied to one end. For water to enter either level or tunnel, air is displaced. (It is pushed out) so fresh air is not coming in, as long as water is rising. (The airflow is AWAY from the water)

No doubt buggery woulda hacked his way outta the cave within 15 minutes, usin a paper clip and the kung fooey he learned on the streets of san francisco.

The scouts ain't dead cause they can't *get* dead, less they starve ta death or try ta swim back through the cave.

They got all the air and water they need, tho purified water is a bonus they have now.

You and wanna B say (ain't gonna use the word "think") they're gonna die of asphyxiation. They ain't.

Obvious you don't know shat bout caves, and you ain't never gonna get any more intelligent, so let's do this the easy way.

Wait til the little bastards is outta the cave, and see how they was rescued.

Somehow I just knew the US would end up spending a bunch of "American" tax payers money on this caper.

Im thinking if the water rises with more rain, water is entering the cave. If water is entering the cave i figure air is escaping the cave and probably exiting through air paths to the terrain above and would be the reason they arent worried about asphyxiation.

Kellory I agree,
Not sure why he's spazzing out with insults, we're all going by the information provided by professionals on site...the issue wasn't running out of air, as much as the pressurized air causing the bends after diving out with tanked oxygen.

The Pro's at location surely have the knowledge and skill set to ascertain the problem at hand, SEAL's are some badazz dudes that can conquer anything...if they are stumped with a solution it must be tricky.

Hopefully the kids come out safely, and the Coach gets a public spanking for taking the boys in there.

There ought to be a law against stupidity for folks dealing with kids. For one, anyone driving a vehicle into running water with any wheeled vehicle should have to spend 10 years in prison for each child that ends up dead. Public hanging for the loss of more than 5 kids.

That same rule may help prevent some school shootings to.

True dat ^^^

There's a big difference between outright murder and terminal stupidity. I agree with you on the stupidity part. On the rest, I see no reason for a mass shooter to survive 3 days beyond his conviction.

You might try reading comprehension classes. They're not going to asphyxiate because they have @3miles of tunnels and caverns to drain of air first. Not because they have a fresh source. I even tried to go sarcastic to get you to think. Instead. You prefer insults. I would prefer to think you are having a bad day, and shall cut you some slack. You're not stupid, you're just not understanding something.
I'll wait for the results from the professional on site.

Oh...and they are not scouts, it's a soccer team, and thier coach.

You haven't waited for shat.

You posted a lot of stupid crap, like you always do, and now realize how stupid it makes you look.

And that's not an insult, it's a simple description of the event. But whine all ya want, and look at the bright side, ya got wanna B backin ya up.

You know nothing of karst topography or cave formation, which blow holes in every theory you've posted.

Its simple plumbing, done nature style. Vented to the outside.

Problem is, now that the story's caught fire, it'll be milked to try and equal the trapped miners.

But however it goes, ain't nobody runnin outta air.

Every quote I posted is from the articles already listed in this thread. But I actually read them. I am not being inconsistent, nor have I changed directions at all. The only theory I posted is that they will be rescued by the water route. But obviously you know more about it than those on site who are working on the problem.

Geezuz, talk about mole hills to mountains.

[quote=kellory Neither does the fact that the available volume of air MUST shrink as the water advances, unless, of course the walls of the cave are made of rubber and just keep expanding like a giant balloon) which of course is ridiculous.

Ever use a water level? If the ends are blocked, it's useless. The water displaces the air and seeks it's own level, always. But you never get more air into the water level, unless the water recedes, or unless pressure of one type or another is applied to one end. For water to enter either level or tunnel, air is displaced. (It is pushed out) so fresh air is not coming in, as long as water is rising. (The airflow is AWAY from the water)[/quote]

Nobody wrote anything even remotely this stupid in any article.

You've not been inconsistent. You've been a moron the whole way through.

But it was remarkably honest for you to admit your only knowledge came from the article.

And citin some article wrote outta Thailand, and edited through the AP, don't grant you no spontaneous credibility.

If you'd simply relied on your nonexistent knowledge of the subject and remained an observer, none of this would be happening to you.

I watched a full interview with the head of the Thailand Cave Diving Association(white guy, looked Special Ops), and he said the situation is a serious problem...probably have to make the boys wear full face masks, strap them on divers backs and swim them out, bends is a real possibility, more heavy rain coming soon.

It could shake down that way.

You'd go FFM so they couldn't spit out the regulator, hook em up over the radio to the buddy, to keep talkin to em.

Wrap em up like a mummy so they can't get tangled up or pull the FFM off, and pull em through usin a rope.

But whether decompression would be required would depend on the weight of the water they go through, not the fact they're in a cave.

Ya but OTOH, by figuring out this problem they get better at what they do.

Just saw this reporting with some key points:

According to the Bangkok Post, none of the boys know how to swim, so they've got hurdles to overcome before strapping an oxygen tank to their backs.

"We are fairly sure that the boys are around 2km into the cave system, of which almost a kilometre of that is through flooded passages … where the water meets the roof," he said. Mr Mitchell said the trip to get out of the cave takes about three hours for experienced divers.

"(It involves) multiple stops, changes of air tanks etc. It's a slow process," he said.

And while it costs us some extra, ours are already on the dole to start with, and would be deployed somewhere training likely if not this. Sure its gonna cost us a bit more in the end, but as noted, "live fire" training is about as valuable as it gets.

Swim out is the only way I'd say. I think I'd feed them so they gain strength then put them in a helmet suit. Then maybe not use a tank but a rebreather.

They’re gonna have to disguise that dumbass as one of the rescuers when they bring him out, for his own safety.

(take a look at the map presented earlier in this thread. It shows the basic layout, where they were found, and the tunnels rising beyond that point. It was also stated they moved to this cavern chamber due to rising water.)

Did you just vomit up today's bbq on your keyboard or is this a post?

It's an attempt to reply to each nonsense charge, line by line. It is not easy to do on a phone. Sorry if it is not up to your standards.

Dated 9 hours ago...
I saw this on the BBC and thought you should see it:

Thailand cave: New video shows boys in good health - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-44707303
Dated today.
Trapped Thai Boys Appear In Good Spirits In New Video From Cave https://n.pr/2NqsCk4

I've yet to read anywhere that any us military are involved. Post up a link that says different.

In that case, try a soothing peppermint tea.

This was in the OP's original link:

Hundreds of officials from more than 20 government agencies, along with private companies, were involved in the search. Rescuers came from at least six countries, including members of the United States military.

A new report on Foxnews says that the pumping is working and they might be able to walk out...if they hurry. Heavy rains are expected by Saturday that could make it a swim only situation.
SOCCER TEAM

I was a caver for about 5 years. I've been in on a couple of flood-ins. In one case, back in 1982, my name was plastered over the AP as the 5th caver on a 5 man team that got flooded in a situation that was on all the news programs. Luckily, I did not go on that trip, but I knew the guys that did. I was also the 1st of a 5 man NSS expedition that got hit with a flood-in at Fischer Ridge back before it was officially joined to Mammoth. I got out, the 2 guys behind me got out. The last two didn't.

I have stayed at a Holiday in Express, so I guess I'll weigh in.

1) If the water level goes up high enough, chances are the party drowns. You might have small air pockets, but the CO2 build-up would eventually kill you. It's never air-tight. I knew a couple that got flooded in and watched the water level come up slowly for days. They huddled as close to the ceiling as they could and finally got out after a week. They immediately divorced their spouses and married each other.

2) I've read all kind of goofy kibbutzing on this Thai deal-- everything including mini-subs. It's all cricket turds. Bottom line is the kids will need to be fed and watered and kept warm until they can be extracted.

3) Boring from the top is usually a big no-no. No, it won't cause the room to fill with water, but it might very well bring the roof down. It was well-meaning stuff like this that caused Floyd Collin's death in 1925.

4) I've never heard of cavers needing decompression. I'm not saying it isn't possible, but I've never heard of it.

5) The party has about zero chance of running out of O2. That's a guess, but the volume of the cave open to them probably has enough to sustain them, and there is a constant exchange of gases with the environment. I've been down the hole at the deepest levels you can go in Kentucky and felt a distinct blow when the air pressure changed.

6) Most caving fatalities come from falls. Occasionally you get drownings. Once in a while you get a sulphur hydroxide asphyxiation. The big killer is Hypothermia. 50F and 100% humidity is a bitch. I nearly died in front of my friends after sitting down to rest for a bit after a heavy exertion. The next thing I knew, my best friend was in my face yelling at me that unless I got up and moved around I'd be dead. 2nd stage came on me within 2 minutes-- never shivvered, never felt cold. I went from hot and sweaty to semi-comatose, and all I remember is feeling warm and good and a little sleepy.

7) A soccer coach taking a bunch of kiddies into a cave is really bad stuff. I don't know if they went in with proper gear, but I have to tell you, we used to kit up like we were going to another planet. Each member of a NSS-sponsored trip had serious gear-- heavy coveralls, gloves, hard hat, etc. Three sources of light were required. They were also required to carry gear for self-rescue. It seemed over-the-top when I first went down the hole on my first trip, but 8 hours in, I tried to hop up on a ledge and an jutting rock caught me on the top of my hard hat. Without it, I'd have stoved in my skull. The blow knocked me out, but I came to in a matter of seconds and continued the trip. A soccer coach leading his team into a cave needs to be hung by the nuts until dead.



Kellory, my compadre, you're wrestling with a pig. Forgive those who know not of what the speak.

Shaman, great info.

None of the kids knowing how to swim is a problem, and perplexing at the same time...how can that many boys not know how to fuggin swim ?

It's Thailand. I've got no clue.

Normally, swimming isn't required for caving. Being comfortable in water is a must. I only had to swim for it once, and that was in a flood-in situation. Truth is, if I'd rolled over on my back and kissed the ceiling, I'd have had an inch or two of air pocket to float out. That's what the two guys behind me did.

Scuba? Yeah, but I never had the nerve to actually cave dive. I remember one passage where we slid a tank ahead of us to get through a sump, and then pulled it back on a rope. However, actually free swimming in a cave was over my job description.

The bulk of my caving was endless slogging in the dark. I was a head taller than most of my fellow cavers, so wherever they stood, I stooped. When they stooped, I had to crawl. I spent a good part of every trip in the prone position. Occasionally I had to belay or go up or down on ascenders.

If you want to experience caving, find a local building site. If you're in the country, use a freshly plowed field. Wait until the dark of the moon, with the ambient temperature about 50F. Wait until it rains and then spend all night alternately crawling, walking, and stoop walking in the mud. For a change up, try to climb in and out of a freshly poured foundation several times and roll around in the mud. When you think you've had enough, repeat the whole thing. At dawn, walk home. Strip naked and change into street clothes before driving 200 miles. Carry one canteen for 12 hours. You can eat either Hormel canned Beanie Weanies, or Vienna Sausage. If you have to eliminate, try to do so without undressing.

Spelunking, no way, no how, nunca, never!

I could see going into caves if somebody was paying me to go into caves.

Outside of that, I'd say you're an idiot.

Shaman,
The boys are soccer players, not cavers nor trained in spelunking skills...but 15 boys that don't know how to swim is strange to me. The coach should be hung for taking them in there, a sign is posted at the entrance not to enter at this time of the year(monsoon season)...maybe he doesn't read or swim.

Yeah, it seemed like a good idea at the time, but . . .


I did manage to get my name on the map. That's something few people can say. I managed to explore about 600 yards of virgin cave solo. I went somewhere where I was probably the first vertebrate. Those are good bragging rights.

I keep a copy of this in my office in case I ever get the bug again:

My thoughts exactly. Did a cave tour in the black hills once. BTDT. Never again. I can't imagine going over two miles in. F that chit.

New reports states that the coach and 3 boys are too weak to make the trip out, rains coming tonight. Water is receding 1/2" per hour, pumps running full tilt...hoses to pump oxygen into cave are being set in place now.

No worries my friend. I know of your extensive caving experience, And I thought you might weigh in, But I was not going to call you in and put you on the spot.

The Bends are caused by the rapid release of pressure. Not water, PRESSURE. In fact, the bends are treated by REAPPLYING PRESSURE and releasing it slowly. A scuba diver gets pressure from water depth, but you can get the Bends on dry land (as the doctor very well knows, and mentioned the possible need for a PRESSURE VESSEL to be air lifted to the site. (We call it a decompression chamber).
The facts also show they are no longer concerned with pressure since the doctors have examined the children and approved the oxygen content as Adequate. They also mention oxygen is seeping through the porous limestone rock and cracks. (At least in this cavern, but oxygen levels may again be a danger if forced by rising water to a smaller chamber) this means seepage, not real airflow, and the pressure has now equalized. This also means they must have checked the oxygen content and pressure. This also means they can force some air exchange by turning the pumps on and off. The flood level pressure will act as a crude bellows. (But that is a short time solution to low volume airflow).
(I have to deal with issues of positive and negative airflow in buildings, which is also a mostly closed loop system, with seepage losses. It can cause serious issues in securing buildings. )
"...Decompression sickness

Hyperbaric chamber

Scuba diving

The bends is also called decompression sickness or caisson * sickness. When a person is scuba diving, the water pressure increases with depth. As depth increases, the pressure of the air breathed also must increase. This causes more of the air to dissolve in the bloodstream.

How Is the Body Affected?
The main components of air are oxygen and nitrogen gases. Oxygen is continuously used by the body, but nitrogen is not used. When a diver ascends, the pressure decreases and the blood can no longer hold all the nitrogen dissolved in it.

* caisson (KAY-son) means a watertight container that divers or construction workers use under water.

If a diver ascends slowly, the nitrogen escapes into the lungs and is breathed out harmlessly. But if the diver ascends rapidly, the nitrogen forms bubbles in the blood that can lodge at joints such as the elbow or knee and cause pain. In severe cases, extreme pain causes the sufferer to double over, hence the common name "the bends."

Symptoms of the bends usually show up within 90 minutes of diving but may take as long as two days. Minor cases cause itching, rash, joint pain, or skin discoloration. Severe cases cause symptoms such as extreme pain at the joints, headache, seizures, hearing problems, nausea and vomiting, back or abdominal pain, vision disturbances, or chest pain.

How Do Doctors Treat the Bends?
Minor cases of the bends usually require no treatment, although a doctor should be consulted. Treatment of severe cases, however, requires a hyperbaric (hy-per-BARE-ik) chamber, a device that creates pressure to redissolve the gas bubbles. The patient is placed under high-pressure conditions, and then the pressure is slowly decreased. Prompt treatment increases the chances for a complete recovery.



Read more: http://www.humanillnesses.com/original/At-Ca/Bends.html#ixzz5KP1eXAEI

As for the idea that a faceless voiceless avatar on a forum with no credentials shown, and a tendancy to result to name calling and character assasination, should be more credible that reports coming from the personal on site, is ludicrous.

Bends? No, never.

I did get a nasty case of worms after one trip. The entrance was at one end of a cow pasture. There was 100 feet of belly crawl through incoming water. On the way out, I must have swallowed some.

I called my buddy when I found my mystery passengers a few weeks after the trip. Fred met me for dinner at the local Frisch's. He told me I should wait for sample to go to the U of Louisville lab. It might be an endangered species of roundworm and my gut might be declared a national refuge.

I went home and took the cure right then and there. Yikes! That was an adventure.



The closest I ever saw a guy come to dying? In those days we were still using carbide lamps. You brought it in sealed in plastic baby bottles-- 2-3 of them in your pack. Every 45 minutes you had to stop, dump out the spent carbide and refill/restart your light. Your waste went into a plastic bag and came out with you so you didn't polute the cave. Somebody had left their baggie behind, and a caver named Joe offered to carry the extra dump in his bag. Turns out somebody else had a bad baggie, and it was leaking, and so Joe took that too.

Carbide outgasses acetelyne gas when it's exposed to water. We were about 8 hours in. Joe sat down, took his pack off and set his helmet beside it. After awhile, there was enough gas coming from the dump bag accumulated in the little niche he was in, that there was enough to ignite. Joe was enveloped in a ball of flame and blown back against the cave wall. The explosion was enough to completely dry out his coveralls and removed the sweat from his hair without burning it off.

I enjoyed the tours I've done in a few cave systems, and I enjoy the history of how things were done before vs now. But I think I would prefer at sea in an open boat to being trapped underground for long. (I'd be the guy recharging the batteries from a variety of sources.)

I'll take my chances on a 36' boat on the lake, before I die in a dark hole in the ground

Death usually comes fast in a cave. There was a woman in a party while I was in that slipped from a shelf and got her helmet wedged and strangled on her chin strap. The other 3 members of the party could only stand by and watch. It took a couple of minutes.

Hit a pocket of bad air? Smell rotten eggs? It's probably the last thing you'll smell. Hydrogen Sulfide gets you quick.

I once made love to a fellow caver in a grotto that was considered the ideal place for cave camping. The cave woman took me there to have her way with me. The next crew through, a week or two later, found the ceiling had collapsed and where we'd been had a rock as big as a VW. Ooops.

If you injure yourself, there's an emergency number to call for the nationwide cave rescue network. Whatever you do, don't let anyone call the county 911. Nobody has the training to do it right. A team flies in and gets you out. Something like a broken leg that is easy-peasy topside becomes life-threatening down the hole.

Shaman, I know you're a big guy, you telling me you shook something loose? (That's impressive)

I'd think a woman that crawls around caves and fugks cavemen would also smell like rotten eggs.

lol ^^^

Bad news hits the cave situation. I had heard esrlier that they were trying to pump air into the boys.

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/984693/thailand-cave-rescue-diver-dies-lack-oxygen-navy-seal

Elon musk is offering help.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/worl...boys-stuck-cave-Elon-Musk-trapped-latest

How do you run out of oxygen while laying out oxygen tanks for later use?

I kids dead ....missing oxygen...NO...the guy on the radio came back to say a worker/diver...

By keeping the locals involved.

He was tryin to help.

""His job was to deliver oxygen. He did not have enough on his way back," said and official."

https://www.bbc.com/news/amp/world-asia-44734385

They are actually expecting monsoon season to start, which means several months of rain.



Swimming aint whats going to save them , they need some cave diving ability [training] together with a huge level
of prof.assistance while they chance their new learnt skill...on what they estimate will be a several hr duration dive without
visibility and far less maneuverabilty [due to scuba equipment] than the boys had when they first went in.



Hmmmm.... will wait and see... ..you talk like SF never have failed missions



Former Navy SEAL Cade Courtley warned authorities in Thailand to abandon plans to teach the group to dive through the cave,
suggesting attempts to leave that way could result in death.

Mr Courtley said: "If you are going to ask an 11-year-old to make a dive that a former Navy SEAL specialised in diving
would have a challenge making but some of these kids are going to die in an effort to try and bring them out using dive equipment."

"When I was a SEAL I was part of a very special dive unit. I have thousands of hours underwater during operations, with zero visibility,
limited to no space.

"If they can’t figure out a way to divert, dam and shore up any additional water from entering a cave entrance, and utilise some
of the pumps that we have in this world…

"If we can’t do that in 2018 and we are saying diving is our best option, that’s a problem."

He added: "Now, I’m in Colorado and it’s easy for me to say. If they are not having that discussion in Thailand, we have a problem."

They've already dropped 40 days of food off in there.

Considering the risks, that's probably the best plan...wait it out till the water recedes, and walk out of there. Unfortunately hypothermia is bound to start, sitting/sleeping on cold rock 24 hrs a day will suck the life from you.

No, just that those ceiling aren't necessarily that stable. You look up and see rock that's been up there for 10,000 years, and you feel safe and the world seems beautiful and eternal, and then you realize you're standing on a piece of the ceiling that's as big as a bus, and you suddenly feel small and vulnerable. It's kind of a sweet and sour thing.

I agree that cave diving is a unique skill that these kids are going to need to somehow magically acquire if they are going to get out via scuba. It was waaaay above my skillset. As I said, I really never needed swimming as a skill, but I did fairly dry trips. I was not a certified diver and I never in my wildest wanted to become a cave diver. Some of my friends, including the infamous cave woman were certified for it.


As to the cave woman, I'll have to leave the details for a future campfire when we all have a scotch in our hands. Suffice it to say that she engineered the whole weekend to seduce me, and she eventually sch in our hands. Suffice it to say that she engineered the whole weekend to seduce me, and she eventually succeeded.

I don't know if it is that way now, but in those days, and in times previous, the women who caved had rather extreme appetites. I met a 70+ year old woman that had been a caver in the 60's-- Bev of Bare Bev's Belly Crawl fame. Her exploits had been legendary.

I never remember smelling a cave woman, at least not in a bad way. They must have had some secret method of deodorization. You'd think that all that time in cramped passages crawling in single file, I'd remember something. The guys? We all smelled like a barnyard after 12 hours underground, and there were no showers at the fieldhouses I visited. You had cold well water and a bucket.


BTW: That flood-in I mentioned where I was cited as the 5th caver got solved in much the same way as this. The guys had pre-positioned a 55 gallon drum of supplies in a high room, and planned for the contigency of a flood-in. When it happened, they just hunkered down and waited. Meanwhile, everyone on the surface was being bat-crap insane. The water level came down and out they came.

Another thing to add to the don't-do list: Never let the media know about an incident. Those of us who knew the situation of those trapped cavers knew it was hopeless to do anything until the water went down. Somebody leaked to the news and now you had national attention on them, and all sorts of crazy stuff being planned just to do something. The way I got dragged into it was one of my media buddies called me for a statement, and when he didn't get an answer, he reported I was in the cave. I was just taking a nap and didn't hear the phone. Within an hour, my name was on the AP wire and NBC was reporting it. Imagine my folks' surprise!

Oh, and another thing. I finally caught a good picture of the trapped kids. They're in streetclothes! Yikes!

Let me give you a typical caver's load-out:

Thermal underwear-- at least tops
Heavy coveralls
Vietnam jungle boots-- great for slogging, but the leather toes got eaten up fast
Baggage handler's leather gloves
Knee pads
Elbow pads
A hard hat with a chin strap
I carried two Carbide lights, and three baby bottles of carbide
A D-Cell flashlight and a change of batteries.
3 candles for a last resort lighting and heat source
a plastic leaf bag-- an emergency shelter
I used a Vietnam-era butt pack on a shoulder sling. Most people preferred gas mask bags
A can or two of food. Chocolate bars. Peanut bars, etc.
A small survival kit with basic first aid, a space blanket and that sort of thing.

I read that it's a 5 hour dive to get to the kids?

No way the kids are getting out like that and they are apparently running out of air in the cave.

I saw this on the BBC and thought you should see it:

Thailand cave rescue: Ex-navy diver dies on oxygen supply mission - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-44734385

Oxygen levels are dropping from 21% now down to 15%.

Prayers for the diver who tried and died.

I just wonder why they ever let them go into a cave like that in the first place.

Not just in the cave, deep in the cave! Who the hell made that decision?

A Thailand Navy SEAL diver is dead. Boys, this is some dangerous stuff! Damn.

If it killed a Thai SEAL then yes, it's dangerous. Those some tough mama-jamas.

These are the same people that fit a family of five onto a moped, and still find room for the groceries.

Your and my idea of dumb is much different than theirs.

All while wearing flip-flops...

To be perfectly honest, normal people and caves just don't mix. Period. Normal people should just stick to the tourist caves. Do Mammoth. Get a feel for what it's like and then stay away.

What I did was with trained die-hard enthusiasts. It took about 2 years of regular trips down the hole before I was allowed to do anything to push the envelope. My first trip was 8 hours, and as I said, I could have killed myself in an instant if I hadn't been wearing proper equipment. During those first two years, I was allowed to go on trips with ever-increasing levels of skill and danger. While nothing formal was done, I was constantly being evaluated by my peers for suitability-- some physical, but mostly mental.

While I was in, I saw scout groups and such attempt caves. A lot of it was cringeworthy.

Listening to the radio on the way into the office this morning and it sounds like they are actually going to try to swim those kids out of there. They said that they were going to do it today or tomorrow. I can’t imagine all of them getting out that way.

Maybe they should drug those kids up to the point that they are practically zombies so that they can remain somewhat calm during the process.

Air supply might be going south so they might have to get them out one way or another. I hope they all get out safely.

The experts said diving/swimming them out was the last resort, it must be going south fast in there. There are pinch points so small the diver has to remove his tank to get thru, and multiple areas of dry/flooded/dry...so the boy will have to be carried if drugged up.

Coach should be beat with bamboo sticks when he gets outside the cave.

This just demonstrates how stupid soccer fans really are.

This has catastrophic potential.

I sure hope they all make it out.

sounds like a Dirk Pit novel.

I have 3 Doxa's, 2 of which are very rare

They have to do something, anything, before those monsoon rains start. I hope they all get out and some parent kicks that coach square in the balls

Volunteers showed up to help pump out water. Actually ended up pumping it back into the tunnels. Wasted work and time. They have been corrected. (Don't have time to find the link now, but I can insert it later if anyone cares for it.)

Very cool. I've been a fan of Clive Cussler for a while. He is an interesting man of excellent taste.

Adventure novels...a thing of the past
Not sure how Clive got hooked up with Doxa, but he's part of horological history now.

Problem with his writing, is that the "fate of the world" hangs on nearly every book. (Yes, I've read them, and I like them, but they burn me out quickly).
He pushes my suspension of disbelief too far.

I just read that the SEAL who died didn't die in the area where the boys are. He was swimming back to the entrance when his air tank ran out. They didn't give any details on how that happened.
They also say that the boys aren't trained enough yet to swim out so it won't happen tomorrow.

They did in the several stories I read.
He passed out on the way back out, and his swimming buddy could not revive him. He didn't leave himself enough of a safety margin. His funeral is being sponsored by the king himself.

Edit to add link.

Thailand cave rescue: Ex-navy diver dies on oxygen supply mission - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-44734385

As I highly expected The SEAL was Buddhist
...they don't view the universe and the divine the same way the Jesus club does.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...l-dies-in-thai-cave-rescue-idUSKBN1JW1KK

I don't give a rat's ass if he believes or not, I'll still pray for him. I'd even pray for you if you died doing your best to help someone else.

He obviously didn't do his best as an X- professional otherwise he wouldn't have run out of oxygen.

Buddhism says one is accountable for ones actions , or ones lack of appropriate ones.

Dumbest comment I can recall hearing on here.

A Navy SEAL running out of oxygen is a dumb thing to happen.

even dumber are Hillary voters....

Not as dumb as ridiculing the dead from behind a keyboard. He put his life on the line many times. I understand he had retired and come back into service to help. It 11 hours round trip and I have read they are working hard in shifts. You only get one chance to screw up. His safety margin was just a little too small.

I pointed out what his fundemential Buddhist beliefs are based on( Self responsibility) and Birdwatcher said
it was the dumbest thing he had heard...so ridiculing the nature of the SEALs Buddhist beliefs is acceptable??

They've had over 65 inches of rain since the boys went missing. That's a bunch.

A lot of things can go wrong in an oxygen depleted environment. Regulating one's breathing and heart rate is part of the training and ability to perform the task. The fact that he was down there making the dive say's a lot about him being a man.

Why aren’t they using rebreathers? Tanks are big and bulky and only have a limited amount of air.

ETA....I too have prayed for that brave man and never thought about his religion. Mine doesn’t make a distinction between whom we deem worthy of prayer and whom we don’t.

Yep, seems like it could have easily been an equipment malfunction in conjunction with a narrow margin of error. It does seem probable that hero left behind a bereaved family, and I’d guess he really, really wanted to see them again.

Just a tragedy all around.

Could also be, that after all the dives they have been doing, he was just a little too tired and swum a little too slowly.

Matters not, he gave it his all.

That's a dikhead statement, have respect for those that tried to save innocent lives.

Where does it say in Bible that Christians should pray for the dead?

Prayers cannot restore his flesh and his Spirit is in the custody of God till judgement.

Prayers emitted by mere mortal sinners have no say , power or effect regarding
the deceased and the creator in anyway.

If you want a religous thread, start one. This is the last bible comment I will make here.
"....The earliest Scriptural reference to prayers for the dead comes in the second book of Maccabees. The books of Maccabees were among the latest written books found in the Old Testament. They recount the struggle of the Jewish people for freedom against the Seleucid Empire, around 100-200 years before the birth of Christ. They are written from an Orthodox Jewish point of view. The second book of Maccabees tells how Judas Maccabee, the Jewish leader, led his troops into battle in 163 B.C. When the battle ended he directed that the bodies of those Jews who had died be buried. As soldiers prepared their slain comrades for burial, they discovered that each was wearing an amulet taken as booty from a pagan Temple. This violated the law of Deuteronomy and so Judas and his soldiers prayed that God would forgive the sin these men had committed (II Maccabees 12:39-45).

This is the first indication in the Bible of a belief that prayers offered by the living can help free the dead from any sin that would separate them from God in the life to come. It is echoed in the New Testament when Paul offers a prayer for a man named Onesiphorus who had died: “May the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord on that day”(II Timothy 1:18). The cavelike tombs under the city of Rome, which we call catacombs, bear evidence that members of the Roman Christian community gathered there to pray for their fellow followers of Christ who lay buried there. By the fourth century prayers for the dead are mentioned in Christian literature as though they were already a longstanding custom......"

LOL, typical...it was you who introduced the religious prayer thing to this non -religious thread.

You could have sent your kooky prayers without telling the CF.

Not as a hijack.

Just keep your faith to yourself.. ...theres no need to poison a thread discussing a Buddhist SEAL
with your brand of kookiness.

What are the Buddhist thoughts on people without integrity or conscience ?

Maybe it was his best. And it’s still a dikhead statement.

Since you have no faith at all in Faith, I propose an experiment in Imperical Testing. You die, we pray for your soul, and you get to see first hand, weither or not it helps. now that's a win-win situation. All you have to do, is die. You don't even have to do a selfless act like the navy seal first.

Rebreathers are being used, just not by everyone.

Im sure physical exhaustion would not have allowed you to just make a mental error, as you did with these words.

Prayers sent.

Campfire rule: If it goes to five pages, the thread will have decomposed into vitriol, name-calling, and nonsense unrelated to the original topic.

Buddhist or not I suspect we'll see more dead before this is all over.

Hope not but the odds aren't good.

As of 2hrs ago...
Thailand cave rescue: Boys tell parents 'don't worry' in letters - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-44748924

Things are getting worse by the day, prayers to the little ones & rescuers.

1 hour ago




Thailand cave rescue: 'Four-day window' for boys to escape - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-44754335

Why didn't Trump do more!!!

Thanks for the update.,

Tell add to screw off.

Add who?

yes do,..If christians don't need a boat because they can walk on water with faith , then diving for hrs out of the cave
with just faith-prayers and no regulators or gas cylinders should be a breeze...

btw; the Thai SEAL is still stone cold dead despite your village idiot prayers..

A Thai governor says the operation to bring out 12 schoolboys and their soccer coach from deep inside a cave where they have been trapped for two weeks has begun.

The acting Chiang Rai governor has told reporters “today is D-Day” with 13 foreigner and five Thai divers taking part in the rescue.


He says the divers went in at 10 a.m. and the boys will gradually come out accompanied by two divers each. He says the earliest they will come out is 9 p.m. Saturday (10 a.m. ET).
The only way to bring them out is by navigating dark and tight passageways filled with muddy water and strong currents, as well as oxygen-depleted air.

Experienced cave rescue experts consider an underwater escape a last resort, especially with people untrained in diving, as the boys are. The path out is considered especially complicated because of twists and turns in narrow flooded passages.

But the governor supervising the mission said earlier that mild weather and falling water levels over the last few days had created optimal conditions for an underwater evacuation that won’t last if it rains again.

Translation; they’re going to most likely die.

Dont worry,... if Kellory and crews prayers dont work they will just say it was 'Gods will' that they died.

which effectively translates to prayers being worthless.

I just read that the first 2 boys made it out a few minutes ago.

Yes, they said two taken to hospital, hope the rest make it too.

Thai cave rescue: 'D-day' for trapped boys - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-44757804

I read that it took an 18 man team 8 hours to bring them out. They're a long way from being done with this. Hopefully it'll speed up some as they work the bugs out of their system but none will become easy. It's a 5 hour trip even for the SEALS so bringing out untrained kids is pretty difficult and risky.

At 8:00 AM here Fox News reports SIX (6) boys out.....

Thank you western civilization for developing modern day equipment diving.

At 8;14 AM CDST they've edited to "At least 4 boys rescued" ? ? ?

Yes. When I posted the link, it said 2.

Typical you..

You have to make all your posts about religion or nobody even listens to a single thing you say. You are a proven idiot. Have been for a long time.

Stop with all the religious posts, you self whoring moron... Nobody really cares what you think.

Amen.

Knee-mail outbound.

Hopefully they have enough divers so that they have a steady stream of kids coming out instead of the same divers having to go back for more kids.

Y'all are a tough crowd, making fun of a dead Thailand SEAL. He was retired but was 37 years old, looked like he was in real good shape.
He knew as well as anybody how dangerous this is. He gave his life to rescue these kids, he died a hero.

Yes, four out so far, looks like the rescue operation is going well but there still could be more deaths.

Reports: First Boys Begin To Emerge From Cave In Thailand https://n.pr/2KU4hkR

One diver ain't making the whole trip, different guys staged throughout the cave. I guarantee they are pumped up and know that conditions can change. So while things are good, they are gonna keep going.

Do the math. They said 2 diver with each boy. 28 went in. Four boys out means 8 divers. 10 more to come out, so I expect 5 more boys in this days efforts. It makes sense to stagger them for no bottle necks at the tight points.

D-day, must be a dire situation...swimming them out was the last resort.


Best wishes and PRAYERS to the boys and the rescuers

There are only sections that require divers, there are sections that require full climbing gear. But of course those would have been staged to hoist the boys up.

It's a daisy chain with various people/jobs at various points.

Rains coming, and conditions are going to get worse fast. Water is as low as they can get it for now, and it will only get harder if they wait.

That would make sense, as long as they have the gear and air for those who need it. Oxygen levels are dropping.

It appears to be a last resort. If the weather does what's forecast, the water could get too deep to bring them out. The underwater distance could get too far to swim. They're racing the storms.

The discussion about O2 levels dropping pertains to where the boys are, I'm guessing less of a problem at other areas.

You say last resort, I say well planned, thought out operation. I guarantee none there are thinking this is a last resort operation.

I think it is more in general. They said it was decreasing due to the high traffic of rescuers in addition to the boys. All of them had to pass twice through the other areas as well. (Where they rested)

With the available options stated by the rescuers, from drilling a hole,,,to waiting 3 months, swimming the boys was listed as "last resort". Obviously they made the call to move now, I'm sure it's in the best interest of the boys safety.

They are weak and low on oxygen, it's now or never.

Seems like it's the best option and best options are not last resorts.

Anyone else think there will be either a locked gate at the entrance, or an escape shaft dug in the dry months after this?

4 are out

As has been said.

It's the only chance. Anything else is pure fantasy. So much half-assed misinformation on this.

Godspeed

I don't know how many of you have been through the Asian monsoons, but I sure as hell would not want to be trapped underground during one. You can damn near drown being ABOVE ground when it rains that hard. We're talking feet of rain, not inches.

I think they planned as best they could.

But now it's down to the nut cuttin', and they had to do it.

That's all anyone can ask.

When I was in Explorer Scouts we went in to a cave. This was up in North Georgia, 1964, there was no park, no signs, just climbed a hundred yards up a mountain. There was a six foot high black hole in the side of the mountain. Our Advisor tied a rope around a pine tree and threw it in to the dark hole and we went in, hand over hand fifty feet straight down to the cave. I was 13 and I went first. No harness, no helmet. This was 1964. I guess I stuck my flashlight into my pocket I don't remember.
Eight of us and we went maybe a quarter mile into that cave. No water in this cave.
I enjoyed seeing the stalagtites and stalagmites etc. We stayed in there 2 hours and I was also the first one out! I must say I was glad to get out that place was scary and I felt claustrophobic in there.

When I was in college we went down to Florida and went scuba diving in a crystal spring. This spring was 200 feet across and the water perfectly clear, like looking through air. At the sandy bottom in the bright sunlight I could see perfectly.
I went 60 feet down to the bottom and there was a cave! Nobody had told me about that. About six feet high. It was pitch black dark in that cave. I didn't have a light. I went about 2 feet into that cave, and I got the hell out. Going in to an underwater cave is some scary stuff, I would never do it.

There is a scuba club at Ga Tech and every year they go diving in those caves in Florida. About every third year you read about a couple of the Ga. Tech divers dying in those flooded caves. Dangerous stuff.

Here in San Antonio for the longest time we had three dead cave divers in our aquifer, the one they knew where he was they were able to finally fish his remains out a few years back after like 25 years. The other two were swept away by a strong current over by Uvalde. Not a fate I’d wish on anyone.

https://www.bbc.com/news/live/44755093

More details. And the rains have arrived.

How long does it take for the rain to find it's way into the cave?

It is one dicey operation. It is scary to watch live on tv, hope everybody gets out of this alive.

Limestone has big cracks, so it is pretty much instantaneous. Water will rise quickly.

Not long. 10 hour break while diver prep for next attempt. Read the link, has quite a bit of small details.

There was a mixup with volunteers earlier on where they set up and started pumping water without coordination with the main detail. They didn't realize they were just pumping water back into the caverns.

Seems like they should have had more divers set to go, no need stopping just go !

I understand there are 90 divers involved.

90 divers, 7 hours 40 minutes, resumes in 10 hours after rest and O2 resupply.

Wow, didn't know there were 90....carry on

They should have had like 95....

lol

How many boys got out?

Last I saw was 4 boys, 2 went to hospital

They ran out of gear that was staged air tanks etc...resume rescue in 10-20 hours

Correct. (As per the written word)

"It was announced earlier that the rescue mission to bring the football team and their coach out of the cave system in northern Thailand had been paused overnight.

It may seem a surprising decision, as the rescue team had previously indicated they were in a race against time to get all 13 trapped people out.

However, Narongsak Osottanakorn, Chiang Rai province governor and head of the rescue operation, did explain it to journalists earlier - and we now have a full translation of what he said, which you can read below:

We will be able to continue the rescue operation when we are ready to do so.

We will be ready soon, because we will need to redo laying out all of the air tanks and all systems along the way again.

We have used everything [in the set up] that we had today. The set up team will do their work again once they are ready.

It'll be difficult to tell exactly when the next [evacuation] will start. But I guess it will be ready in the next 10-20 hours.''

So the rescue mission to bring the eight boys and their coach to safety is scheduled to begin again on Monday."

While they have 90 divers, how many are qualified to actually lead the boys out? Many are probably ferrying equipment as they aren't fully trained for the rescue.

Never forget,

there was 91.

And what he did, is what we are now waiting on once again, laying out the tanks for the next attempt.

And it was carried out as a test run to work out the process albeit with the boys of most medical concern.

It was also done in better time than expected.

Apparently, the doctor running the rescue has placed the rescued children in decompression chambers, and the rescuers and children remaining in the cave look like Arnold Schwarzenegger in the last minute of Total Recall, at this point, due to the ever increasing pressure.

Also, everyone in the cavern, including all the extra people keepin the kids company, is dead from lack of oxygen at this time.

Thai cave rescue: Remaining boys wait for operation to resume - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-44760896


Little early to be drinking that heavily Fubarski. You might want to try some coffee.

Dr.Harris from Australia, was specifically requested by the British divers for the rescue task, because
he has a calm rational head, ...30 yrs dive experience, ..has embraced the science of modern medicine
and the latest advances in dive science technology ..and is experienced at caves and retrieving cave divers.

All up about 90 divers are involved, but the actual team at the coal face pulling the boys out ,comprises of
13 foreigners and 5 hand picked of the most capable Thai SEALs.

I don't know of any pastors or prayer groups doing anything practical to rescue the boys.
they are just waiting to hopefully save some souls with prayers should any die..., but God has already got that covered.

https://www.smh.com.au/world/asia/t...in-thai-cave-rescue-20180708-p4zq9r.html

Wasn't it you that posted all the details bout everybody bein compressed by water in a level, or somethin real detailed like that?

And, I must admit, your detailed dissertation on decompression chambers and their necessity for this rescue was most gripping and informative.

That WAS a fear of the doctor's, and he did mention they might need a decompression chamber be airlifted into the site. After he got hands on info from the site and ascertained the boys condition in person, he dismissed that need. However, I believe it was you who said they had no chance of running out of oxygen, and yet that is one of the largest factors in the speed of this rescue. (Decreasing oxygen levels from an acceptable level of 21% down to 15%).

You are intentionally trying to start something, and I'm not playing. I'm doing paperwork and don't have time for your nonsense. (GFY)

I posted about the compressed air from water, was passing on what the experts on site stated...they were planning hyperbolic chambers, and they stated that was a big concern.

I'm not a dive nor cave expert, and never claimed to be...I was just passing info from first responders as reported.

Wishing them luck. They ought to be getting going soon. Occasionally BBC radio has had some decent reports on it..

Layin it off on the doctor? You was the one expoundin on your personal experience with water picks or somethin involvin paper clips, which absolutely proved that everbody's eyes'd look like Marty Feldman straightaway, and they was gonna explode if they didn't get decompressed.

I'm doin you a favor by not quotin the stupid shat you posted, so's you can go back and edit that crap outta internet history.

Just got ridda 4ajerk, and along comes kellory.

Proof that nature abhors a vacuum.

You mean laying it on the Doc like in his own words?
I never claimed to be a caver. But the doc is, and was specifically requested to join the rescue due to his extensive experience in diving and caving. He is very highly qualified. If he felt the need to cover all the bases, he had the background to determine that.

I stand by my written words.

Except now, you pussy, they ain't your words, when they turn out ta be wrong.

You call BS on a post, when you have no clue, then you lay it off on somebody else when it turns out your clueless ass was wrong.

You wanna call BS on a post in the future, make it somethin you actually know about, like paper clips.

On the bright side. Four more boys out.....

8th boy just removed from the cave, 4 boys an 1 azzhole coach to go.

They are done working for the day

Sorry Boomer, you were 3 seconds faster than me

Figure tonight they will get the last four boys out and leave the coach to think things over?

It looks like none of the parents, etc. are CF members.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ped-underground-write-letters-coach.html

Any blame games can be better played by anyone directly involved who needs to do that after everyone is out of the cave.

Hey, they are Nips, aren't they.
When they put the scuba gear on the last boy, there in the darkness of the cave, the last Thailand SEAL will hand the coach the Samurai sword, and tell him, "Premier Vhatuphatuasong is sure that you cannot live with your shame. He is sure that you know the right thing to do..."

Thais are good people and have long been a good US ally. At least they were good people in a different culture in the late 1960's.

From written reports, the most fit came out first and the others have been left for later to benefit as much as they can from the high protein, etc. foods that have been provided with. According to one report, the coach is the worst off because he refused to eat any of the food they had available to them before they were found.

And they are not Nips even though they might meet the CF requirement of "all look alike".......

Ya, it has been my experience that other Asians really admire the Japanese...... you know that whole “Greater Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere” thing from the ‘30’s and ‘40’s.

Anyway the guy is a Bhuddist, if you kill ‘em they just come right back

I like Thais. Anyone who names a city Fuqckit is aok by me. Plus that peanut sauce is pretty good. Carry on.

For a bit of historical perspective about Thailand, the Japanese overran the country beginning the same day that Pearl Harbor was bombed. After the small Thai army was defeated, the Japanese military used it as a base for its military campaign to conquer Malaysia.

And Hari-kari is a Japanese military samurai cult ritual dating back to the 11th Century in Japanese culture. It has nothing to do with Thai culture.

At the entrance of the cave a sign says: Don't enter the fuggin cave during monsoon season

The coach said "fugg it, let's go in"

You left out the part where it said that Monsoon season was July to May. The entered the cave in June.

It appears you're correct, not sure why the reporting keeps stating the cave sign ?

Bayou rover - I applaud your efforts on this thread!

My $0.02: When all is said and done, that coach will be acclaimed as a hero.

CNN would love your reporting techniques. It fits right into their mantra.

After everyone is out, the why's and the what for's can be assessed and not speculated about to such a high level as they are now .

I know, I know, Nips are Japanese. Japan is an island off the coast. Thailand is on the mainland. Different culture.

I was making a little joke.

I do think 'ol coach might partake of a little of the spirit of the Samurai and commit seppu-ku, even if it is not part of his particular culture.
We already got one dead guy and might be more before this is over.

All you naysayers talking about how impossible this rescue was to pull off can go fuq yourselves - because it's happening.

I admitted the gentleman was right, and I was wrong...I know that's rare around here. I was going by the BBC reports since many are Brit divers.

My bad. I guess that maybe makes you a candidate to be an MSNBC reporter then, shooting from the hip and all. They once admitted that they were wrong about something.

BTW - The sign actually warns against entrance from July thru November.

Sounds like they should change the fuggin sign, it's raining like hell there.

The coach is 25 years old, he was doing a little team building. I wouldn't hang him. Maybe I'm in the minority.

They need a new sign....

Damnit, it's tough to keep track here....

You dont have a clue.

Wat yer spozed ta do is not report on new news. Ya wait till it gits old as chitt and when evethangs all strait a few days later tgen ya make yer report.

Course, by then some udder sucker done reported fake news onit and you dont needta report onit. You git ta sit an callum a dumb schiett.

Jag spot on,
Most on the thread were trying to provide info to those that cared about the boys, any misinformation or mistakes was accidental. I'm an Engineer, not a journalist, diver, or cave expert.

4 boys and 1 coach to go.

Like this one?:



Fill an @sshole and invert an empty brain in it, and ya get a engineer tryin ta BS his way through not knowin jack about caves.

I would have left him alone in his bath tub with his rubber ducky and an empty glass if he hadn't started spouting uninformed opinions about what signs read and what coaches should do or not do as a result. He sounded like he thought he was the stud duck at a donkey BBQ.

Right now we can only hope and pray that they are able to get everyone out of the cave safely. There will be plenty of time later for reflection based on facts and not on uninformed opinions spouted by internet experts who have azzholes and other things associated with them.

Along comes BayouHomo to jump in the game, he's so smart(said nobody ever)...lol

I SURE WONDER WHY THERE WAS AN ATTEMPT AT STARTING ANOTHER THREAD. lol

Trying to weed the riff-raff out

I get that Thailand has a tradition of adults luring kids into caves, but I'm not getting the soccer angle.

People are trapped in a cave!

Quick!,...go get some Caucasians!

We are known to float.

P-h-u-k-e-t, let's go spelunking.

Gotta put P h u k e t on my bucket list.

This is much more fun than the Peruvian miner thread.

LOL..!!

A man's gotta save face somehow when he's lagging behind badly, and name calling is all ya got.... Right?

Does this mean all the boys are out ?

Yes, they're ALL out, coach included. I don't know how many rescuers and what equipment has to be brought out yet. There has to be a pile of stuff in there to haul out.

This was an amazing display of teamwork, hard work, and guts to pull this off with the loss of only 1 man. We can't say too much about the team that did it.

Fortunately they are. Yet you still seem to be more concerned about your online persona.

Let the pissing olympics begin. You can be both a contestant and a judge with your online expertise and being an engineer and all.

A much harder task than I'd have thought, 2 miles back is a game changer.

This is some great news. It was really looking grim there for a while. Thanks to the brave divers who risked their lives to get into that cave and save these boys.

One last thing - Bayou Rover is smart. Signed someone, ever.