Do you guys remember that world famous Thai cave rescue by uber experienced British Cave Divers? The one in 2018, when 13 schoolboys and a teacher had to be drugged, and then slowly unconsciesly transported underwater across like 2km of underwater passages? Rocket Daddy called one of them a libertarian man on twatter. One of the divers was known as Rick Stanton, a mega neurodivergent boomer bong loner, who had like 30 years of cave diving, and cave diving rescue experience.
Well our story takes place in 2004, about 15 years earlier in Mexico, when our boi Rick Stanton was called by the British military to help save some bongs who got caught trapped in Alpazat caves after a flash flood, very similar to the Thai cave rescue incident.
Well the way it works is that Rick isn't actually part of any actual institution or rescue organization. Not like Burgerland's coast guard. His dayjob is being a firefighter. But because diving underground and in caves is so astronomically dangerous, there's very few peeps on planet earth's Billions who actually has garnered the skillset and capability of being able to stay calm underground, underwater, andd with no capacity to even orientate yourself upwards or downwards. Dozens of cave divers end up dying each year, because even experienced open water divers continiously underestimate the dangers of underground diving.
So the way it has worked for the past 35 years was that Bong military would call Rick and any other of his fellow renowned Cave Diver rescuers, every 2 yearsr, to come and help whenever some british peeps got stick in watery caves; danger zones where the usual brit special forces or special rescue workers could not even dare for fear of getting stuck and drowning.
The point is that Rick and his fellow diving neurodivergents don't belong to any miltary arm, they are just experienced regular civilians whom are often deferred to by the british equivalent of seals and stormwater rescuers. They only belonged to the Cave Rescue Organization https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cave_Rescue_Organisation
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2004-mar-25-fg-cavers25-story.html
In 2004 6 British Navy and Air force guys, who were part of a british Caving Association, decided to goof off during their official work hours, and set their off time in an "official military expedition to support adventurous training." These cavers wanted to partake in the cave rich region in which they found themselves. Totally unoffical like
Unfortunately for these chodes, a flash flood occurred right as they were in the Alpazat cave, trapping them behind sumps of underground waters. This moment would result in frosty diplomatic tension between Britain and Mexico for the next decade.
Luckily for these dipshits, there was prefabricated emergency camps in a drier part of the cave, similar to mount Everest where they have several intermediary camps, as the Alpazat cave system was very large. So they were ok, and wouldn't immediately starve or drown like the Thai schoolboys, they were still stuck like plugs. They even had a radioset with them to communicate with the outside.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2004/mar/24/owenbowcott
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicente_Fox
At this point in time Mexican President Vicente had a low approval rating from his constituents, and seized upon the moment when reports came that not just Brits, but British soldiers were trapped in Alpazat cave. He drummed up controvesy, in order to be seen as a strong and decisive leader who would take on foreign intermingling.
The 6 morons trapped in the Mexican cave were just fools goofing off, but now their presence in an awkward place was threatening British-Mexican diplomacy. If they were just civilians, it wouldn't have mattered, but because they were British armed forces personnel it looked dodgy as frick to the mexican press.
https://www.standard.co.uk/hp/front/why-were-soldiers-in-mexico-6981633.html
Basically the Mexican prez was all like WTF are ur soldiers doing in our natural environment!? The gossip and tall tales in the Mexican media made a rumor that British espionage forces have been secretly digging in Alpazat caves, looking for Uranian deposits to mine in secret, but the Flash flood made them be caught red handed!!
This event was fire onto oil, because prior to these 6 fools getting stuck, the very month prior to this, a secret report got leaked which proved that Britain had been spying on Mexico, so the mexicans were already fired up.
The british diplomatic arm, was all like: What the heck are you talking about?? But because the cavers had radioactive-detecting equipment with them when they were rescued, it all but confirmed the rumor in the mexican media at that moment. But these radioactive detection devices were more used to detect dangerous gasses in isolated caves, and were standard equipment - not something you can explain to angry mexican special forces barking in your face.
The biggest force for contention between the Bong and Mexican ambassadors was that the Bongs refused the mexican rescue forces. This enraged the mexicans who believed they didn't want to be rescued by mexican personnel so that they might have time to stash away incriminating evidence of their secret mining whatever. Meanwhile, the british military didn't trust the local mexican rescue operator's capabilities, and wanted their own men, including their cave diving specialists like Rick Stanton. They knew full well how dangerous under water cave rescue operations were, and weren't in the least bit diplomatic in their statements that they didn't trust mexico to safely rescue the 6 bongs.
When the Mexican general came to the Alpazat cave and demanded the British rescuers there to show him where the 6 other divers were stuck, because he didn't comprehend they were blocked off by vast underwater bodies, he was lead to the 1st sump under which the cave tunnels disappeared into the dark waters. Exiting meekly like an r-slur, he finally consented to the british cave diving specialists to get on with the rescue operation.
Cave divers Richard Stanton and Jason Mallinson assisted the soldiers one at a time to exit the caves, and the dive for each to 13 minutes - just so you guys can appreciate just how fricking deep these guys were stuck at. The dive was 300m long.
Hilariously, when Rick and Jason exited the caves towards the waiting press and cameras, the other mexican rescue workers, that did frickall during the operation, would exit with them shoulder to shoulder, as if they had a hand in the rescue to look good for the cameras.
Anyways after much Polandball tier diplomatic peepeewaving, the british military personnel was allowed to frick off back to Bongland.
Another amusing story before the rescue took place - When Rick and Jason, the two experienced cave divers, arrived in Tacoland, they were immediately shadowed (comically badly) by mexican espionage personnel. When they were met at the airport, a mexican woman with flawless english would ask them really weird questions, like: to which branch of the british military do you belong?
Rick and Jason would stare at each other dumbfounded, and be like: mate we're only civillians!
But no matter how much they tried to convince the mexican authorities that they were merely two nondescript civilians, the more the mexican spies attributed more outlandish identities to the divers, until the mexicans had convinced themselves that these two troublemakers were dodgier than pinballs. I mean what nation would just contract ordinary citizens to come to another country in a rescue operation!
That's all i got, GOOD NIGHT
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
cave divers are fricking insane tbh
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
just the thought of swimming through a tiny little tunnel barely big enough to move through that's full of water makes me want to die.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Most of the tunnels are pretty big though. You only go in the tight ones if you want to. And its usually pretty hard to get permanently stuck.
Though someone just died a few weeks ago after getting stuck in an exceptionally tight spot. But he's only the second one I've heard of that died after getting stuck in a restriction.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
isn't the larger risk that trying to squeeze through a narrow tunnel damages your equipment, rather than getting permanently stuck?
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
It would depend on what equipment you were using, for the most part if you're wearing the proper equipment for stuff like this it'd be really hard to.
Even if you did break it, you have redundancy for almost everything including air sources. Plus whatever your buddy is carrying.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Would you go cave diving with me?
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
More options
Context
More options
Context
or i could not do it and not risk getting stuck.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
More options
Context
And if you panic kick you'll stir up all the sediment and be blinded too.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
But if you do it right you can see more rocky tunnels that look just like the rocky tunnels you saw on the otherside
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
They're pretty
And you can be somewhere where only a handful of people if any have been before. Closest thing to space exploration.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
I'd rather go to a cave that's NOT underwater thank you
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
But then you have to deal with gravity.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
More options
Context
More options
Context
More options
Context
stop iβm already scared
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
More options
Context
Time to die
https://old.reddit.com/r/oddlyterrifying/comments/13hoi5q/tight_squeeze_at_deep_cave/
Ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooo oooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooo oooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooo oooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooo oooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo ooooooooooooooooooooo
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
Who said anything about swimming?
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Wtf is wrong with these people
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Their dream is to slowly suffocate in a freezing cold underwater cave
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
More options
Context
Frick off that's so dumb, why would anyone do that?
(I'm talking about reaction videos, not the cool cave diver)
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
More options
Context
More options
Context
Theyβve had to put up underwater signs to discourage r-slurs.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
That looks like the perfect place to hide treasure
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
More options
Context
Man I don't even want to wreck dive, these people are insane.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
More options
Context
I love reading the cave diving forum. When someone dies the main sentiment seems to be "well, that's sad, I hope this doesn't cause that cave to get shut down"
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
Getting stuck in an underwater cave and drowning is literally my worst nightmare
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Fortunately it's pretty easy to avoid underwater caves
unless you're @Robo7
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
More options
Context
More options
Context
More options
Context