Thai cave rescue: how divers went from the easy life to daring mission
Life on the tropical island of Koh Tao was idyllic, but when the emergency call went out, a disparate team of cave-diving experts leapt into action
Long-time dive-school partners Mikko Paasi and Ivan Karadzic were on different continents when they got the calls for help. Paasi, 43, rushed to the northern Thai city of Chiang Rai from Malta on July 2, his eighth wedding anniversary, to meet up with Karadzic – who had cut short a holiday cave diving near the Thai province of Krabi – and one of their close friends, Erik Brown, a Canadian diver.
The Thai government, the divers said, had told them it needed their expertise and specialised equipment for an audacious mission: to locate and ultimately, it was hoped, extricate 12 young boys and their football coach from a flooded cave by diving them out.
Part of a small, tight-knit group of technical divers used to a laid-back life on the Thai resort island of Koh Tao, the three eventually became a crucial part of the effort to shepherd the boys through the cave’s narrow, mud-clogged passages, as the world waited and watched. United States military officials described them as among the world’s top cave divers, whose niche passion helped pull off an undertaking many thought would end in multiple deaths.
“If you can use the skill set to help in any way you can, you have to,” says Brown, 36. “Lots of people would have done it – we just happened to be really close.”
Koh Tao, the trio’s base in the Gulf of Thailand, has lured divers since the late 1980s with its clear aquamarine waters, sunny weather and easy access to dive spots. Jim Donaldson, a partner and manager at Big Blue Diving, a Koh Tao dive school, estimates that there were just six dive shops on the eight-square-mile island in 2000, a year after he arrived, compared to about 65 now.