Article on Ben McDaniel - Vortex Springs Case

[jeffloughridge]

I hope this is in the right place...I didn't post in A&I since it is not new.

There was a fairly well written article in this morning's St. Pete Times Online about Ben Mongomery and his disappearance at Vortex Springs last year.

When a diver goes missing, a deep cave is scene of a deeper mystery - St. Petersburg Times

[Cave Diver]

Interesting article, thanks for sharing.

[Kevin Carlisle]

That was posted on CDF last week. Good story, the camera was not abandoned due to the cable snagging tho, it was stopped when it reached the part of the cave where it was too tall to travel.

[NetDoc]

Great article. It captures what a lot of us have been thinking and leaves the questions open.

[mike_s]

Article on Ben Montgomery - Vortex Springs Case

Perhaps we can get someone to change the title to this to reflect the correct name. Ben McDaniel. (not Montgomery)

Great article. It captures what a lot of us have been thinking and leaves the questions open.

While it covered a lot of "what ifs", it made it out that he "mapped the cave" and he was a real cave diver, while in reality, he wasn't cave trained.

I think the article leaving out the fact that he wasn't cave trained was a huge omission.

[Cave Diver]

Perhaps we can get someone to change the title to this to reflect the correct name. Ben McDaniel. (not Montgomery)

Done. Ben Montgomery was the author of the article.

[SC_Hoaty]

I think the article leaving out the fact that he wasn't cave trained was a huge omission.

Agreed. One has to read between the lines to get that. The closest the article came to being explicit was this: (my emphasis)

He told the deputies that he and Taran also noticed that someone tampered with the gate, apparently to access the cave without a key. They suspected it was Ben, who didn't have the proper certification to pass through.

[Blue Sparkle]

While on a tangential search, I ran across a (very brief) news blurb about Ben McDaniel from about 10 days ago. The reward was mentioned in the OP's article, but this expands on it a bit.

COLLIERVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — A Collierville couple hope to raise enough reward money to tempt a diver into the Florida underwater cave where they believe their son's body lies....

Collierville couple hold fundraiser, hope to tempt divers to find son's body in cave - WHNT

I hope it's okay to tag it onto this thread; it didn't seem worthy of a whole new one.

Edit: I just noticed I had another copy of it open in a different tab - this one is essentially the same, but with a little bit more material at the end.

"We are offering the $10,000 because there is someone somewhere in this world who is brave enough to go back there and find Ben," Shelby McDaniel said.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/04/1...#ixzz1KUmFxZNq

I can see why they would want closure - heck, even I want to know what really happened and I never knew him; but it seems a bit uncomfortable to "encourage" people to dive in there. I can't imagine how I would feel if I made that offer and someone who really needed $10k went in looking and died. Ugh.

[Tortuga68]

The 'reward' offer has already been mentioned in the main A&I Vortex Indident thread... IMO there is no "back there" that hasn't already been gone to (that can be reached), & the guys who went there already are the bravest and best there are

Reposting the offer is only increasing the (hopefully very slim) chances that someone will take it up

'Tempt' is right... tempt to their own death

[karstdvr]

I can't imagine how I would feel if I made that offer and someone who really needed $10k went in looking and died. Ugh.

Shelby Mc Daniel befriended a lot of cave divers on facebook,and when this reward was offered I made this comment. I was removed as a facebook friend by him,and told by some friends of the family he was been through a lot and I should be more considerate. I think being considerate,and tempting someone into a dangerous situation are mutually exclusive. I feel for the McDaniel family,but I abhore the idea of more victims to a greater extent.