On the following day, Thursday June 28 and day six of the rescue, Rick and John dived the three short sumps to chamber 3. As they surfaced they realised there were people in the chamber. Hoping they’d found the missing boys they soon realised these men were older, it transpired they were Thai water company employees who had not been reported missing and who had been trapped for around twenty four hours, possibly longer. Their situation was desperate, conditions were worsening quickly, there was no communication to the surface and no one, least of all the two divers, knew at at that stage whether Chamber 3 would flood completely.
In the cave the water was still rising and although the chamber is in part of the show cave Rick described the diving conditions heading back to the cave entrance as appalling. As well as low visibility which was to be expected in the flood water the site had become contaminated with diesel after a pump installed inside the cave had been flooded. As they stood in the sumps the muddy water was churning, swirling and eddying around them. The four men were not divers, or even cavers. The two British divers had only their personal equipment, there was nothing spare for the four to use, and no time to return to the entrance for help, more equipment or more divers.
The two found themselves in a completely unexpected situation and quickly devised a plan to relay the four men through the three sumps and around 700m of “open” passage back to the cave entrance. Rick explained there were some positives, the sumps were shallow, under 5m deep, fairly short at around 10m long, the water was fairly warm and the four, though scared, were very keen to get out!
The plan was fairly simple – both divers were wearing twin side-mounted cylinders and therefore had two demand valves. Each of the two would then take it in turns and relay rescue each of the workers through the sumps, one at a time, utilising the mask from the other diver. The group would then be escorted back through the cave to the next sump where the process would be repeated. In any dive rescue there is always a risk that the victim will panic, and possibly harm the rescuer or damage his or her equipment.