These Men Were Trapped In An Underground Cave For 9 Days | Trapped S1 EP4 | Wonder

a flash flood trapped seven French cavers a hundred meters underground as the water rises it forces the men up against the cave roof there is no escape [Music] [Music] in southern France a freak storm turns a weekend caving adventure into a life-and-death struggle seven men scramble into their life rafts and wait helplessly as the floodwaters forced them relentlessly upward the air pocket that's keeping them alive is shrinking if the water keeps rising it will crush them into the cave ceiling and drown them Nicola vo land is on his first overnight caving expedition it is a terrifying initiation I was 19 years old at the time why at the beginning of my life am I going to die here Nicola is the youngest member of the team he and six more experienced cavers have been planning this expedition for months all of them are from the nearby town of gramma [Music] they all share one passion exploring the planets underground frontiers the Vita Hale cave system is right in their backyard it stretches for 14 kilometers beneath the fields and forests around Rama it's a giant subterranean network of caverns with an underground river and caves up to 40 meters tall there's only one entrance this is how Nicola and the others have descended into Vitiello the entry point is a narrow 40 meter deep well that connects with the underground river at the start of the expedition the river is just ankle-deep in most sections in other areas they need rafts to make their way through the deeper water not only particular our goal was to follow the underground river and check out parts of the cave that hadn't been explored fifteen or twenty years one can send anyone to attend any two days into their expedition a freak wave of violent thunderstorms sweeps through the region dumping sixty two millimeters of rain in just 12 hours the underground river rises quickly flooding the cave and blocking the cavers only escape route [Music] Nikola and the six other cavers have been trapped for most of the day they huddled together just one-and-a-half meters from the roof of the cave [Music] there were no sounds anymore no noises it was a silent Lake that was rising little by little listen guys Nikola tries to boost the group's morale he tells his friend that he'll buy them all a car if they get out alive he's only half serious nova quasi-neutral group this very rugged venue new [ __ ] Wanda we were supposed to meet up with another group of cavers the next day so once the water rose we knew our families would sound the alarm and contact the rescuers 300 kilometers away in another cave system burnout torte leads a rescue training exercise bergna is a world renowned caper with nearly two decades of experience now his expertise is urgently needed in france's biggest ever cave rescue attempt hello almost wanna move it up any news our own song we got a phone call that there was a group of seven people trapped in the Vita has only Nepal improved a la Commedia it's a huge cave system and the flow of the river there gets incredibly powerful when there are massive floods it becomes really dangerous so we took this call very seriously we knew we had a potentially tragic situation on our hands for the men trapped in there life rafts the hours passed slowly and painfully at eight to ten degrees Celsius the water is bone-chilling ly cold we felt abandoned we asked why did this happen to us the only thing keeping them alive is a pressurized pocket of air between the water and the top of the cavern the men know their situation is precarious any change in the pressure inside the cave could make the water rise suddenly that's the net motion pathetic I was asking myself will I have enough air to breathe city uh city's always either we get out or we will be left to die the men must use their lamps sparingly the lamps burn a flammable gas to make light and this process consumes precious oxygen with every breath they rob the tiny air pocket of its life-saving oxygen and every time they exhale they filled the air chamber with increasing amounts of deadly carbon dioxide as carbon dioxide levels accumulate in the body breathing accelerates heart rate increases tissue fluids become acidic extremely high levels of co2 can cause respiratory paralysis convulsions coma even death [Music] computer technician Philippe Verte is the team's technical expert he uses an altimeter to check the air pressure in the bubble he knows that as long as the pressure remains stable the water will not rise or drop suddenly Philippe reports that the pressure is high and holding for the moment but any change in another part of the river could eliminate their safe haven in seconds [Music] in the town of gramma family and friends of the cavers are worried they fear that the torrential rains have turned the VTL cave system into a deathtrap [Music] rescuers set up headquarters on a military base above the cave system rescue groups from across the country converge on the small town but because the entrance well is flooded they are unable to get down in the caves [Music] one of the key rescuers to arrive on the scene is D better the era he's a veteran advisor with the country's caving rescue organization called spiel EO secure francais more importantly it's where he grew up and began caving as a boy [Music] here's what we know there's been a ton of rain we have seven cavers trapped underground and they've got enough food to last them three days we have to try and rescue them but we know the only entrance is filled with water Nicola vo land and his fellow cavers have now been trapped for almost 24 hours so far the air pressure has held steady but they're in for the shock of their lives upstream in another part of the cave system some debris breaks loose as the blockage clears there's a sudden dangerous drop in air pressure than a powerful surge of water the moment the water goes down it goes down fast faster than it rose well not like Jeff Stassi Pisa our torsos were shaking and trembling our ears were blocked you really had the impression you were squished into a bottle and being shaken in every direction as the water level drops the men clamber onto a ledge that had been submerged until now we were worried it was like a whirlpool that was gonna suck us down underwater bash us into the walls and drown us in the current the sudden draining of the water disrupts the pressure in the gallery and creates a bizarre phenomenon for a period of nearly ten minutes multiple waves batter the inside of the cavern the noise was absolutely infernal we were really in the middle of the elements that were in a fury [Music] the unpredictable underground river presents a huge challenge for the rescuers in order to conquer it they desperately need the expertise of world caving specialists banner torte the cave system actually descends and the river flows through it so essentially the current flows downward from the highest point to the lowest point he heads for gramma with a special kayak ideal for this kind of rescue the water has receded the trapped cavers make a camp on a three metre wide ledge the waves have left them badly shaken we had to organize we had to do something we said to ourselves survival starts right now we had about three days of waiting we figured it would take about three days for the water level to drop before we can head back out [Music] the men carefully rationed the food that's left packets of soup a few cereal bars rice cakes and some caramels the Kumasi affair on Gurukul we started to tabulate what we had for supplies what we had for light how much water we had we had a stalactite that ran with water drip by drip that we collected and purified with hydro clonise on tap burner tort arrives at vita l by now the floodwaters have receded this means that tort can attempt to enter the cave system along with giver of the era the local expert receive a surplus as soon as i arrived on site i was updated on the situation and we quickly made the decision to form a team that would include giba riviera and myself give up give up a momento rescuing the trapped men is the biggest challenge of been house career he and ghee will have to navigate a maze of dangerous caves and unexplored galleries to find the cavers the rescuers know that the trapped cavers planned to go to some of the highest points of the system if they made it that far they might still be alive no clue India mom didn't come to methey even though the water rose 30 meters at the lower end of the cave system it didn't mean that it completely flooded the upper end so if the trapped cavers were up there when the water was rising we had every hope of finding them in perfect health allow and ghee prepare for their underground search with military precision gearing up with the most sophisticated rescue equipment this includes been a special two-man inflatable kayak gee who's already been underground on a scouting mission tells Ben now that the current is very dangerous the objective of the mission was go to the furthest point possible in the cave system we figured once the water started rising the cavers would have moved to camp would have withdrawn to a higher part of the cavern so burn our and I left on his customized raft with a lot of equipment to fight the current and to do a lot of climbing when Ben orangy descend into the cave system they discovered that the underground river is still raging in some passages in others it's flooded right to the ceiling making any headway among the jagged rocks is taxing and dangerous now come in we had enough room between the roof and the surface of the water to move forward but it was difficult because the water had a violently strong current after nearly five hours of slogging through the cave system there finally within striking distance of the cave called Sol duquan this is where been our and ghee hoped the men are trapped in the higher galleries the only way to get to those galleries is to climb you corny phobia imagine imagine the Saudi colon is a chamber that is pointed so we arrived at a gallery that is situated at this level and then we had to climb the slope towards the summit of the chamber it was about a 15 meter climb to get up to the upper gallery it's a grueling five hour climb the two men dragged themselves forward hauling heavy equipment and bare nails inflatable kayak when they finally reach the upper gallery it's waterlogged but otherwise empty except for one disturbing sign that someone or something has passed through here once we made it to the upper gallery of Salle de colon it's basically the highest point in the area we looked around and noticed there were little bits of plastic stuck to the ceiling that was incredibly disappointing and distressing because this meant the whole network had been filled with water it was pretty tragic Guillen then I'll know that if the men were here they would have drowned if they're still alive they have to be somewhere even higher in the cave system the next big cave is clay divert another 2 kilometers upstream Benna and ghee want to press ahead but it's too dangerous the water completely fills the low sections in front of them they're forced to turn around and head back to rescue headquarters to devise a new plan [Music] Nikola and the other cavers can only wait with no sense of time and no daylight sleep comes in fits and bursts some sleep others talk and always they worry about the changing water level okay Phil I'm about so basically we went into survival mode we figured it would be a good idea to eat every 12 hours and we try to really conserve our energy we had a stove to heat the water so that we could hydrate ourselves as well as warm ourselves and we still had a bit of fuel for our lamps to eventually light the way out they fantasize about the perfect meal almost immediately the first thing that comes to mind is hunger they share and save her memories of great restaurant meals and favorite recipes all you think about is food and so we had to be really careful in ration our meals I remember we had one meal that consisted of a spoonful of curried rice 15 milliliters of hot tea a quarter of mandarin orange and a rotten chestnut that was a meal when Ben R&D resurfaced the rescuers adopt a new strategy to speed up the search for the missing cavers they tell their fellow rescuers that it's difficult and risky to make headway underground they'll have to find a quicker way to get access to key caverns it's time to bring in the heavy machinery the topographers will try to pinpoint the location of caves that rescuers haven't been able to reach via the underground route the drilling teams will punch through the earth to get direct access to the chambers below drilling should create new entry and exit points along the cave system [Music] but this will provide shortcuts for the rescuers and hopefully bring them within reach of the trapped cavers more safely and more quickly deciding exactly where to drill is a daunting task just 30 centimeters in the wrong direction can mean missing the entire cave system subside nobilis woefully duty pamaj we needed two types of machines for the drilling operation we needed drills that could go very deep to try to locate the river and we also needed drills that could bore out a hole large enough in diameter for a person to fit through that was essential once started the drilling teams hammer away at the rock day and night at the same time other rescuers try the underground route via the well which is the caves only natural entrance they must work their way up the river to where they think the men could be trapped [Music] the seven trapped cavers have managed to hold on for almost a week but their situation is getting desperate they're almost out of food what's worse the water is rising again with news of the rising water the fear flooded right back in we checked a level quickly and saw the water kept on rising and the current was getting stronger and stronger and then the biggest fear for all of us was we all looked up at the ceiling everyone said no way there's no way we're going in the Rass again it was so horrible so difficult physically that we wouldn't survive a second flood rescuers work around the clock to find the seven missing cavers then the weather takes another disastrous turn for the second time in a week torrential rain hammers southern friends water floods the cave entrance shutting off all access a team of rescuers is underground now they too are cut off by the rising water above ground Benna torte has to find a way to warn them and fast he scribbles a message on a notepad and attaches it to a bear lamp bulb and a phone then sends it all down a small drill hole he must draw the attention of his men to warn them of the dangerous new flooding given default yeah Villa dump oh yeah visa myself so there was the phone there was the lamp and there was the message and the objective of that was to stop them from going any further we didn't want them to keep going back toward the entrance to Vita head because we knew the water had risen there and they would have been trapped easily at first bonaga gets no response from the team underground he waits for three hours then a welcome sign of life from the rescuers below burn our wards them to stay where they are until the floodwaters recede there's nothing these trapped rescuers can do until the water level drops again or the drilling crew enlarges the hole so a body can squeeze through but they are safe [Music] elsewhere in the cave system Nikola via land and his six trapped colleagues have used up almost all the fuel for their headlamps even if the water level drops they no longer have enough light or even the strength to walk out of the cave system on their own depression sets in we were really wishing the water wouldn't rise to that level again for me if that was the case I would have probably let myself sink it was a point at which we all wanted to abandon it to let it all go [Music] drilling teams work around the clock and the race to blast into the rock and enlarge the existing hole [Music] finally the giant drill busts through the city of Lima capital palms of all don't see cliff good that was a major accomplishment for us once we created the new opening it was like removing a whole piece of the cave network but the rescue mission is far from over even though they've created a shortcut into the cave network they're still not certain where the seven missing men might be or even if they are still alive time underground takes its toll on Nikola and his fellow cavers their main preoccupation now is to fight off dehydration and hypothermia and now there's another worry their supply of water purification tablets has almost run out she typifies she called her quantification I wasn't mad at anyone I was depressed I felt abandoned abandoned by life completely by now the massive rescue effort is an international story the media has descended on the quiet countryside there now torte and his team now have to deal with a new set of challenges especially how to prevent any bad news from leaking out suffers a deduce aunt was impersonal given it there were about two to three hundred people who came from everywhere and we had huge problems trying to control that we heard that some reporters had plugged themselves into our telephone system we had microphones planted in different command posts we had people listening to our conversations on long-range microphones or Navi the Jean cocoon TV D'Amico a longer distance le conversación con Poovey ofwar don't go to the road but now gathers his team and briefs them on the media store from now on they must use coded messages when calling each other the code the codes were used so that the media didn't understand the meaning of our words so basically we had time to organize and tell the families the rescuers code if they find the survivors alive is send us some food if the cavers are found dead the code is send us some carbide as the drilling team zero in on the large gallery called clay to boot the calcified Rock slows them down this kind of rock has a lot of cracks and fissures which can cause the drill head to bend or break a little petite to come along with the help of a little camera that we sent down into each hole we looked to see if there were any galleries at the same time we measured the speed of the air current because if there's a strong air current that means there's a direct connection with the larger cave Network the drill has penetrated 28 meters down into the rock suddenly it breaks through to a large cavity of air we immediately decided to widen the drilled hole and now and eHome are trapped here somewhere in the galleries of clay davood but the camera can find no signs of the missing men [Music] underground we always have the impression of hearing noises isara noises strange noises above all when there's a river and the sound of water nicola thinks he hears a voice one of the others is also sure he's heard something you did in the midst of the sounds of water and the sounds of voices that we constantly heard i believe i heard something a little bit stronger a little bit louder they wonder if it might be rescuers but for every moment of hope there's a moment of despair when they realize it's just an illusion something's holding them up yeah well said yeah but we said is it hallucination to people at the same time that would be bizarre is there someone who's trying to contact us is there a rescue we look to our left looks where right but there was no one there was nothing [Music] Trudy said temple cinnamon all seven of us thought a lot about our families we thought they must be dead worried after waiting several days like this we all wish they still had hope but they all thought as long as we don't find them they are still alive let escape is gonna seduce many familiar Sakuni say for a majority don't the survivors knew each other but the families also knew one another during the whole rescue they tried to help us to kneel please a keeper the father when they keep turtles Iquitos over tough to cover yet so fast how about you even got revenge on the drilling teams the rescue teams on the surface we were all working 24 hours around the clock it was raining snowing it was freezing the support of the families was very important and helpful and kind to the rescuers they made us coffee they brought us food they really tried to lend support to all levels of the rescue effort in the face of a daunting challenge a tool in évora pyramid is certain model isn't what it be comfortable that is unruly difficult a today proved the provider the rescuers are encouraged by the enlarged drill hole above clay to boot they know that if the trapped cavers are still alive this is the most likely place to find them kiba Riviera prepares to descend into the cave system once again he went underground about five or six times and every time he was down for long complex and intense missions all that combined with fatigue puts a rescuer in danger of getting injured [Music] don't you people money did they for a guy like me gay was the most important resource I had to send him on missions where his presence was indispensable subways on sir Elliot Wendy Spencer there were two possible routes a main climb and a gallery that went off in another direction he unhooks his line he will be joined by another rescuer he believes that if he can discover a passageway through to the river he'll be able to find the trapped men if they're still alive they've got to be close with some botanist together we went into that gallery with the hope of finding our survivors we covered 300 metres it was the first time that anyone disturbed the soil and we didn't manage to find a direct link to the river [Music] no sound no sign of air currents G explores other areas of the cave system with no result and no sign of the river finally after many climbs and many obstructions we reached a cavity of a few meters that blocked off yet another gallery you know as soon as I got through the rockfall there was an enormous sound it was the sound of the river the rumbling of water in the gallery the resonance of that water and also at the same time there was the current of air that was tickling my nostrils the discovery of the underground river is a big breakthrough he believes that the trapped cavers must now be within shouting distance [Applause] [Music] have a punt on dude we didn't hear them there was no sign of life but at least the search could now accelerate they push boulders into the cavern below hoping that the noise will spark a response from the trapped men but again there's no answer I've lost positive Sokka we'd been underground exploring for several hours by now the people there skee reports to the rescuers on the surface he tells them that although he has found the river and cleared a passageway to it there is no sign of cavers and he cannot go any further we'd finally found a connection to the river at this end of the system but the cavers weren't here and so we needed to deploy new teams to look for them [Music] after more than a week of rescue work and five marathon underground missions he is exhausted he has no choice but to head back to the surface when he arrives up top he briefs the others about the shaft that leads to the underground river and where they need to go next he set the path and a fresh team of rescuers can now continue the hunt for the trapped cavers Cyril Arno is a member of the next unit going in akise discovery of the shaft leading to the river was huge for us we now had a new access point where we could quickly put our feet back in the river at this point every minute counts there has been no word from the trapped cavers for almost 200 hours there's no evidence they have survived the floodwaters Cyril's team plows forward they see a bend up ahead I think it was about eight or nine o'clock on Sunday morning everyone was in the sleeping bags distinctly I heard a voice someone who is talking to someone else there I felt my stomach going nuts my throat closed the seven cavers have been trapped for nine days they are so weak and disoriented that they can't even tell if the sounds they hear are real and at that moment everyone yelled with all their lungs [Music] it's silly then we waited all seven of us distress tents shivering on edge and then we heard lava pools the answer we were waiting for for ten days but we saw the rescuers arrive later the sensation was unimaginable [Music] after nine days trapped 100 meters underground Nikola and his friends now know they are going to get out of the cave alive to celebrate they present the rescuers with one of the stale pieces of cake they've been saving it was contact with another human being to know that we were not forgotten not abandoned and finally that we would get out though the men have been found alive cyril decides not to call up with the code he'd rather deliver the news personally to bear now safety feed those interested boot he did that for one reason only to keep the information as confidential as possible because we knew on the surface there were a lot of people listening in on our comm systems and if they decoded our message it could have caused some serious problems Accio dunah dunah Cody Oh event your mum was it a problem in the middle of the night on the tenth day the cavers begin to emerge from the bowels of Veta Kyle Nicole a violin is the first to be winched to the surface [Music] pleasure me a silver merci I could never thank enough all of the people who took part in the rescue it will forever be etched in my memory and my eyes will always remember those first images of the rescuers looking at us seeing us alive at the end of ten days ten days of anxiety what can I do to thank them you need more than one lifetime for that it was an immense joy for me when we finally found them I was a bit disappointed that it wasn't the one who actually met them underground but to see them a little later when they came out was fantastic this operation was the biggest and longest rescue effort ever in France the high point of it is that we found the seven men alive for me it will always be one of those experiences that is totally extraordinary after the rescue Nicola became an SSF rescuer himself as did several other cavers an experience like the one we went through it certainly leaves a mark on your life Michael I said to function of its new home at the time I was 19 years old I didn't know much about life it taught me a lot it taught me personally to live more intensely to pay attention to my choices and to pay attention to my friends to respect life Oh Sarah Lily our victim owns to build ties with everyone because it could happen to anybody oh gee a lot there near speleology is the last activity in the world that allows us to uncover territories completely untouched by civilization it's fabulous all the mountains have already been climbed by one route or another but underground there's still much to discover today we still find new networks of 30 40 even 50 kilometers Rita hell is now officially sealed off from the world the military zone is closed to cavers no one will explore the cave system any time soon that is unless cavers can find a new way in to this day many continue to search for that possible fissure that possible crack that will lead them back down into the abyss if tomorrow we find a new entrance to that network I will be the first to return

Channel: Wonder

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Keywords: Wonder, survival, trapped, trapped s1 ep4, trapped season 1 episode 4, trapped in a cave, trapped underground, wonder survial stories, trapped full episodes, these men survived, i shouldnt be alive wonder, i shouldnt be alive, wonder i shouldnt be alive 2018, wonder survival videos, survival stories, survivors tell their story

Id: qP_9bZyxGVM

Length: 47min 49sec (2869 seconds)

Published: Fri Nov 08 2019