Chilling new theory emerges about how five divers died inside ‘shark cave’
An expert suspects the five divers who died while exploring underwater caves in the Maldives might have been sucked inside by a 'formidable' force.
What really happened during the deadly dive last week currently remains a mystery, although several chilling theories have been put forward while the official investigation gets underway.
Monica Montefalcone, a University of Genoa ecology professor, her daughter Giorgia Sommacal, research fellow Muriel Oddenino, marine biology graduate Federico Gualtieri, and diving instructor Gianluca Benedetti all perished in the tragedy which took place last Thursday (14 May).
The group had dived down to the Thinwana Kandu cave system, which is also known as 'shark cave' among locals.
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Divers have since recovered all of the victims' bodies, with officials saying that four of them were found 'pretty much together' in a 60-metre-deep cave in Vaavu Atoll, which is twice the legal depth for recreational diving in the island nation.
It later emerged that the divers did have a permit to dive to a depth of 50 metres to carry out scientific work studying coral.
The search had been temporarily suspended after a local military diver, Staff Sergeant Mohamed Mahdhee, died during a previous retrieval attempt.
Maldives government spokesman Ahmed Shaam explained the conditions below the surface were 'challenging', due to tough terrain, strong currents and poor visibility.
The rescue team used closed-circuit rebreathers - which is a system that recycles exhaled breathing gas and removes carbon dioxide through a chemical scrubber - allowing for 'significantly longer dives'.
The five experienced divers had entered the water on Thursday morning to assess the complex underwater cave system, but failed to resurface.
Local experts and foreign divers have previously ventured inside the cave, presidential spokesperson Mohamed Hussain Shareef said, who warned it is a 'very challenging dive'.
"Number one, because of the depth," he told the Associated Press. "Number two, because of actual terrain.
"That specific channel has strong currents, strong downdrafts down toward, and the conditions down there, the visibility, for example, once you enter the cave would be almost zero."
Now, the president of the Italian Society of Underwater and Hyperbaric Medicine has shared his chilling theory about what might have gone wrong during the expedition in the Maldives.
Alfonso Bolognini reckons that the group might have been 'sucked into' the caves by a super strong current before running out of oxygen as they fought to escape.
Sharing his hypothesis with Adnkronos, the underwater expert explained that he made his assumption after considering the description of the underwater conditions by rescue divers.
"They first sent a ROV [remotely operated vehicle] to the entrance of the caves," Bolognini said. "They couldn't get it in due to the very strong currents, and they had to go there themselves."
He explained that the Finnish divers, deployed by the Divers’ Alert Network Europe, had sent him a 'diagram of the site' which illustrated the 'three chambers, an entrance, and an exit'.
After weighing up the layout, the expert believes that a 'formidable Venturi effect' could have been created while the fivesome were diving.
The Venturi effect refers to the drop in pressure which occurs when fluid flows through a constricted or narrow area - like the narrow entrance to the cave system - that subsequently creates a vacuum.
Mapping out the rest of his theory, Bolognini continued: "Two things could have happened after the suction. Either everyone was sucked in, or one was sucked in and the others attempted to rescue them."
He noted that the 'professionalism' of those involved in the dive also supported this argument, as they were 'highly trained'.
"It was probably an 'observational' survey to then dive at a later time to explore the caves, and instead they were sucked in," Bolognini then mused.
"With that level of knowledge, it is unthinkable to go so deep without the necessary preparation for that type of exploration.
"They were probably at the end of the dive, they were there for the coral reef, the caves were not the objective.
"They decided to make this dive a little deeper to view the entrance, they were sucked into a probably dark environment, with zero visibility even for finning, in a state of great disorientation, probably due to panic.
"In the desperate search for the way out, they probably also ran out of air. But this is, according to me, a fairly reliable reconstruction of what happened."
Topics: World News, News, Science
Olivia Burke