Maldives scuba diving tragedy survivor decided to stay on boat before 5 confirmed dead
Topics: Environment
William Morgan
Featured Image Credit: Muriel Oddenino via Facebook
Topics: Environment
The tragic deaths of five scuba divers in the Maldives has spawned numerous questions about what took place hundreds of feet under the Indian Ocean, with more details emerging about the ill-fated expedition.
Authorities in the South Asian archipelago are carrying out a high-risk underwater rescue operation today (Friday, May 15), after a body was recovered from the five-person expedition the day before.
Official statements indicate that the five Italian nationals, marine biologist Monica Montefalcone, 51, daughter Giorgia Sommacal, 22, Muriel Oddenino from Turin, Gianluca Benedetti from Padua, and Federico Gualtieri from Omegna, all died while exploring a cave system.
But while families across Italy grapple with the shocking news of the mass death event, it has emerged that their dive team was originally meant to have six members descending to Vaavu Atoll on Thursday.
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This network of complicated underwater terrain begins around 160 feet under the ocean's surface, which local dive centers describe as a 'honeycomb of caves' with large overhangs.
But just before the dive team set off for the atoll, one woman, an unnamed University of Genoa student, decided to stay back on their yacht, the Duke of York, narrowly avoiding the tragic fate that befell her crew mates.
The Daily Mail reports that this unnamed student has since returned to Italy, though it remains unclear why she decided to stay back. This is just one of the details about this fatal expedition that remains unclear as authorities try to figure out what happened.
Yesterday, rescue teams were able to recover one body from a cave roughly 200 feet below the surface, but their search failed to locate the rest of the dive team, who are believed to be in the same cave.
The Maldives' National Defence Force are carrying out further searches today, but have faced rough conditions - not dissimilar to those faced by the Italian divers on Thursday, with initial reports indicating that there was a weather warning in place.
However, the bereaved husband of one of those who died on Vaavu Atoll, Carlo Sommaca, told La Repubblica that his wife, Monica Montefalcone, was an experienced diver. She was also a respected marine biologist, TV presence, and professor at the University of Genoa.
After learning that he had lost two members of his family on the dive, Sommaca said: “She would never have put her daughter’s life or the lives of the other children at risk out of recklessness. Something happened down there.”
Police in the small island archipelago have said they are exploring multiple theories about what took place on the dive, which experts have said would have been challenging even in ideal conditions.
One early theory is that poor visibility may have hampered the dive team's ability to navigate underwater due to poor visibility and wind speeds on the surface up to 30mph.
Officials have also said they are not ruling out the possibility that one of the divers may have become stuck in the cave, with the rest of the team failing to surface due to an attempt to free them.
Alfonso Bolognini, president of the Italian Society of Underwater and Hyperbaric Medicine, explained the risks to the Mail: "At 50 meters of depth in the sea, there are several risks; it's a real tragedy.
"There are several hypotheses we can make right now: an inadequate breathing mix can create a hyperoxic crisis when there's an increase in the partial pressure of oxygen in the tissues and blood plasma, which can cause neurological problems.
"Inside a cave at 50 meters of depth, all it takes is a problem for a diver or a panic attack for a diver." He added: 'the agitation causes the water to become cloudy and can impair visibility.
"In these cases, the panic component could lead to even fatal errors."