Missing Thai boys, coach ‘found safe’ in caves: Chiang Rai governor

They are now too weak to move, and rescue diver Butch Hendrick says getting them out is going to take some time.

They were provided with equipment from Derbyshire Cave Rescue.

‘They have been all over the world’.

“Now the difficulty is getting them out because they are underground within this massive cave complex”.

Divers took advantage of a brief window of good weather on Monday to edge further into the cave, with the water levels dropping slowly but steadily every hour thanks to round-the-clock pumping.

In addition to teams of divers pushing through murky waters to find the group, teams have also been busy pumping water out of the system as well as setting up groundwater diversions to try and drain the cave.

Thai officials say rescue workers have found all 12 boys and their soccer coach alive deep inside a partly flooded cave.

The US experts get to work around the base, while the three British divers and others scour the mountain for alternative entrances into the cave.

Aside from belongings left at the mouth of the cave and handprints on cave walls, there has been no trace of them found since. What a great team! “We will bring food to them and a doctor who can dive”.

With him was Mr Stanton, who began diving aged 18 in order to explore caves after being inspired by a television programme. “So I’d say, yeah, it’s an accurate statement that it’s challenging”.

The boys, ages 11 to 16, and their coach disappeared June 23 after entering the flooded Tham Luang Nang Non cave in Chiang Rai. There are just a large number of little things that you have to be on top of at all times’.

Hundreds of soldiers (above), groups and volunteers laboured for a week to supply the forward teams of Royal Thai Navy and foreign divers and cave-exploring experts to finally reach the trapped boys and their coach on Monday.

Rescuers had been focusing on an elevated mound, which cavers have named “Pattaya Beach”, in the cave complex’s third chamber, knowing that it could have provided the boys with a refuge when rains flooded the cave.

There were jubilant scenes outside the cave as overjoyed relatives hugged and cheered upon hearing that the boys are alive.

“How many of you?” one of the rescuers said in English.

Video released early Tuesday by the Thai navy showed the boys in their soccer uniforms sitting on a dry area inside the cave above the water as a spotlight, apparently from a rescuer, illuminated their faces.

“Not today. There’s two of us”. We’re coming. It’s OK.

“Many people are coming”, the rescuer tells the group. Many, many people. We’re the first.

The worldwide rescue operation – which included the Thai Navy SEALs as well as experts from the US, China, Australia and the United Kingdom – had been working to reach a large, deep chamber, informally named Pattaya Beach, where they believed the missing boys had taken refuge. You have been here.ten days.