1 minute ago, Andaman Al said:

Hmm

 

You just reminded me. I know a group of guys in the UK who were looking for investment to further develop a drill bit they have come up with. They do have working examples already. The drill bit uses a thermal lance ahead of the cutting tool and melts anything in front of it. It is going through rock like a knife through butter and can drill a hole 10 times faster than anything currently in use. They have calculated they can easily get a 5km deep hole. I am sure if they can cut an airhole or extraction hole in record time they will get all the money they want to take the drill into full commercial production. I will call them.

It will probably be news to many but Thailand is considered a world leader in drilling fast economical holes, things have slowed down now, but in previous years hundreds of wells were drilled in Thailand annually over a + 30 year period.

2 minutes ago, Andaman Al said:

I understand that and do not question his sacrifice or courage. I am questioning the Management of the crisis situation. they have a responsibility to all the divers/rescuers to ensure that the safest possible environment is created to ensure that casualty numbers do not grow. You know that.

 

Certainly agree with that. My prior comment was just pointing out that it's not entirely clear whether he was there strictly as a volunteer or whether he was ordered back into service by the military.

 

11 minutes ago, JestSetter said:

Not sure if this was covered by anyone, but it was reported that volunteers had accidentally failed to take the water that was being pumped out away from the cave. Of course, the person in charge blamed the volunteers, not himself, for the mishap.

 

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/984331/thailand-cave-rescue-football-team-trapped-Thamg-Luang

Correct. It was going back into the cave. Since rectified and hopefully will reduce the water level till they can walk out.

3 minutes ago, CGW said:

IMO they would have to line the hole, drilling a hole through limestone/unconsolidated material is easy, keeping the hole is the difficult bit, for what it is worth I had 40 years drilling before retiring.

Thanks! Can you answer whether they could drill a 4" pilot hole out to 24" in one shot if they weren't drilling through hard rock like in Chili?

 

How long do you think it would take to drill if they had such a rig on site and set up and had to line it as they go? If the drill rig can get in, does that mean they have enough of a road that they could keep it supplied with what it would need in terms of slurry and liner pipe?

2 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

 

Certainly agree with that. My prior comment was just pointing out that it's not entirely clear whether he was there strictly as a volunteer or whether he was ordered back into service by the military.

 

Irrelevant. If he was asked, but not ordered to do so, he was hardly going to refuse.

1 minute ago, jerry921 said:

Thanks! Can you answer whether they could drill a 4" pilot hole out to 24" in one shot if they weren't drilling through hard rock like in Chili?

 

How long do you think it would take to drill if they had such a rig on site and set up and had to line it as they go? If the drill rig can get in, does that mean they have enough of a road that they could keep it supplied with what it would need in terms of slurry and liner pipe?

I doubt they would do the large hole straight off, as they would not know if it was actually in the right place till they reached the depth of the cave. Obviously faster to drill a small hole than a large one.

39 minutes ago, Ks45672 said:

Thais Should have stepped back to a supporting role  via translators and let real experts handle this 

Be honest

Who would you rather be rescued by in a life or death situation? 

 

Anybody who can do it. I have no racial or territorial preferences on who saves lives.

 

You are one of the most negative posters on these threads.

3 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Irrelevant. If he was asked, but not ordered to do so, he was hardly going to refuse.

 

The term "recalled" in the military usually means "ordered" as I understand it.

3 hours ago, Brewster67 said:

Falling unconscious.... Sounds like he ran out of air, which means he was diving with a tank....

 

Why can't they rig up a system where a dive mask is connected to an air-line and air is manually pumped using a rotary pump operated by a team and one kid at a time brought through each flooded section at a time starting with the coach who got them in that situation in the first place.... I think igt is their ONLY hope.

 

Each person will need to be shepherded by experienced (NONE THAI) cave divers...

 

they MUST do something soon because this year has seen a very very rainy dry season and god only knows how bad the monsoon is going to be like this year.

 

Bering sea gold divers can stay under water for literally 8 hours at a time on an air line and mask setup.

Are you talking about a hookah rig or are you just making things up as you go?

Just now, thaibeachlovers said:

I doubt they would do the large hole straight off, as they would not know if it was actually in the right place till they reached the depth of the cave. Obviously faster to drill a small hole than a large one.

Yes. But in the Chilean rescue they drilled the hole 3 times, at 5.5", 12" and 28". It was necessary to do the intermediate 12" hole because the big drill couldn't drill out a 28" hole in the hard rock all at once without getting stalled. My question has to do with whether an intermediate sized hole would be necessary in the Thai situation - I'm guessing not because the material being drilled through is so much softer that the big drill could probably just follow a small pilot hole drilled by a smaller rig.

Here's the one part of this I'm confused about:

 

The description of the route from the current forward command post to the kids includes some section or sections that are now underwater that are so narrow that barely one person can crawl/swim thru at a time, with those section(s) now underwater.

 

So, does that mean in originally getting into the cave, that all 13 kids crawled thru that kind of a very narrow passage/passages when they were dry?  (Something that I certainly wouldn't have been very excited about doing from a claustrophobia standpoint). Or somehow, did the kids get to where they are now by some different route than the one ultimately found by the UK divers?

 

 

RT @digitalay 11:15 AM

 

7 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

 

The term "recalled" in the military usually means "ordered" as I understand it.

TallGuyJohninBKK: your points are worth considering, in my opinion. If the guy was 'retired' from active service and then was suddenly ordered back to join this extremely hazardous and arduous rescue effort, he might not have been in tip-top condition (not his fault at all, if that were the case). This is one reason why forcing such 'reserves' back into work on a terribly fraught and dangerous mission like the present one is not necessarily a wise procedure ...

 

I am speculating here, of course, and certainly in no way trying to detract from the diver's heroic courage and selflessness.

Chilean Mine rescue wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Copiapó_mining_accident#Plan_B

killed...

 

he died, he was not killed by someone there, not the same, whos writing those articles...

2 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

 

The term "recalled" in the military usually means "ordered" as I understand it.

That's assuming they meant "recalled" or something else. Firstly it had to be translated to English, and may have been said by someone that has no military knowledge and used the wrong terminology. I can't find how long it was since he left the military, but I had only a 4 year "recall" period when I left. Obviously I don't know the legal situation in LOS, but usually ex military would only be recalled in an active service situation, and this isn't.

As I said, it doesn't matter anyway, as he would be unlikely to have refused a "request".

RIP

3 minutes ago, billd766 said:

 

Anybody who can do it. I have no racial or territorial preferences on who saves lives.

 

You are one of the most negative posters on these threads.

He's right though.  Reports from foreign experts at the site point to Thais not wanting to lose credit in the effort.  Foreign experts have literally been sitting around eating waiting for the go ahead only to see Thai, ahem, "Navy Seals" go in and in this case, die (as I predicted).  Ego unfortunately prevails at sites such as these as I have experienced first hand.  

2 minutes ago, phuketlive said:

killed...

 

he died, he was not killed by someone there, not the same, whos writing those articles...

Maybe someone who's first language is not English. Remember where this is.

1 minute ago, ThaiWai said:

He's right though.  Reports from foreign experts at the site point to Thais not wanting to lose credit in the effort.  Foreign experts have literally been sitting around eating waiting for the go ahead only to see Thai, ahem, "Navy Seals" go in and in this case, die (as I predicted).  Ego unfortunately prevails at sites such as these as I have experienced first hand.  

Before denigrating Thai "SEALS", perhaps you could wait for the official explanation as to why he died.

4 minutes ago, ThaiWai said:

to see Thai, ahem, "Navy Seals" go in and in this case, die (as I predicted).  Ego unfortunately prevails at sites such as these as I have experienced first hand.  

Congratulations to you on getting it right!  Have a gold star.  Sheesh.  And well done for sneering at the Seals while you're at it - men who are countless times braver than you.

 

Yeah, "Ego" is problem not only on site, but also in these threads.

21 minutes ago, Sheryl said:

I think BBC is taking that from the press conference official announcement that has been translated as saying he died form "lack of oxygen" or "lack of air" (probably said air but that could mean oxygen or air, usual Thai terminology is not precise in that point, and rememeber those giving these press briefings are politicians, not technical experts). Cannot be sure of that translation and also need to understand the way causes of death tend to be understood by lay people and reported.

 

Unless an obvious equipment malfunction was identified already, the cause of death will not be known until/unless an autopsy is done, if then (quality of Thai autopsies often not the best and by the time translated into English and reported in the media, essentially  worthless)

People don't dive using pure O2, so it's probably "air", though they may have meant hypoxia.

One explanation that has already been suggested is that the tank air compressor intake was too close to the engine exhaust. We'll have to wait and see.

I have no problem with Thai Navy SEALS.  Originally they were trained by US Navy Seals and, hopefully, maintained that level of excellence.  However, living in Thailand for the past 10 years, I somehow doubt it.  But regardless of that, they were trained for Ocean and Fresh Water diving.  This is cave diving, which is something entirely different.  As I mentioned before, I was a military trained diver, but no way would I want to undertake something like this on my best day.

 

6 minutes ago, jerry921 said:

Thanks! Can you answer whether they could drill a 4" pilot hole out to 24" in one shot if they weren't drilling through hard rock like in Chili?

 

How long do you think it would take to drill if they had such a rig on site and set up and had to line it as they go? If the drill rig can get in, does that mean they have enough of a road that they could keep it supplied with what it would need in terms of slurry and liner pipe?

Theres a lot of variables here, remember that.

4" to 24" - anything is possible but more likely to go 6" or 8½" pilot hole, tools for directional work more readily available, build a hole opener to suit to open to 24" commonly done.

 

How long, balls to the wall, less than 24 hours - BUT - you are drilling into a small cavern, it would no longer be a cavern if you fill it up with cuttings from the hole! so you would have to spend time cleaning the hole, that would depend on how much pump power was available to you, ideally, you would need ~1,000 gallons a minute. When you break through into the cavern you are going to have about 1,600 Bbls of fluid that will fill the cavern, with a hydrostatic head of ~1,200 psi, what is that going to do to the cavern, is it even an option, you can see where it gets difficult...............

Logistics is the killer, its fine bring a rig in but first you have to have somewhere to set it up and support the maximum loads expected, plus a safety factor.

 

How many more heroes have to die until they understand how serious the situation really is. They knew of low oxygen levels in the first days of the rescue operation.

 

  If that's true they've to get the kids out ASAP, I hope  that the English blokes are still around. 

That's assuming they meant "recalled" or something else. Firstly it had to be translated to English, and may have been said by someone that has no military knowledge and used the wrong terminology. I can't find how long it was since he left the military, but I had only a 4 year "recall" period when I left. Obviously I don't know the legal situation in LOS, but usually ex military would only be recalled in an active service situation, and this isn't.
As I said, it doesn't matter anyway, as he would be unlikely to have refused a "request".

2006 from what I saw.

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killed...
 
he died, he was not killed by someone there, not the same, whos writing those articles...

In at least some Englush speaking countries "killed" does not imply murdered. "Killed in a car crash" for example, said all the time.

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30 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Maybe someone who's first language is not English. Remember where this is.

He got killed by low oxygen levels, but splitting hairs doesn't help anybody. 

One of the Brave.. RIP..

How many more heroes have to die until they understand how serious the situation really is. They knew of low oxygen levels in the first days of the rescue operation.
 
  If that's true they've to get the kids out ASAP, I hope  that the English blokes are still around. 

Low oxygen levels in the cave atmosphere did not cause this death. Neither his diving buddy nor others in cave at same time affected. O2 levels certainly need monitoring/attention but do not explain this death.

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