Aquanaut: A Life Beneath The Surface – The Inside Story of the Thai Cave Rescue

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This is the thrilling account of the dramatic Thai cave rescue which saved the lives of thirteen people, from the diver who led the rescue. The Wild Boars and their coach had taken what they planned to be a 1-hour trip to the Tham Luang Nang Non cave in northern Thailand after practice on 23 June 2018.

The Brit says: “It was amazing to see Viggo morph into me. Some people actually struggled to tell us apart.” Irish actor Farrell had long chats with Bristol-based IT consultant John to make sure he nailed both his character’s accent and mannerisms.

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Samon later received a full scholarship from the Masters School to study there and he became the captain of its soccer team. Samon said it was “just incredible” that Stanton’s intervention, as he and his Wild Boars teammates fought for their lives five years earlier, had afforded him the opportunity to graduate from prep school and gain admission into Vermont’s Middlebury College. I carefully held his precious life in my grasp, bearing the full weight of responsibility towards his survival through the most extreme of circumstances.

Mortensen first learned about Stanton and his heroism when the rest of us did, glued to his television set watching the rescue unfold in 2018. When he first read the script, he was eager to portray a complex, brash man at the center of such an astonishing endeavor. And Mortensen knows how to fully commit to truthful portrayals of his characters. To become a Russian mobster in David Cronenberg’s 2007 film Eastern Promises, he traveled to Russia to read Russian novels and stayed in prison-gang-tattoo make-up while on set in London (and while frequenting a neighboring Russian restaurant, which, of course, completely freaked out all the diners). He got his open water scuba diving certification because of a single underwater scene in G.I. Jane, which eventually ended up on the cutting room floor. And he studied sword fighting so intently for The Lord of the Rings that legendary stunt coordinator (and former Olympic fencer) Bob Anderson said he was the best swordsmen he’d ever trained. Thailand, July 2018. Twelve boys and their football coach vanish into Tham Luang caves just as the monsoon rains hit. A mile from the surface they are trapped by rising flood waters. All attempts to reach them fail. One of the boys had a lung problem from being in a damp environment for two weeks and when I first surfaced, he was blue and barely breathing. A plan was eventually formed to sedate the group of boys with ketamine so that they would not panic while being carefully pushed to safety through the water, wearing wetsuits and buoyancy aids. Dr Harris was right behind me and we got him into the recovery position and we took an hour stabilising him before we carried on. I was the last one out that day.In a heartbreaking statement to i, he said: “As a personal recollection it was Dom whose unconscious body I swam with as I escorted him to safety on the second day of the rescue mission. Each chapter of Thirteen Lessons that Saved Thirteen Lives tells one part of the edge-of-your-seat mission from Tham Luang but also imparts a life lesson, gleaned from John’s previous rescues and record-breaking cave dives, that can be applied to everyday obstacles and challenges.

He says: “Viggo is fun and we have a laugh but I’m not sure we have the same sense of humour. Mine is quite dry and it took him a while to understand that I was joking when I made certain comments. Stanton, a firefighter from Coventry who has earned a reputation as one of Britain’s top cave divers, was among those who went to the cave. He soon led a team which went on a mission to go inside the cave to explore it for signs of the Wild Boars. THE ENTHRALLING INSIDE STORY OF THE THAI CAVE RESCUE FROM THE MAN AT THE HEART OF THE MISSION, AS SEEN IN THE SUNDAY TIMESverifyErrors }}{{ message }}{{ /verifyErrors }}{{ I couldn’t help but ask Stanton what it felt like to be portrayed by such a beloved actor, who just so happens to be stupidly good-looking. “It’s not going to do me any harm, is it?” he replied. All jokes aside, Stanton said he and Mortensen became friends over the months of calls and shooting, and he was impressed by Mortensen’s commitment to researching the role. Director Ron Howard and his crew perfectly recreated the cave sections Stanton and his fellow rescuers said were the most difficult. (Photo: Vince Valitutti/Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures) What I heard about his work ethic – and who he was in the cave, and who he was before the cave and after, I knew that he was going to be just fine here,” Danforth said to ABC. According to ABC, the head of the Masters School, Laura Danforth, said it was an easy decision for her institution to recruit Samon. In this story of breathtaking courage and nerves of steel, John reveals how responding positively to the statement, ‘But I can’t…’ by stating, ‘I can,’ led to one of the most incredible rescues of all time.