Pilot found 20m from cave's surface with remains of earlier victim
The final mission of Hong Kong deep-cave diver Dave Shaw has reached an emotional conclusion, with his body being recovered strapped to the remains of the young man he had promised to return to his parents.
Four days after he went missing, Australian Cathay Pacific pilot Shaw, 50, was found just 20 metres from the surface with the remains of diver Deon Dreyer, which he attempted to recover from the foot of the 282-metre-deep cave in South Africa on Saturday.
Shaw had asked that no attempt be made to recover his body if the mission went wrong. After his disappearance, his wife, Ann, said she was content for Boesmansgat, one of the world's deepest freshwater caves, to be his final resting place.
Footage from a video camera strapped to Shaw's helmet reportedly shows he got tangled in lines and equipment as he worked to recover the body of the 20-year-old diver, and was unable to cut himself loose before his oxygen ran out.
The bodies of Shaw and Dreyer, who died in a 1994 diving accident, are believed to have floated towards the surface as police divers worked to pull up equipment used in Saturday's mercy mission. Shaw discovered Dreyer's remains during a deep-diving world record attempt in October. Unable to free him because his air tanks were lodged in silt at the foot of the cave, he promised Dreyer's parents to return to retrieve the body.
Working with nine international divers, he had just five minutes to release Dreyer's body before taking it up to a colleague at 220 metres. However, he appears to have died after getting tangled in equipment and running out of oxygen.