GRIM DUTY — Members Tom Ebert and Ed Lucas help in recovery effort for fatal caving accident in Albany.
— Photo by Sherry Halbrook
Help retrieve body
Members see grim side of ‘caving’
BY SHERRY HALBROOK
Not everyone would enjoy climbing and crawling their way
through dark, tight passages to see the earth from the
inside out.
For PEF Region 8 members Ed Lucas, Tom Ebert and Thomas
Engel it’s fun.
But they understand the dangers and responsibilities,
too. So, they responded immediately when the Albany
County Sheriff’s Department called on them, as
trained members of the Albany-Schoharie Cave Rescue Team.
They were summoned to help retrieve the body of a cave
diver who died while trapped underwater.
The young man was not experienced in cave diving and had
become wedged in a twisting passage just 18 inches wide
under the water while exploring a cave with friends on
Monday evening, February 26.
The PEF members knew this victim — a 23-year-old
college student and experienced caver. And, while they
would have much preferred to bring him out alive, there
was no chance for that. The diver’s air tank had run
out before his friends could bring help.
It was Wednesday night, February 28, before they
succeeded in freeing the victim and bringing him out.
“We were part of a large team of law enforcement,
fire fighters, expert divers and cavers who worked on
this,” Lucas says. “Thom Engel helped develop
the recovery plan. Tom Ebert worked there all day
Wednesday, and I was there Tuesday and Wednesday. I
helped carry (the victim) out.”
“This was a very good team effort,” Lucas says.
“It really has to be run like a military operation.
Everyone has to work as a team. You have to have one
person in charge and one plan we all follow. And we all
have to follow directions without question.”
If there was one lesson the experience brought home, the
PEF members said, it is the importance of not going
beyond the scope of your training.
But that doesn’t mean it’s more dangerous than
other sports.
“This was the first fatality in a New York cave
since 1968,” Engel says. “How many other
outdoor sports can claim that kind of safety
record?”