TWENTY-NINE
HUNTER EXPERIENCED THE RAPTURE IN A neighboring cave called Palomitas. She went in with another woman, and after some time they came to the lip of a pit hundreds of feet deep. Hunter’s partner rappelled away, leaving her alone on top. That was when The Rapture hit. Andi’s heart started to race and she began to hyperventilate. Panic seized her. She could not remember how to use her vertical gear, or how to rappel, or even how to open her pack. She found it almost impossible not to stand up and bolt for the surface.
Hunter started to cry uncontrollably. She screamed down to her companion, who told her to sit tight and breathe, and it would pass. It did not. In fact, it got worse. She became absolutely convinced that she was going to die, then and there. Hunter had never experienced anything like The Rapture in her life, which had included frightening moments in other caves, as well as on mountains and dives.
In desperation, perhaps unconsciously, Hunter’s mind turned to her mother. Aloud, she said, “Mom, if you’re there, I really, really need you right now. Please help me.”
After a while, she began to calm down. She waited, and breathed, and kept thinking of her mother, and slowly her faculties and composure returned. Her poise regained, Hunter did the drop, joined her partner, and continued their trip. Had she been less experienced, The Rapture might well have killed her.
BEFORE LONG SHE WAS BACK TO work in Cheve. The purpose of everything, every bolt driven, wall climbed, pit rappelled, sump swum, pound hauled, and camp endured, was to put divers Stanton and Mallinson in the water. Describing Rick Stanton, an even-tempered English firefighter by profession, Stone bestowed the highest imaginable accolade: “cool and reserved, much like [Sheck] Exley.” Mallinson, an equally skilled cave diver, bore some resemblance to the actor Mel Gibson. Every bit as proficient as his frequent partner Stanton, he was less a people person. Regardless, it was his work underwater that counted, not making nice in camp.
Mallinson, Stanton, and Rich Hudson, the third British diver, showed up in base camp on March 13. All three were surprised by how much the 9,100-foot altitude affected them, even just walking and doing light work. They were concerned that it might impair their diving or make them more susceptible to decompression sickness, but there was nothing they could do about it.
Other cavers had been rigging and stocking the camps long before their arrival, so the three readied their diving gear, then helped carry it to a staging area about 1,600 feet deep in the cave. They were not using Bill Stone’s new and improved rebreather, the MK-V, which they thought too heavy and complicated, preferring to dive with their own smaller, simpler homemade rebreathers. In addition to simplicity, another advantage was that their units were “ventral mounts,” meaning they were worn strapped to the chest rather than the back. That arrangement made squeezing and wriggling through tight spaces easier.
Stone himself would not dive on the Brits’ stripped-down rebreathers. He was especially worried by the fact that they lacked redundancy and had no way to measure oxygen levels. To him, it was like driving a car with a good motor but no brakes. But he knew that Hudson and the others had logged scores of dives on their creations, and they were still among the living. If they wanted to go driving around without brakes, more power to them.
Eleven days after their arrival, Hudson, Mallinson, and Stanton arrived at Camp 3. Cheve’s terminal sump, where they would begin their dives, was still several hours away, requiring passage through Wet Dreams, the Exclusion Tubes, and Nightmare Falls.