LUCKY THIRTEEN
Reader's Digest Canada|September 2022
A freak monsoon trapped a soccer team and their coach deep in a network of caves. How an international effort helped get them out.
Matt Gutman
LUCKY THIRTEEN

SOCCER PRACTICE FOR the Moo Pa ("Wild Boars") team had just ended when assistant coach Ekkapol Chantawong-or "Ek"-suggested that he and the players take refuge from the simmering mid-afternoon heat by exploring the Tham Luang cave. Ek, a boyish 25 and more a big brother to the kids than a drill sergeant, heard no complaints. The cave, at the base of a mountain in northern Thailand, was a favourite hangout.

That Saturday, June 23, 2018, at noon, the Moo Pa jumped on their bikes and rode half an hour to Tham Luang. Parking their bikes outside, they entered the cave, passing a sign that read: Danger!! From July to November the cave can flood.

Coach Ek wasn't worried; it was June and the monsoon rains that could flood the cave's channels were still weeks away. Behind him were 12 players who, like many Thais, went by nicknames: Night, 17; Tee, 16; Note and Nick, 15; Bew, Adul and Tern, 14; Dom, Pong, Mark and Mick, 13; and Titan, 11.

The mouth the cave was large enough to fit the Taj Mahal. Mud stains six metres up showed the high-water mark of previous years' floods. Walking farther into the cave, their way lit by flashlights, the team climbed over boulders, slid down steep slopes, walked through puddles and ducked at those points where the ceiling was only a few feet high. About one and a half kilometres in, they turned left at a T-junction and climbed down into a bowl-shaped recess. Their destination: a sandbar inside the caves named Pattaya Beach, more than a half-kilometre farther in.

About 15 minutes later, they reached Pattaya Beach and stopped for a break. Titan, experiencing the cave for the first time, was creeped out by the dark and the spooky shadows cast by their flashlights. But he didn't dare tell the older boys.

Coach Ek checked his watch; they'd been in the cave about an hour. It was time to head out.

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