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Richard ‘Harry’ Harris is a medic, anaesthetist and experienced cave diver. When he read about the 12 Thai boys and their soccer coach trapped in the Tham Luang cave system in Thailand, he knew he was uniquely placed to help.

Richard arrived to the caves in northern Thailand with the rescue operation underway. On the ninth day after the group’s disappearance, British divers John Volanthen and Rick Stanton reached the boys and their coach in a part of the cave known as ‘Chamber 9’. Miraculously they were still alive.

This was when the rescue operation began. The group were 2.4 kilometres (1.5 miles) from the cave entrance, over half of which was completely underwater. Visibility in the caves was almost zero; Richard describes it as like swimming through coffee.

Richard and the other divers floated various ways of rescuing the group – teaching them to dive, or leaving them for months until the monsoon season ended – but nothing seemed plausible. Then Rick Stanton had an idea – if they anaesthetised the boys, the divers could swim them to safety.

Richard decided to support Rick’s idea, but it was an agonising decision. He didn’t believe the boys would make it out alive: for him, they would either die anesthetised on the passage out, or be left to starve at the back of the cave. Whatever happened, Richard felt, ‘this rescue had my name written on it.’

Richard gives his astonishing account to Outlook’s Emily Webb.

Producer: Katy Takatsuki

Picture: Richard 'Harry' Harris
Credit: Kristoffer Paulsen