They Became Part of the Cave | The Laos Gold Mine DISASTER - video Dailymotion

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They Became Part of the Cave | The Laos Gold Mine DISASTER  Deep beneath the mountains of Laos, a terrifying disaster unfolded inside a dangerous gold mine cave system. What began as a routine mining operation quickly turned into a nightmare as workers became trapped underground with no clear escape.  This documentary uncovers the chilling details behind the Laos Gold Mine Disaster — the collapsing tunnels, rising panic, rescue attempts, and the haunting moments that left miners buried deep inside the cave forever.  Discover the real story behind one of the most disturbing underground disasters and the risks faced by miners working in extreme conditions every day.  ⛏️ Real disaster story ⛏️ Underground rescue attempts ⛏️ Chilling survival details ⛏️ Documentary-style storytelling  Watch till the end to uncover what really happened inside the deadly cave.  #Laos #MiningDisaster #GoldMine #CaveDisaster #Documentary #Underground #DisasterStory #TrueStory #Mining #Tragedy  The Laos mine rescue began after gold miners became trapped inside a flooded hand dug mine in Xaisomboun Province during early monsoon rain. This video explains what really happened underground, why the route became so dangerous, and how narrow passages, muddy water, zero visibility, unstable tunnels, and limited air turned a short distance into a major rescue problem.  Through rescue footage, location maps, mine diagrams, and context from cave diver Mikko Paasi, we break down the Laos gold mine disaster, the search for the trapped miners, and why being found alive was only the beginning.  Credits: จักรกฤษณ์ แตงตั้ง Mikko Passi Bulek-shots - Ojamo Mine Finland  Thank you all so much for watching. Please leave a like and a comment if you enjoyed the video, and consider subscribing if you are new here!   Music by:  Kevin MacLeod Emmit Fenn CO.AG jeffliymusic Rage Sound Finval  Gnarled Situation by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/...  Source: http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-...  Artist: http://incompetech.com/  DISCLAIMER: All materials in these videos are used for entertainment purposes and fall within the guidelines of fair use. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statutes that might otherwise be infringing. No copyright infringement intended. If you are, or represent, the copyright owner of materials used in this video, and have an issue with the use of said material, please send an email to mrdeified@gmail.com.   Copyright © 2025 MrDeified. All rights reserved.  #mrdeified #deified #disaster   #poland

Transcript

00:00Right now in Laos, an underground rescue and possibly a recovery is still unfolding.

00:07Inside a hand-dug gold mine, a group of miners went into the mountain hoping to strike it rich.

00:13But somewhere inside, the way back out was cut off, leaving them trapped in one of the

00:18most claustrophobic rescue situations imaginable. This is the clearest breakdown of what happened,

00:24why the operation became so extreme, and why this situation is still far from over.

00:30A hand-dug mine is extremely dangerous. From the outside, it is just a small dark opening in the

00:36mountain. Inside, the tunnel drops low, bends hard, and tightens until walking is no longer possible.

00:44This is where the claustrophobia starts to become physical. The miners know where the roof comes

00:49down, where their shoulders scrape, and where the floor turns slick with mud, and where their tools

00:55have to be pushed ahead because there is no room to carry them. In some sections, the man squeezes

01:02through first, then reaches back to help pull the next man through. The tightest parts are where the

01:07mind becomes generally claustrophobic. A man cannot just crawl forward, he has to turn his body the right

01:13way, flatten himself against the ground, and move slowly enough so that he does not wedge himself in

01:20place. In the worst sections, even breathing becomes part of the problem. A full breath makes

01:26the chest wider, and the only way through is to exhale, make the body smaller, and slide forward

01:32before a panic attack takes over. The men who work these mines understand that feeling. They know the

01:39difference between a tight passage and a passage that starts to feel like it is closing around them.

01:44Some have such close calls underground, that once they make it back out, they swear off the mine

01:50completely. They do not need anyone to explain the risk. This is what makes the place so dangerous.

01:57The roof is already claustrophobic when it is dry. The miners know where to crawl and where to twist,

02:03and where they need to pull someone through, but that only works when the mine stays familiar.

02:07For these men, it did not stay familiar. The mine changed after they entered, and from that point on,

02:13it kept changing. The men who entered this mine are artisanal gold miners. They are small-scale

02:20miners working with basic tools, local knowledge, and whatever access the mountain gives them.

02:26In places like this, mining is not always separate from ordinary life. It is how people make money,

02:33part of the seasonal work, and part of the local economy where risk is built into the work itself.

02:38This matters because the men were not tourists walking into an unfamiliar cave for adventure.

02:43There were local villagers entering their working place. The mine may have been dangerous,

02:49but that was also part of the world they knew. This is Miko Pazi. Professionally, he is a Finnish cave

02:55diver, explorer, and technical diving instructor. But underground, he is the guy people call when a

03:02rescue becomes life or death. When the space is so tight, most people would freeze, and when the people

03:08inside may not come out alive. His career began in the cold, flooded mines of Finland. Decades later,

03:15when the kind of situation unfolded in Laos, Miko was called to give the trapped men a chance.

03:21In Laos, some miners carry food and water underground to stay inside these mines for days while they work.

03:27That detail changes the way the place should be understood. In May of 2026, early monsoon rain

03:34moved through central Laos. Above ground, it was rain. Underground, inside those narrow mines,

03:41it was the beginning of a disaster. Water found the lowest sections first, pushed mud into the crawls,

03:48softened the floor, and filled the tight places the men had already squeezed through once.

03:52The route was still there, but it was no longer the same route. For the men inside, that was a

03:58nightmare. The way out was supposed to be the familiar part, but now the same passages had less

04:03air, less space, more water, and more mud. A crawl that was already extremely challenging

04:09became something a man could now drown in. At some point after the rain came in, one man actually

04:15made it out. He brought the first real information from underground. Others were still trapped inside.

04:22Water had entered the mine, and the way back out had changed. That's what he could tell them,

04:27but he did not bring a map. He could not show them the crawls that had flooded, which turns were

04:33blocked, and which sections were still passable, or where the trapped men had gone to stay alive.

04:39Outside, the entrance gave almost nothing away, just mud, rock, water, and some small opening in the

04:45mountain. The first question seemed simple. Where are they? But that was not enough. In a mine like

04:52this, knowing where someone is does not tell you if they can be reached. The real question was what

04:57stood between them and the entrance. Only a handful of people in the world were suited for a problem like

05:03this. Calls started going out for someone who understood flooded caves, mines, restrictions,

05:09and rescue work in places where a normal mistake can become fatal. Mikko was available. More

05:15importantly, he understood what would happen if the wrong people tried to force their way into that

05:21mine. His life had been built around this exact kind of environment. For decades, he had worked in

05:27the places most divers spend their careers avoiding. His background was not open water diving. Where the

05:33surface is above you, an escape is straight up. Mikko learned in flooded mines and caves, where the

05:39ceiling is over your head, the walls are around you, and the only way out is back through the same

05:44passage you used to get in. One of the places that shaped him was Ohamo Mine in Finland. It was

05:51cold, dark,

05:53flooded, and enclosed. During his instructor training, Mikko did hundreds of dives there. The kind of

05:59repetition changes how a person thinks underground. He learned to read a route, the ceiling and the

06:05width of a passage, the visibility, the line, and the places where a diver has room to turn around.

06:11The places where there is no room to turn around matter even more. Later, after moving to Asia,

06:18Mikko built his life around technical diving, side mount rebreathers and wreck exploration,

06:23underwater filming, and cave rescue. All of that experience pointed towards one skill,

06:29staying calm in places where a mistake is not easy to undo. That mattered in Laos because it was not

06:35just the search, it was a route problem. The men were somewhere inside the mountain, but the real

06:40question was whether anyone could actually physically reach them through the mud and the restrictions.

06:45This is where Mikko was different. He understood that the distance underground does not mean much by

06:50itself. A few meters can be easy, and the next few can stop everything. A rescuer has to know where

06:57the

06:57passage is wide enough for a body, whether the water can be seen through, whether equipment can fit,

07:04and whether another person can be passed, and whether the way back still works after the way

07:09in has already taken everything out of you. Mikko has also been a part of the 2018 Tham Luang

07:16Cave Rescue in Thailand. That story is not the focus here, but it matters because he had already

07:21worked inside a flooded underground rescue where the route, the equipment, the team, and the return

07:26path all had to be treated with extreme care. Laos was smaller, rougher, and less understood from the

07:33outside, but Mikko began working the problem. The situation started to change. The mine was still

07:39dangerous, the route was still brutal, but now there was someone on the scene who understood what the

07:44mountain was asking for. And for the first time, this meant there was a real chance. From the surface,

07:50the distance sounded almost manageable. Reports placed the trapped men only a few hundred meters

07:55inside, roughly 200 yards from the entrance. Above ground, that is nothing. It is less than a few city

08:03blocks. It is a distance someone walks in minutes. But underground, distance does not work that way.

08:09Mikko later described parts of the route as around 60 centimeters wide, or about 23 inches.

08:16Outside the mine, that sounds like a number. Inside the mine, it is the difference between moving

08:21and not moving. A human body has to fit through that space. So does a helmet, a mask, a light,

08:27cylinders, hoses, and a guideline, and whatever other equipment the rescuer is carrying. Every piece of

08:34gear becomes part of the body. A shoulder catches, a tank scrapes, a hose drags against a rock, and a

08:40helmet presses into the roof. The passage does not care if someone is trying to save lives. It only gives

08:46the space it gives. Mikko said that there were places where divers had to exhale just to wiggle

08:51through, and he experienced this many times going through this cave system. The floodwater inside the

08:57mine was described as coffee-colored. Clear water is dangerous, but it still gives information. A light

09:03can show the floor, the wall, the next turn, or a space ahead. Coffee-colored water almost gives

09:09nothing back. It turns the passage into a blind space, basically a blackout. A rescuer can be inches

09:16away from the wall and still not see it clearly. The floor disappears. The lower part of the tunnel

09:22disappears. Mud rock tools and loose materials stay hidden until a hand, knee, or tank finds them.

09:30Mikko described moving through the water by fingertip. He was not reading the route with his eyes.

09:35He was building it through contact. A hand on the wall, fingers on the line, a knee testing the bottom,

09:42or a foot searching around the ground that still held. Every moment gave him a small piece of

09:48information, and each piece mattered because the way back out had to be preserved. The ceiling was low

09:54enough that rescuers were constantly touching it, and Mikko said the collapse risk was high. In a

09:59tunnel this tight, even a small collapse does not have to bury the whole mine to stop the rescue.

10:04It only has to block one crawl, or one section, where there is already almost no room. So the rescue

10:10was never about just going 200 yards into the mountain. It was about whether a person could pass through

10:16200 yards, in mud, in darkness, through coffee-colored water, under a low roof, inside a route no one fully

10:22understood anymore, and still have enough control to make it back out. Every trip into the mine took

10:28something out of the rescuers. This was not a rescue where a team went in once, found the men,

10:34and then walked them back out. The route had to be entered, checked, backed out of, adjusted,

10:39and entered again. Each attempt, crawling through the same restrictions, feeling through the same brown

10:45water, dragging equipment through the same low spaces, and coming back out with less energy than

10:51before. That is why medical checks mattered. Fatigue becomes a part of the danger. A tired rescuer moves

10:58more slowly, and they make worse decisions. They also have less strength to return and make it back

11:04out themselves. Several of the rescuers had to be completely removed from the rescue operation.

11:10If they kept pushing themselves, no matter what their mind said, their body had already given out

11:16on them. That fear was not theoretical. Just days earlier, another cave diving disaster had unfolded

11:23in the Maldives. Five Italian divers died in an underwater cave system, and during the recovery

11:29effort, a Maldivian military rescue diver also died while trying to save them. The search was suspended

11:36after his death. This is the part people forget about underground rescue. The cave does not only threaten

11:42the people it trapped inside, it threatens the people who go in after them. The footage from the mine

11:48makes the route harder to dismiss. The first thing the video shows is not some large rescue site with

11:54space to organize. It shows a rough opening in the mountain. People gathered close to it, hoses running into

12:00the darkness and equipment being handled in mud, and a rescue operation pressed right up against the

12:06entrance. Inside, the scale becomes clearer. In the footage, the body becomes the measuring tool.

12:13You can see how little room exists around him. There is no space for another person to pass beside him.

12:19There is no easy way to turn around. If something catches, everything behind him stops. The hoses and

12:25lines make the space even tighter. They are necessary, but they are also part of the problem.

12:31A hose running through the mine has to bend through the same route as the rescuer. A line has to

12:36stay

12:36clean enough to follow. Equipment had to be managed without letting it snag, pull, or disappear under

12:42the mud. In a normal rescue scene, gear looks like support. The footage keeps showing the problem in

12:48small ways. Person shifts forward. A hose drags. A hand checks the line, and someone pauses

12:55to adjust. Then the moment starts again. Nothing looks smooth because there is no smooth way to move

13:02through a passage like this. The movement itself looks exhausting. A rescuer crawls, stops, lowers his

13:09head, then adjusts his body and has to move his equipment around, follow the line, check the space,

13:15and then moves again. Each section takes effort. Each tight area forces the body to work harder than it

13:21would in open air. Mud steals motion, water adds resistance, and the roof keeps the body low and

13:27pressed. The passage gives no easy place to rest. From the outside, reaching the men sounds like the

13:33main goal, but being found alive does not remove the problem. It only changes it. Now the route has to

13:40be

13:40crossed back again, but in the harder direction, with trapped men who have already been underground,

13:45already been waiting, and already have been exposed to the conditions inside.

13:49The rescuers cannot just walk them out. They have to move them through the same claustrophobic route

13:54that drains the people trying to reach them. For most of the route, the camera has been following

14:00mud, water, hoses, lines, and the slow movement of the rescuers through a passage that barely gives

14:05them room. The light only reaches a few feet ahead. It catches the roof and the wet walls,

14:10and a small section of the tunnel starts to open up. This is the tunnel the rescuers were working so

14:16hard to find. They were trying to find a specific chamber, and this tunnel is looking like it's

14:22going to be their gateway. Then the light reaches the chamber. They are not sure if this is the one,

14:27or if they will have to continue moving forward. They hear something, and then all of a sudden,

14:33they realize what is actually happening.

14:58The men are sitting together in the darkness, close to the rock, still deep inside the mine.

15:04They are not standing near the entrance. They are not being lifted into daylight. They are in a pocket

15:10of space beyond the flooded tunnels, tight restrictions, muddy water, and low roof that

15:15made reaching them so difficult. For a moment, the footage carries itself. Five of the missing men

15:21are alive. They look towards the rescuers from inside the chamber. The camera light moves across

15:27their faces, helmets, and bodies, and the rock around them. Some of the men appear stunned.

15:33Some look exhausted. At least one appears to break down and start crying, and the reaction says more

15:39than any other explanation could. From where they are sitting, they cannot see the pumps outside.

15:45They cannot see any of the people at the entrance. They have no idea what is going on, besides what's

15:51happening in that little chamber. They could not know how far the rescuers had made it, or whether

15:56the route could be opened at all. They were underground, waiting in darkness, listening for

16:02signs that someone was coming. But that chamber was not safety. It was the place where they had

16:08survived. After contact, the footage becomes practical. Rescuers move around the men. Lights sweep across the

16:16rock, and water bottles are handed over. People lean in close and start talking to them and check

16:21on their condition. The first question had been whether anyone was alive. Now the question became

16:26what their bodies could still do, and if they could hold up any longer. That mattered because they had

16:32been underground for days, way longer than expected. They were all experiencing psychological drama as well.

16:39This was a very traumatic event. Even if they entered with food and water, no one outside knew how

16:45much longer they had left, how much they had eaten, how dehydrated they were, or how much strength they

16:51had lost. A man can be alive and still too weak to crawl through the mud. He can be conscious,

16:58but still

16:58disoriented. He can answer questions, but still not have enough strength or coordination to move through a

17:04route that trained rescuers struggled to pass. In this mind, that difference mattered. After all the

17:11checks were made, the rescuers had to decide how to get the weakened men back through the same route.

17:16The water level still mattered, and the air in the chamber still mattered. Everything that made the

17:22route hard to enter was still waiting on the way out, and the discovery of the trapped men was later

17:27met with shock when the rescuers were told that two men were still missing somewhere in the maze of

17:32tunnels. That fact cuts through the relief. Five men had reached a place where they could survive.

17:38Two had not been found. In a flooded, hand-dug mine, that difference came down to only a few feet

17:45of

17:45elevation or whether someone reaches air before the route changes behind them. A person slightly

17:51higher in the system could still breathe. A person slightly lower could be cut off. A pocket could hold

17:57air while another filled with water. The men who survived were not alive because the mine was safe.

18:03They were alive because they had reached a place where the mine still allowed them to wait.

18:07As of now, the miners are still trapped inside the mine. They have been found alive and are still

18:13surviving, but this is not the same thing as being rescued. The teams have not figured out how to get

18:19them out, and the situation inside the mine is still extremely dangerous. The tunnels are unstable.

18:26Sections have been collapsing. Some rescuers have reportedly gotten stuck inside the restrictions,

18:32and every attempt to push deeper inside the mine carries the same brutal risk. The tunnel can shift,

18:40collapse, or close off while people are still inside it. That is the nightmare of this rescue.

18:45The men are alive. The rescuers know where at least some of them are, but the mine is still in

18:51control.

18:51It is narrow, muddy, flooded, unstable, and barely passable even for trained rescuers.

18:58So the problem is no longer just finding the miners. The problem is getting them out without

19:03killing them or the people trying to save them. Rescue teams have been testing different options,

19:09pumps, hoses, divers, guidelines, and alternate plans, but none of it has turned into a clean extraction.

19:15The biggest issue is still the same. The route is dangerous enough to collapse on anyone inside.

19:22These men have now been trapped for over a week. And here's a live look at the preparations for the

19:28extraction literally put out as I was about to post this video.

19:50I will keep following the incident and make an update video somewhere down the line.

19:54And with that being said, I just want to thank you for watching the video.

19:58Please give it a like if you enjoyed it, and subscribe if you want to see more videos like this

20:02one.

20:03I hope to see you at the next one.

They Became Part of the Cave | The Laos Gold Mine DISASTER

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