[Bored chemist]

It would take longer to sort through the ideas than to get on with doing what they think will work (they have rescued kids from caves before).

[David Cooper (OP)]

It would take longer to sort through the ideas than to get on with doing what they think will work (they have rescued kids from caves before).

All ideas should be passed through filters to eliminate the dud ones and allow the good ones to get through to the people best placed to act on them, and those filters need to be people of high intelligence rather than low. The whole world would be better run if we had the right networks to feed ideas into such that the better ones get referred on up, but instead of that we have armies of blockers who make it their life's mission to prevent progress.

Which kids have been rescued from flooded caves before? That hasn't been given any mention that I've heard - on the contrary, they talk about this being unprecedented. The closest to it that the experts have mentioned has been one where they rescued two men with a much easier route out, and one of the rescued men discussed that rescue at length.

[diverjohn]

I have diving experience. There is no easy solution to the boys in the tunnel situation. Visibility is poor as the rain water brings sediment into the situation. If the boys are taken out by scuba divers, some will likely die, with hypothermia (long time in the water) and running out of air (people in panic use twice the air) being of top concerns here. Not good. If they are left inside the cave until October when the rains stop, they may die of disease (if one of them is harbouring a germ). If a tunnel is bored (mostly through limestone) there is risk of the cave collapsing. The flexible tunnel idea MIGHT work though it would be difficult to get it into place. In any case, there is no safe solution to this rescue. Let's hope the Boring engineers will use their GP radar and find a safe place to make a rescue tunnel.

[Bored chemist]

Which kids have been rescued from flooded caves before?

https://www.nytimes.com/1993/07/25/us/midwest-flooding-stranded-boy-rescued-after-flood-cave-killed-4-youths-2-adults.html
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/more-than-a-dozen-trapped-by-high-water-in-kentucky-cave/


Now those two were in the US, so it's not the same case as one I know of from a caver who was present at an incident in the UK where a delighted cave rescue team who thought they were there to recover a body actually found the  boy alive.

instead of that we have armies of blockers who make it their life's mission to prevent progress.

Do you not see the symmetry here?

You are suggesting that the progress currently being made is blocked while people do something which is impractical or impossible.

When people point out issues with your idea they are not blocking "progress" they are, depending on circumstances, either blocking a bad idea, or at least providing feedback in order that any plan which includes your idea includes mechanisms to overcome the issues.

[Bored chemist]

All ideas should be passed through filters to eliminate the dud ones and allow the good ones to get through to the people best placed to act on them, and those filters need to be people of high intelligence rather than low.

I have an IQ of 176 and your idea is a dud.
(I also don't believe IQ is relevant here- but you keep going on about intelligence...)

[syhprum]

I think some mini submarine like device possibly constructed from large diameter tubing where the boy could be enclosed  in the dry with a communications headset and pulled thru.
A test run could be made with a dummy to see it did not jam and the boys could be dosed up with tranquilisers to reduce panic 

[David Cooper (OP)]

Well, their plan A has gone well so far with four of them out safely. Their old plan B was thrown out when they decided that the place probably does flood to the roof and that they had to get them out in a hurry. My proposal was for an alternative plan B (and potentially for it to become plan A if plan A was judged to be more risky), but fortunately it looks as if they may well get them all out soon anyway. (Things would have looked very different today though if they'd been dying on the way out.)

https://www.nytimes.com/1993/07/25/us/midwest-flooding-stranded-boy-rescued-after-flood-cave-killed-4-youths-2-adults.html

"By this morning, the water had receded and they entered the crawlway to find Gary Mahr, just 1,000 feet from where they had suspended the search "

In other words, they didn't need to dive anyone out.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/more-than-a-dozen-trapped-by-high-water-in-kentucky-cave/

No information on how they got them out, or on how far in they were.

Now those two were in the US, so it's not the same case as one I know of from a caver who was present at an incident in the UK where a delighted cave rescue team who thought they were there to recover a body actually found the  boy alive.

Again no info on the difficulty and method of getting out.

instead of that we have armies of blockers who make it their life's mission to prevent progress.

Do you not see the symmetry here?

What symmetry? The reality is that most good ideas, particularly in politics, run into a wall of idiocy which they simply don't break through - the intelligence of the bricks in the wall is very average and no one in it is capable of recognising a better-than-average idea, so the bulk of the ones that do get through are the mediocre ones.

You are suggesting that the progress currently being made is blocked while people do something which is impractical or impossible.

I'm suggesting nothing of the kind - that is a fabrication of yours. I've been proposing an alternative option which would be fully possible and practical, and the parts could be built quickly. If the attempts today had led to drownings, they would be looking for a plan B with great urgency, and putting together the pieces for that plan would not have impeded plan A in any way at all - providing more options is never an obstruction.

When people point out issues with your idea they are not blocking "progress" they are, depending on circumstances, either blocking a bad idea, or at least providing feedback in order that any plan which includes your idea includes mechanisms to overcome the issues.

In your case you were making ludicrous objections which were merely filling up a potentially-important thread with useless bloat.

I have an IQ of 176

You've hidden that well.

and your idea is a dud.

It would be possible to test it and see whose judgement is better. There's nothing in the idea that goes against science (and there's even a precedent for it in nature, if you know your spiders), so you're going to look more than a little stupid when someone demonstrates an air tent in action.

(I also don't believe IQ is relevant here- but you keep going on about intelligence...)

It is relevant - when someone imagines that air tents have to be installed underwater rather than putting them in before the water rises, you know that their ability to model ideas in their head is not what it might be. Given that your IQ is so high though, perhaps you'd temporarily suppressed it by the celebration of a football result.

[Bored chemist]

Again no info on the difficulty and method of getting out.

Actually there was further info.
It was tacit, rather tan explicit.
If they hadn't had to dive the lad out, I'd not have said that they did.

My proposal was for an alternative plan B

So, it wasn't actually a way to rescue them- it left them in the cave.

It is relevant - when someone imagines that air tents have to be installed underwater rather than putting them in before the water rises,

We do not live in a world where that state of affairs is relevant.
The boys were in the cave.
The water was in the way of them getting out.
Unless you are proposing time travel to get the tents in place before the boys got there  then, in order to actually rescue them, you need to establish an air filled path for their escape, you have to get that pathway under water.

If you are saying that all you planned to do was keep the boys in the cave indefinitely, well fair enough- the objections we raised were not relevant.
But I didn't realise you were considering something so monumentally dumb as to keep the kids there until they died of hypothermia or disease (which would be pretty soon in those conditions).

Sorry for the misunderstanding.

It seems that the people who know what they are doing have opted to do what they suggested rather than what you suggested, and it's working.
Funny that, isn't it?

[David Cooper (OP)]

Actually there was further info.
It was tacit, rather tan explicit.
If they hadn't had to dive the lad out, I'd not have said that they did.

That doesn't automatically follow, but there's also the issue of how long any such dive was and whether there were any obstacles.

So, it wasn't actually a way to rescue them- it left them in the cave.

The word is that the attempts to pump out water and to divert some of the streams that feed the caves led to a dramatic reduction in the strength of the current through parts of the cave, making the extraction much easier than had been predicted a couple of days before where it looked impossible. This explains the faster travel times and shows that the death of a navy diver there was no longer an accurate representation of the degree of risk. Had this change in conditions not occurred, it would have been surprising if they had managed to get them all through alive, but this change of conditions swung the odds in favour of an immediate extraction by making that the least risky option.

What I proposed, as is clearly stated earlier in this thread, is that air tents could buy time and take the pressure off. Once survival was assured, more air tents could have been fitted along the route to provide staging posts where recovery and further instruction (mental rehearsal of the next step) could have taken place, thereby making it more practical for them to fight the strong currents.

We do not live in a world where that state of affairs is relevant.

They were in the dry, so it was fully relevant. They were in a place that might not have remained dry, so if it had been impossible to get them out straight away safely, maintaining dry space there would have been their only hope.

Unless you are proposing time travel to get the tents in place before the boys got there  then, in order to actually rescue them, you need to establish an air filled path for their escape, you have to get that pathway under water.

If you can deliver tanks of compressed oxygen that far, you can deliver air tents and the equipment needed to fit them. The key thing to keep it going is a tube piping air in, and they had that in place before I started this thread - that's an essential for keeping the air tents full of good air.

If you are saying that all you planned to do was keep the boys in the cave indefinitely, well fair enough- the objections we raised were not relevant.

The most vital purpose was to keep them alive indefinitely rather than have them drown there, but with the option of getting them out reasonably soon through small stages via more air tents.

But I didn't realise you were considering something so monumentally dumb as to keep the kids there until they died of hypothermia or disease (which would be pretty soon in those conditions).

There's only one thing here that's monumentally dumb, and it isn't anything to do with me. An air tent would provide dry space and prevent skin rotting. The temperature there out of water is not a threat to life, and we have also invented things called clothes.

Sorry for the misunderstanding.

All you're providing is misunderstandings.

It seems that the people who know what they are doing have opted to do what they suggested rather than what you suggested, and it's working.
Funny that, isn't it?

That's called luck - a bit more rain and it could have been a very different story. What I'm suggesting isn't just for this case though, because there will inevitably be another case some day, and my proposal may be the key to maximising survival there. That is why you're not being helpful. Air tents need to be made and tested, and the main thing to test is how robust they need to be to avoid being ripped by currents or torn off the wall. Research is needed into the speed of currents in different tunnels and caves and not just the degree to which they flood. I'm talking about applying science and improving technology. You're happy to stick with what we already have and not to advance, but that will cost lives.

[mrsmith2211]

It seems oxygen may be a concern, if the void is solid one could hook a tube to an oxygen tank and hose ocygen to the cavity they are in, the air bubble in the cavity should stay, then shoot food in through the tubes like the old fashion drive up bank tubes until divers can rescue all the stranded people.

[Bored chemist]

so you're going to look more than a little stupid when someone demonstrates an air tent in action.

Well, since they are out (without an air  tent in sight), it looks like I'm not going to look stupid.
Please don't bother to reply by saying "yes, but next time...".
Next time will be different.

[David Cooper (OP)]

so you're going to look more than a little stupid when someone demonstrates an air tent in action.

Well, since they are out (without an air  tent in sight), it looks like I'm not going to look stupid.

Too late - you rubbished a viable idea, and you can't undo that.

[rami999]

it should be well built

[Bored chemist]

so you're going to look more than a little stupid when someone demonstrates an air tent in action.

Well, since they are out (without an air  tent in sight), it looks like I'm not going to look stupid.

Too late - you rubbished a viable idea, and you can't undo that.

You have failed to prove that the idea was viable. Those in charge of the actual events didn't consider it to be so.

I put forward valid problems with a potential idea.

[David Cooper (OP)]

You have failed to prove that the idea was viable.

I don't need to - people can simulate the idea in their heads to test it and make their own judgement (or misjudgement). Poor minds obviously run inferior simulations, but for a simulation to fail to rate this as probably viable, that would take a very poor mind indeed.

Those in charge of the actual events didn't consider it to be so.

There's no indication that they ever had a chance to consider it at all - you need money to get ideas through to where they're needed, and that doesn't always go hand in hand with the quality of the ideas (as demonstrated by Tesla's submarine).

[Bored chemist]

I don't need to - people can simulate the idea in their heads to test it and make their own judgement (or misjudgement). Poor minds obviously run inferior simulations, but for a simulation to fail to rate this as probably viable, that would take a very poor mind indeed.

It takes a remarkably poor mind to think that "proof by loud assertion" will work on a science web page.

[David Cooper (OP)]

It takes a remarkably poor mind to think that "proof by loud assertion" will work on a science web page.

Yes - that's precisely why you should stop doing it.