Vice-Chancellor 

It’s not often we see raw bravery before our eyes. Who can forget four years ago, in June 2018, when a football team of 12 boys and their coach were trapped in the flooded ThamLuang Nang Non cave in Thailand? Today’s honorary graduates would doubtless say they were only using a lifetime of experience they’d gained caving and cave-diving to do the morally right thing. 

We heard it in the news, saw the frantic scenes outside the caves. The boys and their coach were on a visit to the area, and this was meant to be a mild adventure, but they became trapped, and the alarm went out. 

The boys had walked and crawled 2.5km deep into a horizontal cave system. In normal times, the low points were only partially filled with water and there was continuous air flow into the deepest parts of the cave. However, unexpected heavy rains caused water levels to rise, cutting off the air flow between Monk’s Junction and Pattaya Beach, two stretches of the cave system. The boys were perched on a ledge deep in the system and the only air they had was what had been trapped. 

For ten days, hundreds of rescue workers scoured the sodden ground around and above the caves, trying to find a way in. They wanted to drill holes through the rock to allow the passage of air. The rescuers bought time by diving in with food and oxygen cylinders to the trapped boys.Hundreds of Thai citizens were involved in exploring rescue options, and thousands of people worldwide offered their help and advice –sometimes quite ludicrous advice. 

Expert divers arrived from the UK, United States, Australia and China. The Thai government called on Rick Stanton and John Volanthen for their help because of their vast experience and work through the British Cave Rescue Council, and they entered the cave and made first contact with the boys on Day 10. 

Rick and John immediately realised that rescue would be extremely hazardous as the boys could not simply walk out, because of the narrow flooded passages, and breathing equipment would be needed. In addition, on an early trip into the cave, they had found four Thai water engineers who had also become trapped in the cave system during the efforts to rescue the boys and this impromptu rescue had highlighted some of the problems they would face in rescuing the boys. 

Even worse, on Day 13, a retired Thai Navy Seal, Saman Kunan,died on the return from carrying equipment into the cave.  

This was a warning. How could Rick and John ensure complete safety for the boys,who had no experience of diving and were now physically very weak? The Thai authorities were desperate for a zero-risk operation. Rick, John and the other rescue divers were being asked to perform an impossible task.However, the job had to be done, and they devised a method, assembled and adapted equipment, made harnesses,then practised swimming with volunteers in a swimming pool – partly to assure themselves the plan would work, partly to reassure the Thai authorities. 

The rescue began on Day 16 and took three days. The 12 boys and their coach were injected with ketamine to make them unconscious, and then hauled and manoeuvred through flooded tunnels hundreds of metres long, being checked in air-filled caverns and then taken forward through the next stretch by one of the four UK divers. This was all done under desperately difficult conditions. Teams of Americanand Thai combat medics picked up each rescued person as they came near the cave exit andcarried them over rough terrain to the ambulances. 

A huge international team of over 5,000 people was involved in the rescue, including more than 100 divers, 900 police officers, 2,000 soldiers andten police helicopters, and pumping more than a billion litres of water from the caves. But it was Rick and John who devised and carried out the plan that saved the group. Their competence, bravery and calm calculation were responsible for saving 17 lives.  

No one could better exemplify the values this University prizes than Rick and John, who were to save the lives of so many others while risking their own lives. The whole story has been reported in detail so many times, and indeed the Hollywood film comes out this summer. We hope this inspirational story will encourage graduating students today about the values of knowledge, training, meticulous planning, leadership, service to others and selflessness.  

To celebrate their achievements with the award of an honorary degree emphasizes the long association of the University of Bristol with itsSpelaeological Society, which celebrated its centenary in 2019. Both Rick and John have connections through friends to the Society here. John lives in Bristol and Rick has many friends here. 

Rick Stanton was awarded an MBE in 2013 for his earlier contributions to cave rescue. Both Rick Stanton and John Volanthen received the George Medal in the 2019 New Year’s Honours list in recognition of their outstanding bravery in the Thai cave rescue. 

Vice-Chancellor, I present to you Rick Stanton and John Volanthen as eminently worthy of the degrees of Doctor of Laws honoris causa.