In the summer of 2018, 12 Thai teenagers and their 25-year-old soccer coach got stuck deep inside the labyrinthine – and flooding – Tham Luang caves of Thailand’s Chiang Rai province. In this episode of Teamistry, host Gabriela Cowperthwaite takes us inside the caves and alongside the people assembled from across Thailand and the world to work together on a dire rescue mission. Hour after hour, as the caves continued to flood and oxygen tanks ran low, we learn about the leadership and teamwork that enabled disparate groups to remain synchronized, overcome cultural barriers, and make difficult, life-or-death decisions. We hear from Narongsak Osottanakorn, the former Governor of Chiang Rai province, who marshaled the various teams and became a national hero. Lt. Col. Charles Hodges of the U.S. Air Force talks about his role in getting teams to communicate effectively, and Dr. Richard Harris, an anesthesiologist from Australia, describes his climactic moments while inside the caves with the boys. We also hear from Wharton Professor Michael Useem who offers insight into the leadership techniques that propelled the successful mission. And Richard Lloyd Parry, Asia Editor of The Times of London, revisits his daily on-the-ground reporting to tell us how this mission unfolded. Teamistry is an original podcast from Atlassian. For more on the series, go to https://www.atlassian.com/blog/podcast
It's the night of July 2, 2018, and everybody has pretty much run out of hope.
It's now over a week since twelve teenage soccer players and their coach went missing in the twisting, flooded Tam Luang caves of Thailand's Chiang Rai province.
The boys bikes had been found at the entrance of the caves, which wind for six long miles beneath the Doi Nang non mountainous range.
But other than that, there's no sign of the wild boars, as their team is called.
Thousands of people are gathered outside of the cave.
Parents, government officials, Thai navy SeAls, expert cave divers flown in from the UK.
Even members of the thai royal kitchen are on hand to feed the volunteers.
And everyone fears for the worst.
The idea that the boys are still alive just seems impossible to entertain.
It's agonizing.
But then something incredible happens.
Rick Stanton and John Volanthan, two of those british divers, swim 3 miles deep into the cave, squeezing through passages so tight that they can only fit by taking off their oxygen tanks.
They're hoping to find some clue to where the kids had ended up.
Or more likely, their remains.
But surfacing in a pocket of air, they find something else.
On a steep, muddy ledge, they discover a group of boys in maroon soccer jerseys, tired, scared and rail thin, but alive.
One of the most amazing moments in all this was the, was the film that was shot by the two british divers.
That's Richard Lloyd Perry, he's the Asia editor of the Times of London.
And he was there in Chiang Rai while all this was happening.
He's talking about a video recorded by one of the divers on their helmet camera.