How a Man Got Trapped Forever in Nutty Putty Cave
How a Man Got Trapped Forever in Nutty Putty Cave
Transcript
00:00John Jones, a man named John Jones, had entered a cave near Utah Lake with the intention of discovery.
00:06During the search, he decided to go to the narrowest part of the cave and make a new record.
00:12But what did he know that this decision was going to be the last decision of his life.
00:18He was crawling forward in the narrow paths of this cave, known as Nutty Putty,
00:24but he got lost and accidentally entered a part of the cave where no one had ever been to.
00:31It was difficult to breathe in a place as narrow as the grave,
00:37and unfortunately, in this condition, John got stuck upside down.
00:41This is the story of 26-year-old John Jones, who spent the last 27 hours of his life in this cave.
00:48Welcome back to Zambia's videos.
00:51Viewers, there are small cliffs near Utah's Salt Lake City,
00:55in which there is a hydrothermal cave called Nutty Putty.
00:59In 1960, this cave was first discovered by a man named Dale Green,
01:04and since then, thousands of young people have come here to test their skills.
01:10Nutty Putty Cave is famous for its narrow, slippery, crooked paths,
01:16in which there is only one way to go, and that too only 30 inches wide.
01:21That is, only those young people whose waist and chest are less than 30 inches can go inside it.
01:28Every year, about 20,000 people came here to test their skills,
01:33but then there were some accidents here between 1999 and 2004,
01:38and then a lot of questions were raised about the safety of the cave.
01:42On one occasion, a 23-year-old young man was trapped in the depth of the cave for 7 hours,
01:47and on the other occasion, a young man was trapped upside down in the cave all night.
01:52Due to these accidents, in 2006, the authorities closed Nutty Putty Cave.
01:58But professional cavers said that if they had to close it,
02:01then only those people should be closed who have no experience of caving,
02:06because often the same people live here.
02:09On the other hand, officials said that Nutty Putty Cave is no less than a time bomb,
02:14which can kill anyone at any time.
02:17There was a war between professional cavers and officials for Nutty Putty,
02:22and finally in 2007, it was reopened with new rules.
02:27A management committee was formed that would only allow those people to go inside the cave
02:32who have a good experience in caving and who have professional equipment.
02:38To go to Nutty Putty, you had to apply for a permit 21 days in advance.
02:43And for this permit, two brothers from Salt Lake City, John and Josh Jones, also applied.
02:50On November 24, 2009, at 8 o'clock at night,
02:5326-year-old John Jones entered the Nutty Putty Cave system with his group.
02:58Both brothers had some experience of caving before,
03:02but they were going to Nutty Putty for the first time.
03:05Everything remained normal for an hour after entering the cave,
03:08in which they explored the largest cavity, which is called the Big Slide.
03:14This was the point when John, Josh, and the other two friends took the risk of going deeper into the cave,
03:21that is, the most difficult part of the cave, which is called the Barth Canal.
03:25The Barth Canal is so narrow that very few people have ever gone near it.
03:30Not only is it extremely narrow, but it is also very difficult to find its way.
03:35In the past, many people had got stuck on the way to the Barth Canal,
03:38but John, his brother, and two friends were quite fit,
03:42that's when they decided to go to the Barth Canal, while the rest of the team members stayed behind.
03:48The idea of going to the Barth Canal was actually John's,
03:51that's why he was ahead of all of them.
03:54The road was so narrow that John was panting on his stomach,
03:59thinking that he was entering the Barth Canal.
04:02While he unknowingly took a wrong turn and went down the road called Cockscrew.
04:08This was the place where only the thinnest cavers could go.
04:13If you look at the map of the cave, this was the road where John had to go to the right, the Barth Canal,
04:19while he took a left turn.
04:21As soon as he moved forward, the road became more narrow, and now he could not turn back.
04:27But he kept moving forward, hoping that maybe the road ahead would be a little wider,
04:32and he would turn back from there.
04:34Then he saw a place down there, and here John thought that maybe he could turn back from here.
04:41Here the matter got worse, because unfortunately, when he entered this 10 by 18 inch road,
04:48there was a dead end ahead.
04:50And now John was stuck in the opposite place of the washing machine.
04:55His head was down, legs up, and the place was so tight that his hands were also stuck in the body.
05:01That is, he was not even able to use his hands.
05:05John tried to get out of here many times, but he did not succeed even once.
05:10Now at this time, John started calling out to his brother.
05:14After a few minutes, when Josh came there, he only saw John's legs.
05:19At first, he made fun of his brother's condition,
05:22but when he realized this serious condition, Josh was also scared.
05:27Josh grabbed his brother's legs and pulled them many times, but this made the matter worse,
05:33because now John went down more.
05:36John was stuck upside down and was not able to move his body at all.
05:40At this point, both the brothers felt that they needed professional help.
05:45Now the problem was that there was no mobile signal in this depth of the cave to call 911.
05:52That's when Josh had to come out and call back to his brother's location.
05:58About 3 hours later, the first rescue team arrived at the scene.
06:02It was Suzy Mottola who tried to get John out for 2 hours,
06:07but John was more badly trapped than expected.
06:11The place was so tight that Suzy also cut John's jeans so that he could get 1.5 cm more space,
06:18but this also did not work.
06:20Finally, Suzy also came out exhausted.
06:24Outside, John's wife, his daughter and 30 more people from the rescue team had also arrived.
06:30They were pondering different ways to get John out,
06:34one of which was to cut his legs.
06:38But in the end, they all agreed on the use of ropes and a pulley system,
06:44which would be pulled by tying it to John's legs.
06:47But the problem was that the different pulleys had to be drilled into the cave stones
06:52so that the ropes did not collide with the stone and all the load fell on the pulley.
06:57The pulley was drilled into the cave stones and fixed,
07:00which was in danger of the stones breaking and blocking the way.
07:05But for now, there was no other option.
07:08During drilling, some stones broke and fell on John while sliding.
07:13Working at a depth of 700 feet was both difficult and time-consuming.
07:19And because of the narrow path from above,
07:22only one rescue worker could go inside at a time.
07:26The number of rescue workers above was now more than 100,
07:30but they were all unable to do anything.
07:33And a doctor on the rescue team made the matter even more serious
07:38when he said that since John was stuck upside down, he only had 10 hours.
07:45That is, after so much time, his organs would fail one by one.
07:50The human body is designed to be straight,
07:53in which the heart is located in the upper part of the body.
07:56The heart pumps and supplies blood to the entire body,
08:00and about 80% of the blood is supplied to the lower parts,
08:04where the supply is easily reached with the help of gravity.
08:08But since John is upside down now,
08:10his heart will have to pump blood up to 80% of the body by applying more force,
08:17in which the heart will have to work overtime.
08:21The doctor said that this could cause John a heart attack at any time.
08:26After knowing this, the rescue workers tried to straighten John at least.
08:32After hours of waiting, the pulleys were installed and John was pulled by his legs.
08:38But soon he got stuck in new problems,
08:41as if John's legs were in such a position that they were not able to bend.
08:46And when he pulled his legs, his feet hit the roof of the cave.
08:51Anyway, with great difficulty, they pulled John out of this hole a lot,
08:55but at the last minute, a pulley came out of the wall of the cave
09:00and now John was stuck back where he was before.
09:04John was now panicking a lot.
09:07That's when a two-way communication system was sent in
09:10so that he could talk to his wife and relax a little.
09:13This method worked and John got much better.
09:18Finally, after 19 hours, John was ready to be pulled again.
09:24This had to be done very carefully,
09:26because every pull was putting a lot of pressure on John's legs.
09:31With great difficulty, he was pulled out to a large extent this time,
09:35so much so that now his face could be seen by the rescue worker.
09:39The rescue worker later said that John's eyes were red and there were happy moments on his face.
09:46For the first time in the last 19 hours, John was able to see out of that narrow passage.
09:52Now only one last pull was needed and John would have come out of that hole completely.
09:58But then suddenly, the pulley failed again with a shock
10:02and John was stuck back where he had been stuck for the last 20 hours.
10:09In the last attempt to save John Jones,
10:12the stones around him were drilled and tried to break them.
10:16But maybe it was too late now.
10:18John stopped moving and he was not responding to anything.
10:24His wife also tried to wake John up on the radio, but to no avail.
10:30At this point, a brave paramedic was sent down to take John's pulse.
10:36What everyone suspected was that John Jones was declared dead on 25 November 2009 at 11.50 pm.
10:46John's wife did not believe this news at all that her husband had died due to such a small mistake.
10:54She was hoping that the pulse might not have been checked properly from the leg and her husband was still alive.
11:01But the truth was in front of everyone.
11:04But what the doctors had hoped for only after 10 hours,
11:08he was able to live for another 17 hours due to John's good health.
11:14Many plans were made to remove John's dead body,
11:17including the idea of removing the body in two parts.
11:22But in the end, it was decided that the body should be left there
11:26and the entire Nutty Putty cave should be closed forever and John's grave should be declared.
11:32Even today, John Jones's dead body is working to remind of the dangers of cave exploration in Nutty Putty cave.
11:42And there is also a board in his memory outside the cave.
11:47I hope you will like and share this video of ZMTV.
11:51Thank you very much for your loving comments.
11:54See you in the next great video.