Arctic Cave Under Ice...with a Tragic Backstory...Plura

Coming up, Jonathan and Todd travel to the Arctic, cave diving under the ice. Welcome to Jonathan Bird's Blue World! Arctic Norway in winter. It's hard to imagine a place more cold and remote, but starkly beautiful. Todd, Noah and I are driving across this frozen landscape to visit a world-famous underwater cave. Located right in the middle of Norway, almost exactly on the Arctic Circle, Plura Cave is not exactly easy to reach. The Pluriden Valley. Here a river emerges from beneath a mountain of marble, in a small pond known as Plura. The cave lies under the ice at the bottom of this pond. But experienced divers come here from all over the world to dive this incredible cave, and they often do it like us in the winter, because the water is clearer. One such diver is our friend Finnish cave diver Sami Pakkarinen. In 2013, after a two-week mapping project with two friends, Sami made a traverse from Plura to another cave more than a kilometer away, connecting the caves for the first time. The traverse took them from the pond, to the cave, up into a huge air pocket, then back down to a depth of 135 meters, before finally surfacing in another cave known as Steinugelflaget, more than a kilometer away. That made Plura Cave famous as the longest sump dive in the world, and the deepest in Northern Europe. But that first traverse led to tragedy. In February of 2014, a five-man team attempted the traverse, but two of them got stuck, panicked and drowned in the really deep section. Expert cave divers were called in to attempt to recover the bodies. But it was so deep, and so cold, that they decided it was just too dangerous. So local authorities thought the best thing to do was simply to close the cave down and treat it as a grave site. However, the friends of the deceased divers had promised their families that they would get the bodies out. So they started planning a secret, illegal recovery mission. And to lead that mission, they called Sami, because he's one of the only divers that knows that deep section of the cave really well. Over a period of several days, Sami's team of five top cave divers and a dozen volunteers got the victims' bodies out. A couple of years ago, I saw an absolutely amazing documentary film called Diving into the Unknown, about the secret body recovery mission. And I knew that someday, I would love to dive this cave. By a total coincidence, when Todd and I were in Portugal last summer, we bumped into Sami and his girlfriend Jenny who were diving the same caves as us. They invited us to Norway, and here we are! After a three hour drive from Buda, we arrive at Plura Valley Dive Center, where we meet up with owners Ina and Jani Santala, as well as Sami and Jenny, who have already arrived. Ah, they're here! Hello! We made it! Finally! Sami! Good to see you man! Good to see you! How are you? Hi Jenny! How are you? Hi Todd! Hey! Good to see you man! Good to see you! Well, we made it to Norway! Yeah. We're excited to go diving! I think. Very good. I'm not sure if we are. The facility is not just a dive shop, but includes accommodations, dining, and even a bar. Todd and I really want to see the dive site, so we take a walk over. And Jani refreshes the entrance, which has partially frozen over during the night. So this little pond is the start of the river, which goes down that way, and all the water comes out of the cave under those rocks. So we're going to go in here, we're going to go check out the cave, and it's going to be toasty warm! Back at the dive shop, we have a ton of gear to unpack and assemble. We brought our KISS Sidewinder rebreathers, which can provide a much longer dive than we can tolerate in such cold water. Divers like Sammy, who dive in conditions like this all the time, have heated undergarments. Unfortunately, Todd and I do not. It's at times like this when I wonder why I didn't bring the heavier dry suit. This is the way! Todd and I are traveling in the rear with the gear. Just since we started suiting up, the weather has taken a turn for the worse. It won't matter underwater, but it sure makes the gearing up more difficult. Right about now, Todd and I are both thinking the same thing. What have we gotten ourselves into? Sammy leads the way to show us how to get in, and breaks the skim of ice that has already started forming. When we first enter the water, we don't really feel much sensation of cold through the thick undergarment. It takes a while for the cold to really seep through. But the water is only 34 degrees Fahrenheit, just above freezing, so this is extremely cold water diving. Underwater, the visibility is amazing. We don't normally associate cold water with great visibility, but this blows my mind. Sammy sets our primary reel. Then he and Jenny lead the way into the cave. Soon he connects to the mainline, and the dive begins in earnest. Over thousands of years, flowing water has created scalloping on the rocks. An arctic char follows us into the cave. The water has eroded a very interesting look at the layers in the sedimentary rock. Before the dive, we decided that we would turn before reaching the air chamber in order to be sure that Todd and I could tolerate the cold before attempting a longer dive. On the way out, we're going with the flow, so it's a little easier. And we're feeling confident on the next dive we can make it all the way to the air chamber. Back in the pond, we do a safety stop. It's lighter, but not any warmer. My toes are numb and my fingers are worse. That was cold! Beautiful cave! That's a crazy cool cave! You know, I am cold, my toes are my fingers, but I'm not as cold as I thought I was going to be. After the dive, the weather is no better. Yanni makes the mistake of allowing us to drive the van back to the shop. This is fun because I can't really see anything. I'm in a dry suit. I'm not really warm and I'm trying to remember how to drive a stick after 20 years. But so far, we haven't crashed. Oh, and the wind is kicking up. Let's see if we get blown off the road. Let's hope not. Yeah, it was totally the wind. So now we wait for Yanni to come rescue us. Oh yeah, we're driving in the snow baby! Later, Sami takes us on an adventure. We're hiking to the other end of the cave, Steinugelflagget, which is about a kilometer away. I don't want to sound like a wuss, but Sami has significantly downplayed the amount of work it will take to reach Steinugelflagget. Figures today is the day that the snowmobile is broken. I am the old guy. And I'm holding up the team here. I'm going as fast as I can go boss! Soon we have to bushwhack off the beaten path through a meter of snow. Now we're talking! Are we having fun yet? We've reached a giant crater. This entire section of hillside collapsed into the cave below. To get into the cave, we have to climb down inside the crater. What the heck are we doing? Are we pressing down the rope? Inside the cave, it's humid and slightly warmer, so the camera fogs up. We're climbing almost straight down in the first section of cave. Can you imagine getting scuba gear down this? These guys had to get scuba gear down this. Oh my goodness. Sami tells us that it's only 300 meters to the water. But we quickly realize that it's going to take a long time at this pace. For the body recovery, volunteers carried thousands of pounds of scuba gear down this path. We come to a section that used to be submerged, and Sami tells us about the scalloping. You can see that there's lots of these little bumps in here called scallops. These scallops indicate that there has been a very high water velocity when this was submerged once. Larger scallops usually mean slower water movement. A lot of small ones indicate very high velocity. This is filled with those small ones. So how long ago do you think this was underwater? I think this, because you can still see small wooden branches and such in here, so not so long ago. I think when the dam was ready in the 60s, and the water level dropped in here, so this became a dry tunnel. So somewhere in the 50s, 60s, and then you can access here on dry land. After an hour of climbing downwards into the earth, we finally reach the water. It's hard to believe that Sami has dove the cave from this end. We don't stay long, because we have another hour to climb back up out of the cave. That was quite an adventure. We're finally out and it's dark. And I have no idea how anybody could have ever gotten all that scuba gear down there for that recovery. Unbelievable amount of work. Incredible amount of work. I could barely get me down there. Back at the dive center, Jani and Ina have cooked up a delicious hearty dinner. When you've been walking for five hours, any stew would be good. And this stew is unbelievably good. We have a question for you guys. For? For our wonderful friends and guides. Skol. We would never have done that dive without you. There's no chance we would ever go in that cave. Okay. Without you. In which end? Either end. The next morning, we're back at Plura Pond, with a fresh layer of snow and ice. It's a much nicer day. Today we will push all the way to the air chamber. There's a little crust, but it's not frozen over. Getting into the water is like going for a dip in a snow cone. After 40 minutes of swimming, we can see the surface of the water. We ascend into a shallower section. Finally, we pop up into a huge air chamber, which is almost 3 football fields long, and filled with breathable air. We might be in an air chamber, but we're not getting any warmer, so we need to turn around and head back. This is my first cave dive, where my dive is limited not by air supply or decompression obligations, but by how long I can tolerate the intense cold. It crosses my mind several times that I may have bitten off more than I can chew. Our friend Charlie the Char definitely doesn't mind the cold. And since this is not a cave-adapted species, I have to assume that he's in here following our lights. We try to stay up near the ceiling during the deep section to minimize the decompression obligation. I really want to warm up. Everywhere I look, I see the scalloping on the rocks caused by water erosion. These larger scallops indicate a lower flow. As the passages get wider, the scallops are bigger. It seems strange to emerge from the cave into an overhead environment under ice. Of course, that does provide entertainment. At last, it's time to surface. That was cool! That was a beautiful cave. But, I'm freezing! This is Plura Cave. Plura Cave was made famous because of a tragic accident. But everything about diving here is an epic adventure. It's at the Arctic Circle. The water is cold and clear. The rock formations are amazing. And now there is even a local dive shop and accommodations. Without question, this was one of the most difficult cave dives I have ever done. But it was also one of the best adventures I have ever had in the Blue World. Hey you guys, check out that video. It's a really good one. Also, this one is pretty good too. Oh, and don't forget to subscribe.