A Windsor scuba diving instructor believes the biggest challenge facing the rescue of a youth soccer team in a Thailand cave is the mind set of the boys.
Ron Waxman is also the co-owner of Benthic Scuba on Lauzon Parkway.
He says cave diving is very different from recreational diving because you can't vertically rise to the surface of the water at any time.
He says the boys need to be as relaxed as possible in cold murky water and rely 100% on the rescue workers otherwise, the outcome can be tragic.
Add to that, some of the boys can't swim, haven't been properly training and have had little nutrition in the past few weeks.
"The most important thing I believe is that those kids must stay calm throughout the whole process because if one of them starts to panic, panic always leads to irrational actions that could potential hurt the kids or the rescue divers," says Waxman.
He admits that diving in murky water with zero visibility can be frightening for some people.
"I have been in situations where I have had my hands literally in front of my mask and I couldn't see my hand," he says. "That doesn't bother me, but I can certainly see how it would bother a lot of people especially when you talk about 11 and 12 year old kids who don't even know how to swim."
Waxman estimates there are about 1,500 active divers in Windsor-Essex.
Waxman has done shipwreck diving, but never cave diving.