[ad_1]
Rescuers ordered the evacuation of the site to facilitate efforts
The head coach of the Thai football team spent the morning of June 23 to prepare his young badistant to an important task: to take care of boys by himself. ] Nopparat Khanthavong, the head coach of the 37-year-old Moo Pa (Wild Boars) football team, had an appointment that morning. Ekapol Chanthawong, his badistant, was to take the youngest boys to a football field nestled near the Doi Nang mountain range No, a formation with many waterfalls and caves that straddle the border between Thailand and Myanmar
behind them, when you travel, you can stay alert, "he wrote in a Facebook post that he shared with the Washington Post. Ekapol trains the youngest boys, so Nopparat tells him to bring boys from the older team for extra eyes
"Take care of yourself," he wrote.
The hours that followed gave the blow of sending a series of events. riveted to the world: a dramatic search and rescue that found the boys alive nine days later, huddled on a small muddy room surrounded by flood waters. The focus is focused on the only 25-year-old monk, Ekapol, and on the role he played in their situation and in their survival.
Ongoing efforts to extract the boys involved a team of thousands of divers, engineers, military personnel and volunteers from around the world – including Elk Musk's SpaceX – with no clear plan in sight. The dive, the most likely method, is considered too risky for the moment given the lack of boys' swimming experience, the muddy and black waters in the narrow pbadages and the death this week of 39, a SEA of the retired Thai Navy. for boys diving. The engineers searched for a path through the surface of the mountain, hoping to drill them and reach them inside the cave, but they recognize that it could take months and change the geography of the cave in the process. The group continues, some reprimanded Ekapol for leading the team into the cave. A large warning sign at the entrance to the cave might come in so close to the monsoon season, they say, and he should have known better.
But for many in Thailand, Ekapol, who left his life at the three-year-old monastery He joined the Wild Boars as an badistant coach soon after, is an almost divine force, sent to protect boys during this test. A widely shared cartoon of Ekapol shows him sitting cross-legged, as does a monk in meditation, with 12 little boars in his arms.
According to relief officials, he is among the weakest in the group, in part because he gave boys his share of the limited food and water that they had with them in the early days. He also taught boys how to meditate and how to conserve as much energy as possible until they are found.
"If he did not accompany them, what would have happened to my child?" said the mother of Pornchai Khamluang, one of the boys from the cave, in an interview with a Thai television network. "When he comes out, we have to heal his heart My dear Ek, I will never blame you."
Ekapol was an orphan who lost his parents at the age of 10, say friends. He then trained to become a monk but left the monastery to take care of his sick grandmother in Mae Sai, in northern Thailand. There, he divided his time between temple work in a monastery and the training of the newly created Moo Pa team. He found soul mates among the boys, many of whom had grown up in the poor or were stateless ethnic minorities, common in this border area between Myanmar and Thailand.
"He loved them more than himself," says Joy Khampai. from Ekapol who works at a coffee stand at Mae Sai Monastery. "He does not drink, he does not smoke, he was the kind of person who took care of him and taught the children to do the same."
He helped Nopparat, the head coach, design a system where Boys' pbadion for soccer would motivate them to excel academically. If they obtained certain grades at school, they would be rewarded with football equipment, such as fresh cleats for their crampons or a new pair of shorts. The two men spent time looking for sponsors and used the Moo Pa team to prove to the boys that they could become more than their small town suggested – even professional athletes
" He gave them a lot of it, "Nopparat told me. He carried the boys home when their parents could not and took responsibility for them as they were his own family.
He also kept the boys under a strict training schedule, according to physical education teachers of the school field. where they practiced. Nopparat did not know where Ekapol would bring the young football team, but thought it would be a learning experience for him to handle them alone.
The oldest Wild Boars had a match at night, he said, so he put his phone away. When he checked at 7 pm, there were at least 20 calls from worried parents, none of whom had gone home. He frantically composed Ekapol and a number of boys, but only reached Songpol Kanthawong, a 13-year-old team member whose mother picked him up after training. He told Nopparat that the team had gone to explore the Tham Luang caves. The bus ran there, only to find bikes and abandoned bags at its entrance and water seeping on the muddy path.
"I shouted -" Ek! Ek! Ek! " He said. "My body became completely cold."
The information had slowly begun to come out of the nine-day boys' trial before they were found Monday night, through letters and limited communication between the coach , the team and the rescuers. been with them in a small chamber of the cave.
The wave of euphoria that crossed the city of Mae Sai and around the world when the group was found settled in a dark reality that neither Ekapol nor his 12 could see. daylight for days or even weeks. Officials said Saturday that they had a window of three to four days in which conditions would be "very favorable" for boys to try to dive before the monsoon rains hit and continue for months.
oxygen in the section of the cave in which the group hides, which had fallen below healthy levels. Officials are now limiting the number of rescuers who can visit the cave to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide that forms when they expire. Rising water levels could also result in quick extraction, but authorities say the boys are not ready to dive.
Friends, meanwhile, worry about Ekapol. He had the full confidence of the boys, and it is unlikely that they embarked on exploring the cave without him.
"I know him, and I know he will blame himself," said Joy, his friend at the monastery.
On Saturday morning, the Thai Navy published photos of letters the group had written to their families and to the outside world. Ekapol, scribbled on a piece of yellow-stained paper, torn from a notebook, was brief, but included a promise and an apology.
"I promise to take the best possible care for children," he writes. "I want to thank you for all the support, and I want to apologize."
(Except for the title, this story was not published by the NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.) [19659028] (function (d, s, id) {var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName (s) [0]; if (d.getElementById (id)) returns; js = d.createElement; js.id = id; js.src = "http : //connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.5&appId=213741912058651 "; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore (js, fjs);} (document, & quot; script & # 39; , & # 39; facebook-jssdk & # 39;));
[ad_2]
Source link
