The Most DANGEROUS Dive Site on Earth | Diving Gone Wrong 

To anyone wondering, that wheezing sound is just his regulator squeaking. They do that sometimes. He wasn't struggling or panicking or wheezing until he looked at his gauge and saw how deep he was. When you're in deep water like that, you can't tell how fast you're sinking at all. It can feel like you're sitting still, but you could be plummeting. Always keep track of your depth.

That dive video is pure, unfiltered nightmare fuel. It's genuinely chilling how it all goes wrong so fast.

I almost died here. I followed the descent through the tunnel called The Bells down to the arch (6:57 on the right). It was my 4th real dive, so I was very inexperienced. I followed the dive master and saw him disappearing into the arch. After I made it through the arch myself, I looked around and didn't see the dive master. I didn't have a proper diving computer and the mechanical gauge I had malfunctioned and got stuck at around 11 meters. I didn't know that the arch is already on the verge of 30 meters (max depth of dive), so I assumed that dive master descended further and I can't see him, because of the cliff edge, so I proceeded. A few moments later I felt a strong tug on my fin and turned around. I saw the dive master vigorously showing ascend signs to me. It turned out that instead descending he swam sideways (just like he should have actually) and out of sight. He later showed me his dive computer. It registered a depth of 38 meters. It means that I was another 1.5-2 meters deeper than that. Had I continued my descent for another few seconds, I would have experienced severe confusion due to nitrogen narcosis and sank uncontrollably all the way to the bottom, because of compressed buoyancy control vest. I would have ended up exactly like Yuri.

The final moments of the footage are terrifying. The sheer panic the moment he checks his depth gauge, the silt being kicked up from him struggling to ascend. My heart was pounding. RIP Yuri.

I watch these diving videos to reinforce to me that I'm a landlubber, through and through.

It’s worth noting that Tarek said Yuri asked him about diving the blue hole, but Tarek refused and to take him without actual trimix training. I think it was Yuri’s last day or second to last day of his trip, so he didn’t want to wait and do the training. He did this against Tarek’s advice. It’s yet another really sad tale of an experienced SCUBA diver getting overconfident. This is always a rough video to watch, particularly for someone like me who has a fear of not being able to breathe. Hearing him struggle to breathe gives me so much anxiety.

Watching the video with Yuri, you can see how fast he’s descending using the specks in the water. The little snowlike dots in the water are flying past him, he’s sinking at an incredible rate. He’s unaware due to his narcosis, which takes effect before you know it. Dive Talk had a very enlightening video about this incident.

I like that you narrarate these videos in a respectful manner, not playing it up with a scary tone of voice like some other youtubers. This is tragic, and you treat it as such. Thank you❤

The moment the camera shifts from Yuri’s struggle to suddenly being on the surface is one of the eeriest things I have ever seen.

Even tho Yuri’s case has been covered many times, I appreciate that you’ve actually explained what’s happening, how he doesn’t have the right oxygen, him struggling to breathe, his dive computer, him struggling to move around at the bottom, the buoyancy device sound, the panicked moving around. So many folk have included parts of his footage and never explained what’s happening, so I really appreciate the way you’ve covered Yuri’s case and taken the time to explain everything that’s happening from start to finish.

Edit: take note that this advice is 30 years old. As some replies point out the regulations are nowhere close to how they were when I was diving. So just make sure you consult expert and you should be fine. Original comment : tip from an old diver. If you do not have any certification for scuba diving. Do not under any circumstances let yourself be convinced by a local dive shop that they'll let you go diving with a quick few lessons. You should only dive if you were certified by a recognized organization like PADI or whatever smaller ones there are. But never, EVER, accept training that is done on the spot before a dive. Thats a recipe for disaster. Also, I like what one of my first instructors told me about diving. He said unlike other sports. This sport is a sport which you do not do to get in shape. Its a sport that you need to be in shape in order to be able to do it. In the best of situations it doesn't require that much effort. But if a quick current takes you or something bad happens. How healthy and fit you are will be a huge determining factor on whether you survive the problem or it takes you down. What the hell was Yuri doing? For those who dont have diving experience. Doing a descent in open water without the use of a guide rope requires special training. Its really hard to guage how fast you are going down. The fact the first time he looked at his depth guage was when he was near the floor of whatever ledge he landed on seems insane to me.

As a technical diver I found this video a stark reminder of how quickly things can go wrong. I get nitrogen narcosis at around 40m on air and totally confused at 50m. I cannot imagine what was going through his mind at 80m. Trying to make any sensible decisions I would venture to suggest would be impossible.

Tarek is a hero. Helping people recover their loved ones is not an easy job. I've seen divers do it and struggle with PTSS after the operation. It is really hard to find people in a place where they took their last breath, where their heart stopped beating and where the last contractions of their muscles stopped. When people die, their loved ones want to have the body, so they can lay them to rest for their closure. People like Tarek help the family give that closure. And that is amazing.

I’m a commercial diver and have probably close to 500 working dives that being said one of the primary causes of uncontrollable descent or ascent is the reduction/increase of buoyancy as the ambient pressure increases/decreases thus compressing/expanding the air bladders in you BC or air stored in a dry suit . As you get deeper it compresses more thus increasing your decent. In a panic a person may inflate them thus creating the reverse effect. It’s exceptionally more dangerous using lift bags that are holding up 100s or 1000s of lbs of equipment for construction. They can drag a diver down or shoot to the surface, flip then drop the equipment back on the diver. The ocean wants to kill you, never forget that.

I went diving in the blue hole in 2009 and it was really scary to go into the sea after looking at the graves that were done to the cliff side, knowing that for so many that has been their last place, and they have taken their last breath in that spot. Our diver coach was extremely strict about certain rules and had us all swim in a swarm of 10 and no one was allowed to go further then 2 meters from his/hers dive buddy. we dove to about 30 meters next to the walls, went around and came back up. it was really a different dive that day

As a commercial diver I can honestly say that deep water is truly unforgiving. If you don't go into the water with the proper amount of respect and careful planning, you could end up like these people. Also I think a video on people who have died due to "delta-p" while working on pipes and dams underwater would make a great video. Imagine opening a 12 inch pipe 60m underwater and being forcefully sucked into it.

Fun fact- that lens cover that was added at the start of the dive video was a red filter. Divers add them to their cameras during dives because red is the first color to be absorbed by the water at depth.

I'm Egyptian and I've been to the blue hole several times, but only for snorkelling. I remember the first time staring down the abyss and it was just hauntingly beautiful. The first time I went there I wasn't aware at all of its morbid history, I just innocently snorkelled around the edges and enjoyed the reef and the fish. In fact, dahab and the blue hole are a very popular local vacation spot and it's surprising how almost no one knows how truly dangerous it is. When I found out I was horrified and it made my second visit there much more somber but still hauntingly beautiful. Let's not get into the non existent safety regulations, basically anyone can get in the water and swim around the blue hole with no supervision. So I'm not surprised at all that there are no official records of the dives. But still it's my favorite spot to swim around in Egypt and I wouldn't miss an opportunity to visit this enchanting site again! :) Edit: Senpai has noticed me!!

I've watched a lot of this type of content. "scary true stories" of caves, divings, etc., and yours is by far the best. I think what I love most is that you include several stories in most videos and you only report on the story and don't embellish like others do. You do a really great job and I love listening to these stories, as tragic as they may be. Thanks for the good work.

yuri’s scuba diving video was so stressful it’s insane. it got so dark so quickly and i can’t imagine how scary it all must have been once the reality of what happened set in. i hope he wasn’t aware of it for too too long

I had never seen Yuri's video before, god, that made my anxiety shoot through the roof.

I almost skipped ahead when I realized you were going to talk about Yuri, since I have heard his story many times. I'm glad I didn't because I have never seen the footage the way you showed it,and your narration was perfect. This was the first time I actually felt anxious while hearing about his story and watching the video. I caught myself holding my breath and wishing he would stop,turn around, and return to the surface. Well done, as always!

Me and my brother are somewhat experienced drivers, both with advanced open water PADI certification. My brother loves photography and I can tell you that at 10:30, what Yuri is doing is attaching a lens to the camera so it retains color as he goes down, which is why it's red. Color loses its vibrancy the deeper down you go, and red is the first.

The arch is a big reason why the hole is so dangerous. It provides a false feeling that it is the entrance to the top of the hole because of the sunlight shining through the arch. When you have nitrogen narcosis and you are panicked, you swim for daylight. That arch has killed many ppl

I've seen Yuri's footage more than a few times, but it always hits hard. The panic and quiet despair is very upsetting.

It is highly probable that Yuri knew how dire his situation was. Especially in the last 1 to 2 minutes of his life. He seemed to be highly panicked and it was also reported that he was also trying to shed all of his equipment in an attempt to surface. Terrifying

I’ve dived 60m with air, it was a mistake and I was young and too keen to push boundaries, it never happened again. It scared me so much that I still have nightmares, I hadn’t planned stops for that depth and I was suffering from NN, I don’t know how I lived or even that I didn’t suffer. I was able to make it back to the surface safely. This kind of thing happens easily if you are allowed to dive alone or split from the group.

I've dived in Dahab twice and I think it's as mentioned, the fact that it's so easily accessible from land and that it transforms from the sort of leisure diving any occasional vacation diver is accustomed to, to something entirely different very rapidly if one doesn't pay enough attention. As pointed out, on air you get narced pretty quickly when descending, and in this specific place you could potentially go from a bright, safe place where you can surface at any time to being narced out at a depth where you may not have enough air to safely ascend in seconds, if you're even able to get your buoyancy device to cooperate. As for experienced divers dying there as well; yes, that's true, but in many cases they were people who had made a lot of not so complex dives, many not being on trimix, using single tanks of air and using simple BCDs, all of which are fine for reef diving at 20 meters, but not for deep dives. As far as I know there are not many experienced technical divers who were prepared for going deep who have perished there.

My parents were avid divers back in the day, and my mother lost it while diving in a blue hole (I don't know which site it was). She said she just looked into the dark depths and zoned out, and apparently starting descending way too quickly, not realizing what she was doing. My father noticed after awhile that he couldn't see her, then saw some highlighted yellow part of her equipment way below him. He got her before she descended too far and had permanent issues, but she was sick as hell from decompression since she bobbed up past him once she snapped back into it. I enjoy diving, but I usually try to stick to fresh water sites. The ocean isn't for me, other than short sailing and kayaking trips.

I'm a certified PADI OW diver with over 100 dives. In the course this case & others were explained, like the deep dive to the submarine in Australia. Part of the course is the instructors going over deaths to sober us and be aware of the dangers to an otherwise very Zen and easy "sport" to do. Yuri did quite a few things wrong, first by being overweighted, then leaving his buddy. I dove with many divers that love having extra weights, not want to float down slowly, nor practice proper BCD buoyancy protocols. A semi-argument I had with one fellow tourist in Cozumel, was that he wouldn't hesitate to drop his weights to float back up, even though I mentioned that when you panic, the very last thing divers do is ditch their weights. They overinflate then burst their BCDs. Well, we weren't diving off the wall and the local guides let the tourists do what they want if they flash their PADI cards, so... Cozumel reefs are 5m-12m range with wall at 25m. You want to stay far away from the wall. Not much can go wrong at lower depths if you have some experience. Cozumel reef & drift dives are an excellent dive choice for beginners and extremely safe. Just don't do any deep dives until you master your BCD, maybe after 20-ish ocean dives. Personally I don't even like deep dives, as you see nothing. Between 5m & 12m visibility is excellent and lots of life / corals to gawk at, plus, your air tank lasts twice as long.

When I was 13, I was diving King Cruiser in Phuket (top of the wreck is about 20m and bottom is 32m) and went to the seafloor to swim under the wreck. The experience was incredible, tens of thousands of fish schooling around the wreck and feeding on the coral ecosystem that grows onto sunken ships. At the time, I was PADI certified to 60ft (18m) and the dive master told everyone to stay at the top of the wreck, except for a few advanced open water divers. I was getting my advanced open water cert the next year, and I have been swimming my whole life so I went straight to the bottom and started swimming upside down to view the underside of the wreck. When I tell you that pressure changes quick, that is no joke. My BCD was barely able to handle neutral buoyancy with my weight belt, and my tank hit the seafloor. Luckily 32m isn't deep enough for oxygen toxicity, but it was a strange feeling to have to swim directly up to get off the bottom. I would definitely do it again because the views were spectacular and I love wreck diving (not the 2m eels though...), but I HIGHLY RECOMMEND never going below 30m without equipment set up specifically for that purpose, especially for new divers. The feeling of being sucked down by pressure is so foreign to creatures that are normally pulled down by gravity that it is easy to panic or lapse judgement. If in doubt, always establish neutral buoyancy each time you descend, because the BCD buoyancy limit can sneak up on you. And please, if you dive a blue hole stay in view of the walls to gauge rate of descent. Nature does not care, it does not think. Only you can plan ahead to keep yourself safe.

Losing track of your depth in deep, clear water is very easy. I've dove the wall off Little Cayman multiple times, and I have accidentally sunk from 70 to 100 feet without noticing, especially since I also tend to dive a little heavy. Thankfully it was a ten minute non-incident, but it really does come at you fast.

Ah my nightmare provider, right on time!

I'm going to guess that the one main issue that all of them suffered from was... not checking their instruments. When you're deep underwater, you can barely tell when you're moving. Especially when it's dark. This is a big huge hole with no clear landmarks, visual cues, or anything if you're not right beside the wall. Most popular leisure/tourist dive spots have lots of things to see, so you don't have to constantly look at your gauges. This is a deep hole with not much else. The thing about BCDs is that you have to CONSTANTLY check and regulate the buoyancy. Because of they way they work, the air compresses as water pressure increases - which makes the BCD less buoyant. In short, the deeper you go, the faster you sink (unless you're regularly checking your gauges and adjusting the BCD). I'm guessing most people didn't realize how fast they were sinking, thinking they were just taking a slow leisurely dive until the ground came up at them and they realize they're suddenly at 80m+. (Typical PADI open water certification is only good to 18m) The same issue comes up when ascending, too. BCDs get MORE buoyant as you ascend and water pressure decreases... which means divers will rocket up to the surface unless they check their gauges and control the BCD. Now they're going to deal with decompression sickness.

I love how accessible your content is. The narration of the video footage was fantastic, and the captions are always well done. Much appreciated.

Thank you for this informative video. It is great. About the Yuri incident, there are a few remarks though, which can be better explained: - at 10:30: " Yuri fiddles with the camera, attaches something ... to protect it from the pressure he knew he would experience " This is a red filter and has nothing to do with pressure. Under water videotography struggles with the effect of light being absorbed by water. This begins gradually within the light spectrum starting with red, which is absorbed after only 3meters of water. To compensate for it you use red filters. You also will notice the gain in red hue after he attaches the lense. - at 13:30:: " his buoyancy control would´ve become less and less effective as the pressure increased" No this is not the case. The opposite is true. Buoncy in the shallows is more difficulte as the percentage difference of the pressure increases and vice verca decreases with depth. For example, diving from 0 to 10 meters is twice as much pressure (100% increase) you have to compensate for. The same 10 meters from 70m to 80m only is only a mere 14% increase in pressure you have to compensate for. The pressure for the buoncy jacket requires the same pressure as the surrounding, i.e. 8bar. A standard dive would start with 230bar. So there is no propblem with compensation. - also at 15:11: the equipment he has is too heavy. Yuri is an dive instructor. The notion that he is too heavy is something I would definitly not go along with. As a diver, especially with deep dives you try to be as light as possible, as it allows for less trouble with buoncy. J - at 14:35 "regular air isn´t recommended below 40m" Well there are dive organisations, which do not allow for more than 20m. But the fact of the matter is this. On regular air you can go to 70m before the partial pressure of oxygen becomes toxic to breath, at 1.6bar. And here is the math: 0,2bar Oxygen * (7bar (waterpressure at 70m) + 1 bar atmospheric pressure) = 1,6bar Notwithstanding Nitrogen narcosis and decompression sickness. What was apparent to me is this: - why look for a dive body when you swim past him? As I have often found, to do underwater-vidoes requires a well coordinated team. The guy with the camery sets the pace. Whenever I dove with somebody else they would not wait for the camera to be ready, or the time it took to take footage and we lost each other. It went so far that I declined to dive with anybody else or other than my wife and would not take anybode with me. Yuri found somebody on the street. And as he was fiddling with his setup his dive-buddy is nowhere to be seen. That is bad. No team-play whatsoever. Than at at 17:03:49 (footage) there are two other divers around him at the surface, both yellow fins 17:05:52 (footage) passing a lone diver - blue fins. By the way, none of these other divers you see in the picture are very good. They act like seehorses. Upright and constantly kicking. An experienced diver is horizontal, hardly moves at all and fine-tunes his buoncy, mostly with his breath. - The breathing becomes laboured and hectic - he starts gulping at the end of ever breath at 17:07:02 you can clearly hear these gulps. First I thought it might be a problem with the equipment, so I went back to the beginning of the dive. But in the beginning the sound of his breathing is clear ond relaxed. So it is clear that Yuri was struggling, becoming ever more prominent at around 17:07:00. It is obvious that nitrogen narcosis starts to set in. - Yuri died from Oxygen poisoning What this video completly fails to mention is that Yuri was in the death zone. What is the death zone? It is the depth when oxygen becomes poisonous, at 1.6bar. Please refer to 3 sections above, where the math is explained. 17:03:30 dive starts slowly, divers all around - absoluty no indication of too much weight, as the Yuri is calm and descent is extremely slow 17:04:00 he descends - his descend rate is about 20m/min = (17:04:00 hrs - 17:09:00 hrs) / 93m = 5min / 93m . This is fast but still ok. With a dive so deep you have to account for decompression time, so there is no time to linger. 17:05:52 (footage) passing a lone diver - blue fins, maybe his dive-body? They pass and the other guy is not to be seen again. At 17:06:42 shortly before he is affected by nitrogen narcosis he inflates his jacket. This is a good thing, as it demonstrates, that he his cognitive about his sourroundings, knows what is going on and reacts to it. 17:06:50 Shortly afterwards he starts gulping. The diver is clearly in distress, probably induced by nitrogen narcosis. Taking the projected descend rate of 20m/min into account he is now 60m deep. There is no clear math to it. But I can assure you that you feel the nitrogen from 50m and below. Yuri is now 60m deep and his breathing is affected by it. 17:07:00 the bottom comes into view, about 5m below. Visibility is bad at about 6m. But the bottom drops off and Yuri passes along. His descend rat is still constant at 20m/min but he enters the oxygen death zone. Nitrogen narcosis and oxygen poisoining result in a complete loss of control. 17:08:30 - checks dive computer for the first time: 81.7m he is now well into the death zone. Movements are erratic and diver shows clear signs of distress, loosing orientation, time and cognitiv abilities. 17:08:33 - 83.7m 17:08:42 - 89.6m 17:08:49 - 91,8m. 17:09:00 he crashes into the ground. As an experienced diver would never ever do that. And mind you, no attempt to inflate Jacket - total loss of control. 17:09:03 - depth 93m??? Inflates jacket but does not go up - clear indication that not enough air was used to inflate the jacket. Stops to inflate further, as was required, while body reactions become ever more frantic. Jacket does not burst, as there is no accustic indication for that. No malfunction of the jacket. 17:10:58 - struggles while on the ground, - video breaks off. - Technical problems with the vest - "the jacket burst due to overfill"?!? This implies a faulty equipment, which attributed to the event. The events that transpired lead me to the conclusion that the Jacket during the dive cleary functioned flawlessly. If anything, the burst might have happened when the dead body was brought up and the decompressed air at 90m+ inflated to 10x it´s volume. And these is the chain of events that brought me to that conclusion: 17:06:42: Yuri inflates his jacket when he passes 50m, to compensate for the compression of lungs, jacket, dive-suit. Everthing seem to be fine and he progresses the descend. 17:07:00 60m - Yuri has difficulties breathing, acts ever more erratic. No indication of using the inflateble jacket. 17:09:03 93m he inflates again, but does not ascend. He inflates for 4 sec. This might have been too short. The notion he is too deep and too haevy is wrong. A good jacket for an adult can easily compensate for 25-40kg buoncy. In the beginning, on the surface he was well balanced since the descend is very slowly. So there is no indication that he was too heavy. At 90m+ his buoncy was negativ and the 4sec of inflation was just not enough to change that. At the end it is stated that the vest has bursed due to being overfilled. I do not believe that on account of 2 factors. He does only inflate twice, past 50m (a short burst) and at 90m. The burst at 90m lasted for a mere 4 sec. That is just not enough to make it burst. And then a divemaster has a professional vest. Those vest do have a valve to compensate for overperssure. So it is not even possible to burst it. And like I said it has more than 25kg (250N) uplift capacity, some up to 45kg. That should suffice in any case. I do not want to exclude a technical failure. But the footage indicates that the jacket was just fine. At 50m he inflates and procedes. At this point he was still lucid. Had the jacket shown any malfunction he would have reacted, which he didn´t. The 4sec burst at 90m was just too feeble an attempt. The prior clear indications of nitrogen narcosis combined with oxygen poisoining account for the inabilaty to react properly. From 17:08:30 on, when he checks the computer which indicates more than 80m he does nothing to stop the descend - no inflation of jacket. He goes ever further and his cognitive abilities are impared. Also, you don´t hear any burst. And it does not burst as the diver drops ever deeper, since the pressure compared to the outer pressure decreases, relatively speaking. So NO, there is no indication that this accident was due to technical failure. If the report is true though, that the jacket did indeed had signs of a burst upon retreaval, there is one logical explanation for it. It must have happened when they lifted up the body. Let´s say he has like 7ltr of air in his jacket, at over 90m. This would expand to over 70ltrs on the surface. I suspect the retreaved the body from the ground, brought him up and at some point the buoncy was positiv at which point they would let the body go by itself, which caused a rapid expansion of the Jacket and thereby caused the burst. Summary: There was no proper coodination with Yuri´s dive-buddy. They did not know each other and might have had different expectations and a different level of experience at the projected depth. Then it was an unfortunate combination of nitrogen narcosis, combined with oxygen poisoning. So, one error played into the next which led to this unfortunate, causal chain of events. It was human factor, no technical malfuction.

It's amazingly scary to see how quickly the dive turns from peaceful and enlightening to deadly. Prayers to all

Just a couple of small corrections on your video: - @06:50 - the part of the dive map labelled "arch" isn't the entrance to the famous arch on the inside of the blue hole (at around 52m or so on the inside wall facing out towards the ocean). It's a separate feature from the blue hole altogether called the bells further down the coast. It's a chimney like feature with a more or less vertical drop from sea level at the surface which goes straight down and exits around 30-40m facing out into the blue (the ocean). The wall itself that it and the blue hole are situated within go down to depth of I believe around 800m. Once you pop out of the bells, a common diving route is to then do a gradual swimming ascent along the wall until you reach a shallow saddle at about 6m depth which then takes you into the blue hole itself. - The other point to mention was that it's not so much the case that people choose to morbidly go and see the grave stones - it's simply that to do the bells to blue hole dive, you have to walk past them to get to the bells to start your dive. It's a very sobering reminder to not let ego overtake skill, training, equipment and experience. - @10:37 - that thing he's attaching is a red lens filter. They're used in dive photography for colour correction as red light is filtered out by absorption as divers descend. Without them, photos look flat and very blue or green so it effectively restores some of the natural colours that are present underwater. - final point - another reason for the blue hole being so deadly is because of the appeal of the arch. You can see it pretty clearly from above at 40m (the limit for recreational scuba diving) and water distorts perceptions of distance. Lots of divers have gotten into trouble/died because of this factor as they assume that the top of the arch closer than it actually is and that they can make it down there with single cylinders with air (21% O2). Unfortunately, the tunnel the arch opens into requires that divers descend further to exit on the other side of the wall and once you're in there, you're committed. This is where the problem lies as for most people, this route at this depth simply won't leave enough gas to make the ascent and the necessary decompression stops to avoid decompression sickness (aka the bends). Add nitrogen narcosis impairing decision making, increased air consumption at depth, likely an elevated breathing rate due to hard work and adrenaline/stress and depending on how deep divers go, the risk of convulsions brought about by oxygen toxicity from breathing normal air at a high partial pressure...this is what makes the blue hole so deadly. If you dive the blue hole site, it's easy to see the light hitting the arch and think "I could just go that little bit further". Without the right training certifications, buddy/dive team and equipment, it's just not worth the risk. I should also say, for all its reputation, it's actually a pretty boring dive. The same goes for the Belize Blue Hole as someone who has been fortunate enough to have dived both. Aside from that, I just want to say that I'm absolutely loving this channel!

it's so crazy that there were other divers at a lower depth than him just moments before it was all too late..

I dove the Blue Hole about 6 years ago. I was wary of diving regulations and equipment in Egypt, so I spent several days beforehand in Eilat (Israel) brushing on my skills and making sure I knew how to thoroughly evaluate any equipment I'd be using and that I felt better about being able to fend for myself. I'm glad I did. Some of the equipment I got even from a reputable dive shop was janky and my dive instructor (who dove in wearing denim shorts and a tshirt) paid very little attention to me in the water and I basically spent the time trying to keep up with him. Would have been very easy for something to have gone awry. It's an interesting dive site for sure (and Dahab is a really cool spiritual/hippy town) and I'm glad I did it, but to be honest the diving around Sharm El Sheikh is superior by just about every measure. Between the Tiran Straights and Ras Mohamad, the quality and variance in diving conditions is by far and away the best i've experienced.

I've dived the Blue Hole in Dahab. It's stunningly beautiful, but naturally dangerous. It's safe as long as you stay alert to that danger, are properly trained and follow the protocols - including keeping a close eye on your gauges, because it's otherwise impossible to judge depth there. I have a friend who is a hardcore technical diver (tri-mix rebreather), who told me he has been to the bottom of the Blue Hole a few years ago. He saw a couple of the unrecovered bodies on the way down; nothing but skeletons in wetsuits, slightly inverted by the little bit of air left in their tanks. Haunting.

81 meters and still falling because it's goes to 84 in the same shot. That's so tragic. He knew that he needed to have tri-mix for the type of dive that he was gonna do. It creeps me out how many divers decide to do any dive by themselves. It doesn't matter how good or bad you are at diving if you dive alone...you are alone. RIP, Yuri and all others lost in this blue hole.

I get another reason why blue holes are so dangerous - it’s incredibly disorientating: the sudden change in light to darkness, and aside from hugging a wall, you can’t tell which way goes where, especially if you’re becoming affected due to the pressure, nitrogen narcosis, etc.

Your videos scare me shitless - I watch horror movies alone at night and am generally not someone that gets scared easily; but the music + aesthetic that you create via the pictures unnerves me in ways I can’t really explain. Awesome job! Your channel, is, truly, scary interesting.

Yuri’s video is equally terrifying as it is just sad. Such a simple mistake of diving down too far and being unable to ascend, I can’t imagine how scary that must have been. Unless you’ve scuba dived it’s hard to describe the feeling of depth… I’ve been a diver since 2015, the deepest dive I’ve done is down to roughly 35m and even that felt like a long way down, to the point the water becomes murkier and green, looking up you can’t make out the ripples or waves of the surface, you feel like you’re just in an open abyss. So I cannot imagine being as far down as Yuri was, entirely alone, in the dark, probably knowing you’re going to die down there, so incredibly sad. ALSO: Sean I’m sorry if you’ve already made a video on it, but have you considered telling the story of David Shaw? His story is very interesting, there’s a documentary about it on YT called “Dave’s not coming back”, highly recommend.

Yuri case always freaks me out. I’ve seen his video before I really liked the way you presented it.the sounds of his breathes etc. give me a sense of deed

Terrifying “found footage.” After having watched that (I couldn’t look away) I’m in awe at how many people are still willing to risk not just their life but Tarek’s as well. That was also narrated so very well. I’m shook.

Just found this channel. I listen to stuff while I work. So excited to watch all past videos this week ❤

I had already seen Yuri’s footage but with the voiceover and explanation it is much more eerie and heart wrenching. RIP all divers who lost their lives in the Blue Hole.

Ah yes, time for my prescribed dose of thalassophobia 😩🙌

Appreciate the video. I like your format and explanations. I’ll keep watching!

I’ve dived in the arch and the blue hole here. In my view as a divemaster, the deadly element is that the blue is hazy in the hole. You won’t even notice the mesmerising embrace of the big deep blue until it’s too late. I saw it happening to another diver. Careful…

i was a dive instructor and dived the blue hole (not the arch, 30m max) a few dozen times with guests. i did the arch (what you call "exit to ocean" in your drawing) 5 times, 3 times solo, with tec equipment, but on regular air. i think you didn't do a great job describing the layout, the appeal and the danger of this divesite. The main appeal and reason people die is, they do the arch (>52m, tunnel) without qualification or equipment. its a connecting "tunnel" from the inside of the blue hole to the open sea, at minimum of about 52m, but open on the bottom to 150+m. Its absolutely stunning to dive through that arch, its like diving into darkness and then emerging from tartarus into the light and life of the red sea. its just a bit too deep for regular divers, but also, just in range, sometimes in view. a huge temptation. give some bakshish to the right diveguide and he'll take your owd-noob on a 12l tank. boom. gone. what happened to yuri could have happened at any 100m+ divesite. or maybe he was initially looking for the arch?

I've seen this footage before, but it scares me every time. Still one of the most terrifying videos I've ever seen. That water was so dark, he must've had a moment where he realised he was finished. I can't even imagine what must've been going through his mind, gives me the chills.

I was about to say that I loved the blue filter that you added to the whole video. it gave it a very eerie but calming vibe to it. then I realized that I accidentally highlighted the video with my mouse.

I for one have never seen that fotage before. So I hesitantly say thanks for including it. Thanks, because it was very interesing and eyeopening. And hesitantly because... well. That's probably not hard to figure out. Anyway. I only found your chanel a week or so ago, and I love it. Have been bingeing a lot of your videos. Never found much enjoyment in videos about cave diving/exploring since it felt mostly like one cave is just like other caves, but you make it really interesting and I'm having fun (among all the death) learning about different types of caves, how they look and their different challenges. Being european I also appretiate you including the metric system. So many videos just use the american system, and I'm left with just a vague idea of how big/small something is. Also, you could probably read the phone catalog and it would be a nice listen. Your voice is really pleasant. Thank you for making such great videos! Can't wait for more! :)

The red tinted lense Yuri puts on the camera is for making reds visible as that part of the visible light spectrum gets filtered out by the water.

See, this is why I don't just plunge into strange holes.

When Yuri first checks his depth gage it says 81 meters down. He pulled it out of camera view for 2 seconds (based on the camera screen time indicator) when he looks at it again it then displays 89 meters down. He begins to panic, because he knows he's in trouble. So apparently he was sinking like a rock, while thinking he was making a controlled dive? 2. Why didn't his dive partner grab his leg and warn him that he was going too deep? 3. If was an experienced diver, he should have known that pure oxygen would be ineffective at a certain depth. I apologize to all on this thread if it sounds like I'm "Monday morning Quarterbacking." I just discovered this channel a week ago and, I'm ADDICTED! When I was a boy, my father took me to see JAWS, 1975, never stepped into the ocean since. And I loved summer's at the Jersey shore! God I'm old.

I just subbed and noticed your are so close to 1 million subscribers!! It's sad that even experienced divers risk their lives like this.

1:29 What is unsettling as well and must make Tarek’s work that much harder, is the fact that not all bodies have been recovered. Some families have expressed their wish to let them rest where they have fallen. I saw a video last year that showed the skeletonized remains that litter the bottom, and some fresh bodies as well.

I live in Egypt and was in Dahab last week. There's a big rock where people's name plates are plastered there to remind people how dangerous it is. Otherwise snorkeling there is wonderful I never get enough of it.

These videos keep me grounded from doing crazy stuff. Glad for that

Very good video. As someone who has always wanted to go scuba diving and isn't aware 9f these invisible dangers, this video and others like it could be saving lives

I believe several people tried to talk Yuri out of diving the blue hole as he wasn’t certified for closed circuit breathing. I don’t dive but even I know you don’t dive to that depth on oxygen. He made the same fatal mistake so many people make when wanting to try something new, they’re in too much of a hurry.

What a sad story for Yuri. When I was training to become a diver there was a story about a couple of boys who went to Kullen to dive. Kullen is a peninsula located in the northwest of Skåne County, Sweden. One of them wanted to free dive and there are places where it is very deep so he had taken a lot of weight with him. As you have probably guessed, he didn't come up again - he sank really hard - probably got an ear squeeze on his way down into the depths. Poor boy. I tried it once during training in the swimming pool where I just for fun had twice as much weight as I should have and I landed on my ass a few seconds later. It hurt like hell, but I physically understood how dangerous it actually was to be overweight. As a freediver, I have used weight to descend, but the last deep dives I did more controlled. Respect the element and be careful out there.

I love the ocean and swimming in general but if my own set of lungs can’t get me there I’m good. The way these people die is terrifying to me.

Dang, it only took 6 minutes for Yuri to go from happy confident diver to frantic and doomed. I can only imagine what was going through his mind when his BCD burst. Knowing there was no way to ascend. RIP buddy. I'm sorry your death is immortalized on the internet to entertain us.

This was incredible! How things like this keep happening today is beyond frustrating. Great video as always 🤙

I know you were concerned about covering Yuri's story since it was so famous, but I'd never heard of it. So I appreciated this. Honestly I think you should eventually cover the most famous incident involving cave diving (the rescue part at least). The Thai kids soccer team. Yes everyone knows the basics but you do very in depth videos and I think you could make it in a way that really goes into detail that few others would cover. That would make it stand out.

This is a good video it shows how dangerous the blue hole is. I was at diving the blue in 2010 it was a great dive and awesome to see but the tour guides did not make it clear how dangerous it is or how many people had died there. Only a few month later i found out how dangerous it is.

I'll keep myself on land where I belong thank you very much for reinforcing that very well with this video!

His problem started at the beginning. Screwing with equipment, bouncy control, switch on regulator possibly in “closed” position, experience. This is a very dangerous dive (like many around the Red Sea). Do not dive them without a guide, no matter how much experience you have. This includes Trimix divers. A professional guide knows the environment and will give you an added measure of safety. This is the first lesson you learn in open water diving. After you are use to the site and informed to its conditions, you are prepared to dive safely. I’ve dove this site. Quite an amazing place. Sad for these divers who lost their lives.

You always do a fantastic job Sean. This one made me cry while listening to Yuri, as I’ve heard these sounds in a few other video’s of divers as they went into narcosis and died. Have a great day everyone

And that my friends is why you check your gauges when you have no visual reference. Like every few seconds, gauge in hand the whole time. Im glad it takes me a bit to equalize as my ears would scream at me for going to fast before i got too deep. For new folks looking at getting into diving, this is a great example of why you are taught the safety processes you are taught. Follow good practices, and the chances of this happening are slim. Condolences to the family.

I know this video has been shown on yt a lot but you explained better than anyone .. thank you

I am a huge fan of your videos!! I love how you manage to be so detailed with explanations and scientific instances for most of these diving and climbing videos, it definitely brings the scary to the interesting stuff!! It's amazing!! Thank you so much!! Please keep doing it! :D

That’s a crazy video - 81 metres is seriously deep! As others have commented, it’s so deep that the normal buoyancy techniques don’t seem to have worked - plus he may also have been in serious distress owing to the physical effects of being so deep with just normal oxygen etc. Perhaps an issue is simply it’s so dark that divers may not realize how deep they are going without visual cues if they aren’t systematically checking their dive computers

Reminds of that stream in the UK that seems deceptively mundane since its so narrow and could almost be jumped over. But its much deeper than anyone would suspect at the surface and the currents are actually stronger under the surface and tend to push anything caught in them deeper down. Its also claimed a lot of lives over the years.

Great Vid, and thanks for the detailed explanation of the footage. Many ppl who are not divers themselves might have a hard time knowing and understanding the vast amount of factors a diver has to consider regarding the planned depth, the tolerances a chosen depth and the equiment allow etc. - even basics like having a leadbelt and feeling heavy AF on land, and suddenly floating as soon as you are in the water, having to adjust the buoyvest every so often, the loss of individual depth perception after the first 10-20m (the first 10 being the harshest due to the biggest relative increase of pressure e.g. doubling) I could go on for ages... also thanks for making a quick note about diving and technical diving. These are two very different pair of shoes. Check your depth! Don't take chances! Stay save.

This place is like Mt Everest except in reverse.. The fascination, the potentially fatal outcome, and the actual body count all have eerie parallels to Everest.

I've never seen anything like this. 😢 Thank you for explaining what's happening in the video and doing it in a respectful manner. Even though it is very hard to watch knowing the outcome, but it is a great learning tool!

Ah hell no. He went 80meters in like 30 seconds. I'm staying out of the water for good

You can tell that Yuri is dropping quite fast due to how fast the particles in the water are appearing and disappearing from view.

Woooo scary upload just at bedtime!! Love your work. Watching from Australia ❤

awesome video! one thing to note: the red cover Yuri was adding is a red lens filter to compensate for the blue-ish images under water and produce a naturally colored image in the camera

Man this is humbling. I was lucky enough to be certified through NAUI in a course at my university and our research dives were only in caverns. They put a huge emphasis on only to diving in terrains you were trained in and all of mine have been in caverns. Been pretty confident that caverns were the more difficult terrain but the false depth perception that comes with open water is no joke. Always dive with a 1-on-1 buddy!!!

I saw Yuri's footage a couple of years ago. At that time it really shocked me. I didn't want to see it again. But this time your explanation helped me understand what was really going on. The fact that he had nitrogen narcosis let me realize why he kept descending. What a nightmare. Thank you Sean @Scary Interesting ⭐

I discovered that I have a fear of murky water, when I jumped into a very green river, with a group of friends, and suffered an embarrassing panic attack. I can't even imagine how much more terrible that feeling would be, in pitch black water, way below the ocean's surface!

9:40 lol the nearby city of Tel Aviv,its about 10 hours and one country border cross away. The blue hole is in dahab, Egypt, TLV is in the center of Israel.😅

Hi, advanced open water scuba diver here! So, there were a couple of things I noticed just because I have the context of training. 1) I don't think he had a diving buddy. One of my number one rules is to always dive with a buddy! Your chances of survival drastically increase with a buddy, and there's just no sign of anyone else with him. You would usually hear the other person breathing as well. 2) Regulators just have a squeaking noise that they make sometimes. It happens when you breathe in. His breathing didn't become panicked until he realized how deep he was after looking at his computer. 3) I am amazed that he did not look at his computer during his descent without a guide rope. Guide ropes are used so that you can ease yourself up or down at a measured pace. While ascending, you have to look at your computer to make sure that you aren't going up too fast (decompression sickness), but almost equally as important, you have to look at your computer while you descend - especially when you're diving in a place deeper than your maximum allowable depth, so you don't go too deep. That he NEVER checked his computer until he hit a ledge baffles me. I think with normal air and an advanced open water scuba diving cert, you can only go a maximum depth of 100 ft, which is more or less out of nitrogen narcosis range (it varies from person to person), and you need special air mixing certifications to get the air mixtures that prevent nitrogen narcosis and allow you to dive deeper. Anyway, just some observations. It is truly tragic to lose one of our own, but watching these reminds me of all of my training and safety protocols I learned. They're always written in blood, it seems.

Seeing stuff like this makes me thankful I had such a thorough dive instructor. Initially I wondered if there wasn't something special happening causing gear to malfunction in these holes (water density changing suddenly or something). Turns out its all just human error caused by lack of experience and preparedness. Always keep an eye on your depth as you descend.. you could be in a downward current and no realize how quickly you're falling.

Dive Talk is a great cave diving channel that talk about these tragedies (and positive stuff too)

I think what is dangerous about the sudden drop off of these extreme depths is the sudden change in the buoyant force, especially in salt water. When diving the goal is to maintain neutral buoyancy if you are not descending or ascending. When divers travers over a spot that rapidly changes in depth they experience less of a buoyant force pressing upward on them. Therefore, if they do not manually or preemptively adjust their own buoyance via their BCD to reach equilibrium again, they can rapidly descend and sometimes not even realize until it is too late.

I have nightmares about being in the deep dark blue sea with nowhere to go and no direction to turn to and wake up in the most horrid panic and sweat. Now I've just watched this, definitely gonna have another episode tonight.

For the algorithm 👊

Great video! The really dangerous thing about this site is the outlet into the open ocean. It's nearly suicidal on a single tank of air (it can be done but you should likely die if you try). Further, I think a lot of the deaths are people who get disoriented and swim towards to deep passage out thinking it's the way up. Because there is light on the otherside of the swim through. Yuri was probably narced. He was too deep. He only attempted to inflate his BCD once he was already out of gas (which he sucked through fast because he was so deep ofc). Its why he dies right after. I could be wrong but I don't think he attempted to blow his vest until he literally was out of gas. He was choking well before that. The depth and weight is not a factor if you still have air in reserves. He also kept not eye on his computer until it was too late. By the time he was looking at his computer he should have ripped his weights, attempted to blow his vest and, if failed, ditch his entire vest and tank and swim for the surface. If he still had any air in his lungs he absolutely could have made a punt for the surface on a controlled exhale. Situational awareness is everything diving. And this is one of the most situational awareness necessary dives you can do recreationally. Rip Yuri - I hope your footage has saved many lives.

16:31 time mark _ " Tarek also found that in his effort to make himself more buoyant, Yuri's buoyancy control device had actually burst due to being overfilled." I don't think that this statement is true. At a depth of 200+ feet, there would have been insufficient pressure in Yuri's air tanks to have fully inflated his BCD. (Indeed, if his BCD had filled, he would have rapidly ascended to the surface until the difference in pressure caused the BCD to burst.). More likely, what little air that found its way into the BCD caused it to burst upon ascension during the recovery operations.

It's incredible just how dangerous something that contains little to nothing in it but water can be; and how it can inspire the worst in people to act carelessly and recklessly despite training and acquired skills. After seeing this, I've entirely changed my mind about a video game about deep ocean exploration.

These videos are pure psychotherapy for myself since my diving accident ALWAYS ALWAYS bring a buddy . 🙏💙