Right at the Edge.

At about 4:23 P.M. that day, Bryan was only twelve feet short of completing the seventy foot rope climb up the "Pozo Esperanza." He was exactly at the lowest of three edges that mark the end of the free climb (one foot wide by about twelve feet long) when he noticed that apart from the usual cave sounds, there was a strange, foreign and growing sound, absolutely unusual. He stopped prusiking to analyze what on earth (better say under) it could be; right at that instant, he had a sort of flash back and he remembered Carlos pointing out just casually, that, "some of the Costa Rican caves are subject to sudden flooding." Since the noise, by then, had grown to a very loud and very close roar and rumble, he quickly balanced his situation: definitely there wasn't enough time to switch to a descent mode and try to reach the rimstone dams section, and if he tried to ascend the remaining twelve feet of the climb and then get off rope, he would be totally helpless right at the "Tube," a seventy-five foot long and narrow phreatic tube (twelve feet high and four feet wide), with no chance at all to reach the next room(Number three), the closest place to find suitible refuge.

So, without hesitation, he opened up his Petzl croll ascender and removed the rope, and then, with his right hand, he "thumbed" the other ascender, so that the rope would slip, and as quickly as was possible he moved to the extreme left, along the narrow and slippery ledge. This placed him about six or seven feet from where the eventual flood (or whatever) would show up, falling into the Pit. It was then when, thinking himself in a safe posistion, he shuted to the ones down below something like, "Hey you guys!... there is a water-flood coming down!...Better run for cover!"

Just about then a solid wall of dark, brown, thick water at an unbeleibable speed and at least ten feet tall and some six feet wide, shot out from the tube, with such force that it jumped clearly across the forty foot wide pit, crashing against the oppisite wall, to then bounce-off at least halfway, finally dropping into the immense darkness below. Saying it, in only a few words, it was simply unbelievable and indescribable!

Bryan had just enoughto tighten the rope against the wall, and to tightly press himself intot a small crack in the rock, and even so, the furious waters missed him by only about ten inches. Obviously from time to time, a little wave would get him wet, apart from the heavy spray flying all over the place, because with the flood came in also a heavy wind. Such was the magnitude of this disaster.

It was indeed a very dificult and edgy situation, and as Bryan later confessed, never in his whole adventurous life been so close to facing death. He even had to cut the little rope that held his pack-sack, because if it somehow got caught by the flowing inferno, drag him down into the pit, or pendulum him right into and under the massive flood. A sure death in either case. Nevertheless, he managed to keep the pack between his legs, since it contained a lot of life support equipment.

At least thirty minutes went by in such a state of conditions, with hardly any trace of the flood lowering it's strength, worsened by the fact of being constantly soaking wet. With a cave