Horrifying new details have emerged about what may have happened inside the underwater cave where five Italian tourists lost their lives during a diving excursion in the Maldives in May 2026.
The group had descended approximately 160 feet into an underwater cave in Vaavu Atoll near Alimatha island when the incident occurred. None of the five divers who entered the cave resurfaced. The victims were named as Monica Montefalcone, a marine biology professor at the University of Genoa, her 20-year-old daughter Giorgia Sommacal, Muriel Oddenino from Turin, Gianluca Benedetti from Padua, and Federico Gualtieri from Borgomanero.
A sixth member of the group, a female student from the University of Genoa, made a last-minute decision to remain on board their yacht, the Duke of York, rather than diving. She is now considered the sole survivor and a key witness in the ongoing investigation.
Medical experts have since offered the most likely explanations for how five experienced divers could all perish in the same incident. Pulmonologist Claudio Micheletto told Italian outlet Adnkronos that oxygen toxicity, also known as hyperoxia, was the most probable cause. He described it as one of the most sudden and dramatic deaths that can occur during a dive, noting that something likely went wrong with the oxygen tanks. At depths of 50 metres, even a small error in gas mixture can prove fatal almost instantly.
Alfonso Bolognini, president of the Italian Society of Underwater and Hyperbaric Medicine, suggested that panic inside the confined space of the cave may have compounded the situation. Inside a cave at that depth, he explained, a single problem affecting one diver can rapidly cascade into catastrophe for everyone present when the group has no way to quickly surface or escape.
The investigation is ongoing. Search and rescue operations were initially suspended due to severe weather conditions.
What do you think went wrong inside that cave? 👇
