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The Situation Room

First Survivor Rescued from Cave; Mission Concludes for Evening. Aired 11:30-12p ET

Aired May 29, 2026 - 11:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[11:30:00]

GREG MOORE, NORTHEASTERN REGIONAL COORDINATOR, NATIONAL CAVE RESCUE COMMISSION: -- in the States will go to a Walmart and buy a headlamp for a dry cave. The cave diver headlamps are specialized, they're robust virtually indestructible, things like that. So, again, a lot of specialized training. Honestly, even with my rescue experience, well above what I've done you know, if I had a situation, I'm calling the cave divers because they're the experts in this situation.

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: They are very brave, as we've been saying throughout.

SORENSON: They are. Greg Moore, thank you so much. We're going to continue following this breaking news --

MOORE: You're welcome --

SORENSON: -- and bring you the latest after a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:35:00]

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: All right. We're continuing to follow the breaking news right now. The first survivor has now come out of that flooded cave, and we have just learned that the rescue operation to bring the remaining four men who have been located out of the cave has been suspended, at least until tomorrow. The team will regroup, review their plan, and continue the rescue operation, we are told, tomorrow.

Will Ripley is on the scene for us. He's been watching all of this unfold. So, what else is going on, Will?

WILL RIPLEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Wolf. So, Kocha is on the line right now with one of the Thai rescue divers. He's actually on speakerphone right now. So, I'm going to let Kocha translate what he's just told us.

KOCHA OLRAN, CNN PRODUCER: Sure. OK. OK. Let me translate that. He just said that today's extraction activities will suspend for tonight. They will resume again at 9:00 a.m. The reason is that all the divers and rescuers are very, very tired. So, the guys that he retrieved today have some problem with his hands and foot, because it's been in the water and damp area for a long time, and he has some problem at his stomach.

Let me ask the name who was the first one who left.

RIPLEY: Yes, yes, let's find out his identity. You're seeing in real time what we normally would do on tape, but this is the miracle right here, the translation power.

OLRAN: Yes, his name is Mued.

RIPLEY: Mued, OK. And what do we know about Mued? Is he a father? Is he married? Do we have any details about him?

OLRAN: OK. He's a son. He's single, and he's with his parents.

RIPLEY: OK. The call has just dropped. So, I'm trying to redial the IFB line now. I can't hear you, Wolf, but if you can still see and hear me, I'm just trying to call back. Can we ask him about the other four? What is their condition, and what is the timeline for getting them out? Is it going to happen when there's daylight? This call is not working.

OK. I'm back. I can hear control.

OLRAN: OK. Four of them started to have some illnesses already. Some of them have stomach issues. Some of them have skin issues, and also the skin at their hands and their feet have some problem because they've been in a damp area for a very long time. And some of them have intestine issues because they didn't go to toilet for a very long time.

RIPLEY: Man, so when do they think they might be able to get them out? In the morning?

Yes, I can hear you guys. This is a diver who's inside the cave right now.\

OLRAN: OK. So, he explains that they're trying to start their job in the morning, but it's also pretty much depending on the understandings of these survivors, the remaining four. He has to see how much these survivors understand the procedures diving out of the flooded chambers. So, he cannot say for certain if there will be more tomorrow, how many people would be ready to come out.

RIPLEY: What's the plan if we get heavy rain, which has been the forecast?

[11:40:00]

OLRAN: It depends how heavy the rain would be. If it's very heavy, they may have to stop for the day. But it's -- the most important thing is the safety of the rescuers and the rescue divers themselves.

RIPLEY: And what about the status of the two who are missing? Any new information on that?

OLRAN: So, basically, they haven't like have -- they haven't had any contact with the remaining two missing people. And also -- but he suspects that the area where the two might be would be about 25 meters away. But the challenge would be that that area would be even lower than the place where the five were found originally.

RIPLEY: Do they think they could still be alive, those two who are missing?

So, Kocha is speaking with one of the Thai cave experts. He actually was involved and took a lead role in the 2018 rescue of the wild boar soccer team in Thailand. So, Thailand and Laos are very close neighbors and friends. They have almost a familiar relationship. They share a lot of the same culture. So, the Thai experts raced over here to work with the Laotian authorities. And this is one of them, one of the most preeminent cave rescue divers. What did he say?

OLRAN: He says, I would say it's going to be very, very difficult. He says from the area where they found five, they needed to dive about 27 meters to 30 meters to get to them. So, the remaining last area that they hope to see is that they still continue to dive another 25 meters. And all the flood would come from that entry. We all would stop there. So, he says that the chance might not be very like well forecast for him.

RIPLEY: The chances aren't good that they are still alive at this point, 10 days without food. Ask him if there's anything else important he wants people to know. And I'll ask you, guys, if you have any questions you want us to pass along, we can ask him while we're on.

I know we have a very long delay here. So, I'll just explain where we've moved to. We were at the kind of main access road to the cave earlier. We had to stop broadcasting from there and tear down very quickly. And we're now back staying at a small guest house, which is essentially the only guest house in this area. A lot of the rescue divers, including the one we're on the phone with, actually are staying here.

And so, at some point in the coming hours, we expect them to come back from the sea. And we may actually run into them here at this location. But right now, they're all still on the scene at the cave. I believe she's actually speaking to him. He might still be inside the cave or just out of the cave.

OLRAN: OK. He says that this is one of his most difficult jobs that he has to do as a rescuer in his entire career. A lot of delicate information and details. He needs to study every nook and, you know, corners of the cave system to ensure the safety of the rescuers themselves. Yes.

RIPLEY: We were on the phone with him earlier when actually word came in that the first villager had made it out. Can he describe that moment in the cave and what the emotions were like at that moment? Because that's what's so extraordinary. Basically, the reason we're able to communicate with him is because they've installed an internet router. They actually dragged hundreds of feet of cable into the cave, set up routers, and that's how we're able to have this conversation right now.

So, he's giving us his answer, and Kocho will translate in a minute. But it's just really been extraordinary, the role that technology has played, in addition to the cooperation between the Laotian authorities and the Thai experts, and now a small army of other international experts who've been flying in.

[11:45:00]

This -- we're sitting along a road here that also serves as kind of a de facto runway in this area. There have been helicopters coming in, bringing additional cave divers, even as recently as maybe 10 hours or so ago, shortly after we landed here by helicopter as well. And I'll wait and see if Kocho can translate what he's telling us and answer that question.

She's still getting more info. She's amazing right here that she's doing live translation on live TV. She's a real pro. All right. Kocho, tell us.

OLRAN: So, he explained that the moment when he shouted, they're out, they're out, they're coming out. He says that he saw his colleague diver left the flooded area first, and then Mr. Mued, the survivor, followed that, and then the last diver came. So, that's why they shouted, very like excited when they saw these three came out of the area, the flooded area.

RIPLEY: Can he tell us which countries the other divers have now come in from? Because it's a growing number of international divers that are here. When we're doing international news gathering like this, it wouldn't be possible without people like Kocha, guys. I mean, this is just an example. Kocha helped arrange our transportation here at the very last moment by helicopter, negotiating up until the minutes before we got on the flight.

OLRAN: So, six nations -- six nationals, six national divers. So, Thai, of course, Finland, Japan, Malaysia, and Indonesia. And France, right, French.

RIPLEY: And French as well, yes. And Finnish. Did we say Finnish?

OLRAN: Finnish, yes.

RIPLEY: Yes, we have Mikko, you know, staying here as well. So, we hope to get more stories from the cave. Thank you, by the way, so much. Thank you very much. Good luck to you. Stay safe.

BROWN: Wait, wait. Will, can I ask a question?

RIPLEY: This is a contact of yours from the -- yes, oh, did we just hang up? Pamela, did you have a question for him? We can try to call back.

BROWN: It's OK.

RIPLEY: Yes. Ask away and we'll try calling him back. BROWN: No, he's got more important work to do. I just wanted to learn a little bit more about how he's doing. He said it's the most dangerous rescue mission he's ever done in his career. He's risking his life doing this. I just wanted to know what was keeping him going under these just intense circumstances, the hardest mission he's ever done, risking his life. What is keeping him going and the other rescuers going? And how complicated is it that the villagers in the cave have these health conditions? How much harder does it make the rescue mission to get them out?

RIPLEY: So, Pam wants to know how does he keep going, risking his life under these very difficult conditions, and also how are the health complications of the villagers affecting the work that they're doing as well? And how are they staying healthy as well?

OLRAN: As a rescuer.

RIPLEY: As a rescuer, but also how -- you know, the villagers with these health conditions, how are they going to treat that and get them out safely?

OLRAN: OK.

RIPLEY: Yes.

OLRAN: Sure.

RIPLEY: OK. We -- did they have that live picture? So, I'm not sure if you guys have a live picture. We have been streaming live near the cave site. Isaac, one of our -- the producers on scene here, had set up a live shot that's been playing on CNN All Access, our streaming platform. I'm not sure if you guys have been taking it on TV, but we should be able to get that video cued up for you pretty quickly of ambulances, the first ambulances driving by leaving the cave site. So, we're the only media here. They're going to get that video cued up if we can. That was just seen moments ago live on CNN All Access.

And so, this really -- this story is kind of unfolding by the minute. Obviously, the latest update is that for the night, we don't know how many hours yet, but for the night the search has been suspended because the rescuers are, frankly, exhausted. And the people inside the cave, of course, they're exhausted and want to get out. But given that they do have these health complications that Pamela asked about, and we're going to get the answer in a minute, that's obviously complicating things. What did he say?

OLRAN: He said very good. His answer is very good. I trust in my team. I trust in myself. And it is because of my good experience from the Thai cave rescue in 2018. And the answer is that the health conditions of the survivors is always the priority. So, any assessment will affect throughout all the plan.

RIPLEY: Yes. If we could talk more about how the Thai cave rescue has shaped this rescue, because obviously they've had the similar procedures in place. They set up a similar command structure as well.

OLRAN: Yes.

RIPLEY: What lessons did he learn from that that they're putting into use now?

OLRAN: Sure.

RIPLEY: Because the Thai cave rescue is another extraordinary story that really gripped the whole world back in 2018 when this wild boar soccer team and their coaches were stuck underground in a very different kind of cave. It was a large kind of a natural cave.

[11:55:00]

They were under there -- underground for 18 days. Eventually, all of the soccer team and the coaches made it out alive, but one of the rescuers actually died in that operation. So, this just underscores how selfless it is that these brave individuals are putting everything on the line to go into this very dangerous and volatile and unstable situation to bring these people back safely to their families. And we're still talking about 2018. We'll get the answer.

OLRAN: The three main things that he has learned from the Thai cave rescue in 2018 is that first, it's a system. They call it ICS system. It's an incident command system. They have good structures who will be commanders and run the whole operation. They must have a single command. Secondly, it's the good leadership of whoever leads the operation. And third, it's also very, very important is that he needs to collect the local knowledge, local terrain, any bits of information that would help in rescue operation he would gather.

RIPLEY: OK. Thank you so much. So, you just heard it in real-time. This is how we news gather here with our incredible producer, Kocha, along with our incredible army of producers around the world who make it possible for us to operate in countries. With all sorts of different languages and cultures.

Your understanding of the local nuance of the way that we needed to deal with the governor when they asked us to stop filming. This is all because of our local experts on the ground here, like Kocha, who are invaluable in what we do here. And so, I'm so grateful for you. My watch has died. So, I'm not sure what time it is, but it's late and we're going to be up a bit later. But for now, we'll send it back to you guys.

BLITZER: All right. Will, thank you so, so very much. CNN is the only media organization on the ground in Laos right there, right near that cave. And please thank Kocha for doing incredible work. Our producer, Kocha Orlan, really was great. Please thank her on behalf of all of us.

ORLAN: Oh, OK. Thank you.

BLITZER: Thank you. Bye-bye.

BROWN: Thank you so much.

BLITZER: All right. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[12:00:00]