Maldives diver dies in search for bodies of drowned Italians as death toll hits six

A military diver has died while searching for the bodies of a group of Italians who perished during a deep-sea cave expedition in the Maldives.

Sergeant Major Mohammed Mahudhee lost his life as recovery operations continued in the Vaavu Atoll on Saturday.

Maldives Presidential Spokesman Mohammed Hussain Shareef said that Mahudhee, a member of the Maldivian National Defence Force, died of underwater decompression sickness after being transferred to a hospital in the capital.

‘The death goes to show the difficulty of the mission,’ he said.

The Maldivian military said in an X post: ‘His courage, his sacrifice, and service to the nation will always be remembered.

‘Our deepest condolences to his family and colleagues.’

Earlier, Shareef said the searchers had prepared a plan based on their progress exploring the cave on Friday.

Mahudhee was part of the group that briefed Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu on the rescue plan when he visited the search site on Friday.

Rough weather has repeatedly hampered recovery efforts.

Mahudhee’s death comes as a group of five Italian divers tragically lost their lives on Thursday while exploring a cave at a depth of 160ft in Alimatha, one of the atoll’s most popular diving stops.

The body of scuba diving instructor Gianluca Benedetti was recovered from a cave on Thursday, but rescuers were still searching for the remaining four divers today.

Shareef said Benedetti’s body was found near the mouth of the cave, and authorities believed the remaining four had entered the cave.

The Italian Foreign Minister, Antonio Tajani, said everything possible would be done to bring the victims home.

His ministry stated it was coordinating with Divers Alert Network, a specialist diving organisation, to support recovery operations and the repatriation of the bodies.

Mystery continues to surround the cause of death. Authorities have launched an investigation to understand what happened, while several theories are being considered.

One of the victims is 51-year-old Monica Montefalcone, a respected marine biologist, TV personality, and professor of Tropical Marine Ecology and Underwater Science at the University of Genoa. Her 22-year-old daughter, Giorgia Sommacal, also died.

Montefalcone’s husband and Giorgia’s father, Carlo Sommacal, said yesterday that footage taken on a GoPro camera could reveal the mystery surrounding their tragic deaths.

Speaking to Italian news outlet La Repubblica, a devastated Sommacal said: ‘Monica usually had a GoPro when she went diving.

‘I don’t know if she had one the other day. If they find it, maybe from there we can understand what happened.’

He also insisted that ‘my wife [was] among the best divers on earth,’ and said she wouldn’t have put anyone in the group in danger.

‘She would never have put our daughter’s life or that of others at risk… something must have happened down there,’ he said.

‘Maybe one of them had trouble, maybe the oxygen tanks, I have no idea.’

Sommacal added that one of the divers on the expedition, Gianluca Benedetti, was ‘meticulous.’

‘He checked everything: the tanks, the weather conditions. He’s not a fool,’ Sommacal said.

‘It must have been fate; they took every precaution possible.’

The grief-stricken father also revealed that his daughter Giorgia was going to graduate from university next month and said he and his wife had been planning a party for her.

The three other victims have been named as Muriel Oddenino of Turin, Gianluca Benedetti of Padua, and Federico Gualtieri from Omegna.

The group had boarded the ‘luxury’ Duke of York yacht, a foreign-operated live-aboard diving vessel, and they disappeared near Alimatha, one of the atoll’s most popular diving spots.

The five divers were believed to have been exploring caves at a depth of 164ft when they went missing.

Cave diving is a highly technical and dangerous activity that requires specialised training, equipment and strict safety protocols.

Risks increase sharply in environments where divers cannot head straight up and at depth, particularly when conditions are poor.

Experts say it’s easy to become disoriented or lost inside caves, particularly as sediment clouds can sharply reduce visibility.

Diving at 50 meters also exceeds the maximum depth recommended for recreational divers by most major established scuba certifying agencies, with depths beyond 40 meters considered technical diving and requiring specialised training and equipment.

Shareef said that the cave ‘is so deep that even divers with the best equipment do not try to approach.’

‘There will be a separate investigation into how these divers went below the permitted depth, but our focus right now is on the search and rescue,’ he added.

Maldivian authorities launched a major rescue operation after the incident on Thursday, deploying boats, aircraft and dive teams to search the area.

Rescuers recovered Benedetti’s body on Thursday, and a first round of searches failed to locate the remaining four divers, who were thought to be inside the same cave.

Local authorities on Saturday suspended the operating licence of the luxury vessel after five of its passengers perished in the deadliest diving disaster in the Maldives.

‘The Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation has suspended the operating licence of the liveaboard vessel MV Duke of York indefinitely, pending the outcome of an investigation into the diving incident that occurred in Vaavu Atoll on May 14,’ the ministry said.

The Duke of York is a 36-metre luxury boat that can accommodate 25 guests.

Meanwhile, police have launched an investigation, but the causes of death remain unknown at this time.

Authorities have not ruled out several scenarios, with police probing whether bad weather may have affected the divers’ visibility.

According to Italian news outlet La Repubblica, the fact that none of the five divers managed to resurface suggests the group may have become lost within an underwater cave.

With little light and poor visibility due to bad weather, they may have lost their bearings, panicked, and perhaps run out of air while trying to find their way out.

Police also haven’t ruled out the possibility that one of the five may have become stuck while the others ran out of air or panicked while trying to free their colleague.

Diving experts have also been speculating on various hypotheses.

According to local media, one of the most widely accepted hypotheses by the coast guard and experts is oxygen toxicity. This phenomenon occurs if the tank’s mixture is inadequate, making oxygen toxic at certain depths.

‘At 50 meters of depth in the sea, there are several risks; it’s a real tragedy,’ says Alfonso Bolognini, president of the Italian Society of Underwater and Hyperbaric Medicine.

‘There are several hypotheses we can make right now: an inadequate breathing mix can create a hyperoxic crisis when there’s an increase in the partial pressure of oxygen in the tissues and blood plasma, which can cause neurological problems.

‘Inside a cave at 50 meters of depth, all it takes is a problem for a diver or a panic attack for a diver,’ he adds, saying that ‘the agitation causes the water to become cloudy and can impair visibility.

‘In these cases, the panic component could lead to even fatal errors.’

The yacht company for the Duke of York, as stated on its official website, provides nitrox – the breathing mixture for scuba diving, composed of nitrogen and oxygen.

It is also unclear whether the Italians’ dive, being at a depth of over 160ft, was regulated, according to the Maldives National Defence Force.

Meanwhile, it has been revealed that there was no local guide to accompany the group into the cave, as required by Maldivian law.

Investigators are also trying to determine whether the group used an ‘Ariadne’s thread’ – a rope used by divers while exploring caves to help them stay close together and find the entrance and exit to the cavities.

The use of the rope is mandatory in certain caves.

In Italy, the tragedy has sent shockwaves through the academic world.

Milan-born Montefalcone worked at Distav, the Department of Earth Sciences. In the Maldives, she was the scientific director of the island monitoring campaign.

Her department has described her as ‘the most experienced, the best, the most competent.’

Montefalcone survived the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami when it struck the Maldives.

Her daughter Giorgia had inherited her mother’s passion for sea life and diving, having completed a degree in biomedical engineering at the University of Genoa.

Giorgia’s boyfriend, Federico Colombo, broke his silence over the young diver’s death.

Speaking to the Italian press, the 23-year-old said: ‘Giorgia loved diving more than anything else.

‘Every time she finished one, she always sent me photos and told me everything in great detail, as if she wanted me to see the sea through her eyes. She often told me that, sooner or later, she would let me experience the experience that made her so happy.’

Grief-stricken Colombo, who had been in a relationship for two years, recounted the moment he found out about his girlfriend’s death, saying that her father, Carlo, came to his workplace to break the news.

‘I still can’t process what happened. She definitely wants me to move on with my life, but now I don’t know how to react, how to move on . She was the one I saw as my wife, the mother of my children,’ he said.

Oddenino, a 31-year-old marine biologist and ecologist, was Montefalcone’s colleague.

She was an experienced diver and authored scientific publications. She was described by a loved one as ‘sweet and sensitive’.

Benedetti, 44, was an operations manager, a diving instructor and a boat captain.

After working in banking and finance for several years, he turned his passion for diving into a full-time career and moved to the Maldives in 2017.

He was the operations manager and skipper aboard the Duke of York, the diving yacht that the group used for their expedition.

He was described by Albatros Top Boat, the Duke of York’s operator, as ‘energetic, extremely sporty, and a lover of reading, classic cinema, and chess.’

Speaking about her son’s tragic death, Benedetti’s mother told Italian news outlet Gazzettino: ‘I heard the news from the embassy. I can’t say anything, and you can only imagine the pain.’

Gualtieri, 31, was a scuba diving instructor and had recently graduated from the University of Genoa with a degree in marine biology and ecology.

He had previously praised his professor, Montefalcone, saying: ‘Ever since I met her, she has always been my guide, encouraging me to follow my dreams and passions.’

His girlfriend, Noemi De Luca, paid a tribute to him on social media, saying: ‘Three years together, but always and forever in each other’s hearts. You’ll always be in my heart.’

She added: ‘Just know that I was, am and always will be proud of you.’

Local officials said it was the worst single diving accident in the nation.

Maldives tourism minister Mohamed Ameen said coast guard officers and security forces were scouring remote seas around where the divers were reported missing on Thursday afternoon.

‘I am deeply saddened by the tragic deep diving accident in Vaavu Atoll today,’ Ameen said in a statement.

‘The coastguard and all relevant authorities are actively engaged in the search and recovery operation.’

The Duke of York’s operator declined to comment when approached for comment.

Rome’s prosecutor’s office has opened an investigation into the death of the five Italians.

The Maldives, a nation of 1,192 tiny coral islands scattered some 500 miles across the equator in the Indian Ocean, is a luxury holiday destination popular with divers, who often stay at secluded resorts or on dive boats.

Local regulations allow dives to a maximum depth of 98 feet, but experienced professionals are known to go deeper.

Diving and water-sport-related accidents are relatively rare in the South Asian nation, although several fatal incidents have been reported in recent years.

A British woman tourist died while diving in December, and her distraught 71-year-old husband died a few days later after falling ill.

A 26-year-old Japanese tourist went missing after a diving expedition near the capital last June.