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Hot topics: australia, law-crime-and-justice, government-and-politics, sport, states-and-territories, nsw, community-and-society, united-states, courts-and-trials, qld

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Dead diver 'dreamt about caves'

Updated February 28, 2011 20:23:00

Agnes Milowka was a renowned diver who knew the risks of her weekend trip. (flickr.com)

Map: Millicent 5280

Related Story: Long process to retrieve cave victim

Related Story: Cave diver's body found

Related Link: Agnes Milowka's website

The woman who died in one of Australia's longest underwater caves believed there was no greater feeling in the world than finding a new underwater passage.

Agnes Milowka, 29, was a renowned diver who knew the risks of her weekend trip with fellow enthusiasts to Tank Cave between Millicent and Mt Gambier in South Australia's south-east.

But she loved exploring dark, subterranean caves like the one in which she died on Sunday after somehow separating from her buddy.

The sinkhole has been closed off while divers re-enter to plot the recovery of her body, which is about 600 metres from the entrance. The recovery mission may take up to five days.

It is understood her parents are at the site.

Ms Milowka, who was from Victoria, worked as a stunt diver on James Cameron's 3D diving film Sanctum, a movie about what happens when cave diving goes "terribly wrong", she wrote on her website.

"I dream about caves. It is an all-consuming interest. It is a passion. It is an obsession," she said on YouTube.

"There is no greater feeling in the world than finding a passage that no-one ever in the history of the world has seen before."

She said cave diving was the true essence of exploration.

"It is like any pursuit that is inherently dangerous. If you are pushing the boundaries of that sport, you will find yourself taking on bigger and bigger risks.

"To me, those risks are worth it because the rewards are worth it."

Superintendent Trevor Twilley says police will not know what happened until they recover and test her equipment.

Ms Milowka's name has not been officially confirmed but news of her death spread on social networking sites Facebook and Twitter as her friends left tributes.

"Scuba Diver Girls asks for a moment of Facebook silence for famed cave diver Agnes Milowka," one website said.

"We will spend this evening thinking, praying for her and her loved ones as well as those who will attempt to retrieve... please everyone else do the same."

The complexities of the almost eight-kilometre stretch of twisting underwater passages mean members of the Cave Diving Association of Australia are helping police plan how to recover her body.

Superintendent Twilley says it will be a difficult task for her friends.

"That is something we have certainly discussed at length this morning - the emotional side of asking them to do that, and particularly when they do reach the deceased, what impact that may have on their emotion and what risk that may add to their safety," he told ABC radio.

He says police have spoken to other cave divers to find out exactly what happened.

"She did go down with what they call a buddy, however she went on a different tangent to one of the extremities of the cave system itself, and that was the last she was seen of," he said.

The police will review the video supplied by the divers to help determine the best way to retrieve the body.

An option is to drill a hole from the surface into the complex underground system at Tank Cave.

Police cars are all that mark the mouth to the caves in a paddock nestled between the region's pine forests.

- ABC/AAP

Tags: disasters-and-accidents, accidents, accidents, australia, sa, millicent-5280, vic

First posted February 28, 2011 17:36:00

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