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Sanctum Stunt Diver Dies In A Real Life Cave Diving Tragedy

by Noreen on April 4, 2011

Image source: agnesmilowka.com

Melbourne cave diver Agnes Milowka, age 29, died on February 27, 2011 while exploring the extensive labyrinth of caves known as Tank Caves, in Mt. Gambier. While the sad event played out much like an incident out of the recent James Cameron scuba movie ‘Sanctum’, Milowka actually worked as a stunt diver for the two female characters in the same movie.

True to the character she played in the movie, Agnes was a passionate cave diver and explorer who  lived to go where no man had before. Captivated by the sheer mystery of unknown passages and where they led to, cave exploration became more than just an obsession for her. Exploring, mapping new cave systems, pushing the boundaries and bringing back images from her adventures to share with the world what very few would ever see with their own eyes, was the center of her existence. Having dived Florida’s cave country and the Bahamas extensively, Agnes turned to her own country and set her sights on Tank Cave, a maze-like system with more than seven kilometers of underwater passages, located near Mt. Gambier in South Australia which is famous for it’s sinkholes,  underground waterways, caves and caverns.

A highly experienced cave diver, Milowka was said to have dived the Tank Caves many times before. She had previously written about the Tank Cave system for Cave Diving Down Under and described it as the “crowning jewel” of the caves in the region. She went on to write-

“The cave is stunning, it is relatively shallow (a max depth around 20m), there is no flow to fight and the water is crystal clear – you can’t go wrong really.”

But she also wrote that the system was complicated, “like a spider web gone wild” and meant divers must learn the cave carefully to navigate tight restrictions and often zero visibility. She wrote of a new passage in Tank Cave she had discovered with a colleague, and described numerous “tight bits” where some divers may have had to take off their tanks to squeeze through. She wrote-

“The walls and roof to begin with are quite soft and squishy, which means that large chunks of the roof rain down on you as you exhale and the visibility is quickly reduced to zero,”

“This is not only a hazard when coming back out through the small restrictions but it also means that this section of the cave is particularly fragile and needs to be handled with a bit of tender love and care.”

On the day of her tragic accident, no one really knows what went wrong. She was believed to have left her buddy and never returned. Her fellow divers reported her missing and one of them was able to identify the area within the cave system where she was last seen.  Her body was found overnight about 600 meters inside the cave system.

On her website, Agnes says she is well aware of the risks she faces everytime she submerged into the dark subterranean world of cave diving.  And in a recent interview with a Polish radio station when asked if the death of a fellow diver scared her a little, she replied-

” I am not scared of diving. Anyone at any point can pass away. So you have to live your life as if tomorrow could be your last day. I love diving, I am passionate about it and I don’t think anything will stop me from doing it. Unfortunately there are risks; in every extreme sport there are dangers. It doesn’t always work out but you do everything possible to not only do that one dive, but to keep on diving over many years. That’s what it’s all about after all, longevity. You have to dive safely but live as if everyday is going to be your last.”

Sources:

Herald Sun

The Sunday Morning Herald (Smh.com.au)

agnesmilowka.com

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Related posts:

The Real Story Behind The Movie Sanctum

Sanctum: The Only Way out is Down

How does cavern and cave diving differ from one another

{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }

EDW April 6, 2011 at 1:28 pm

What a sad tragic loss for her family, and the diving community. We are in her debt for all she has done as a diver, and she will surely be missed.

Reply

Rosa April 13, 2011 at 11:24 am

so sad and tragic…a beautiful person full of life…goes to show you can never be too careful…she will be missed and always remembered….

Reply

Firecop527 April 13, 2011 at 12:13 pm

Such a sad story for the end to such a live loving girl – my sympathy to her family, friends and dive buddies.

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Aquaviews – Online SCUBA Magazine  /  Aqua News  /  Sanctum Stunt Diver Dies In A Real Life Cave Diving Tragedy

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