Diving

Maldives, specialised underwater recovery team arrives on Sunday

One of the divers searching for the bodies of the Italians died. The Maldives Ministry of Tourism has indefinitely suspended the operating licence of the 'MV Duke of York'

16 May 2026

Errore umano e gas nelle bombole, le ipotesi dietro la tragedia alle Maldive

5' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

Key points

Cases still under investigation
"The weather was fine, suitable for a dive"
Every year in the Maldives seven people die while diving or snorkelling

5' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

Maldivian media report that the Maldives Armed Forces diver who had dived this morning to search for the bodies of the four Italians is dead. The diver had been transferred to hospital in critical condition. 'Staff Sergeant Mohamed Mahadi of the Mndf, who fell ill today while diving during the search and rescue operation to find the four missing divers, has passed away,' the Maldivian military wrote on X.

The man died after being hospitalised for decompression sickness, the problem that can affect divers when they ascend to the surface too quickly after a dive. Decompression sickness is caused by pressure changes: during diving, nitrogen accumulates in the blood and tissues, but if the ascent is too fast, the gas forms bubbles in the body. These can cause pain, paralysis, neurological problems and, in severe cases, be fatal.

Meanwhile, the Finnish team specialised in underwater recoveries will arrive in the Maldives tomorrow. This was reported to ANSA by Antonello Riccio, a lawyer who, together with his colleague Gianluigi Dell'Acqua, is assisting the family of the 30-year-old man from Omegna (Verbano-Cusio-Ossola) who died while diving in the Maldives. "We have learned from the Colombo embassy, which has been in direct contact with the Gualtieri family," says Riccio, "that a highly specialised team sent in collaboration with Dan Europe, the insurance company specialised in diving activities with which Federico himself also had an insurance policy, will arrive on site tomorrow.

Maldives presidential spokesman Mohammed Hussain Shareef said that rescuers, engaged in the recovery of the four Italians, have drawn up a plan based on the progress made yesterday in exploring the cave. According to Shareef's report, echoed by Ap on the site, two Italians, a deep water rescue expert and a cave diving expert, are expected to join the recovery operations

In the waters of the Vaavu atoll in the Maldives, recovery operations are underway for our compatriots who died on 14 May as a result of an accident during an underwater dive to explore a cave at a depth of about 45 metres. Cave with a mouth length of about 15 metres and a length of 60 metres.

Le grotte di Alimathà

Nell’atollo di Vaavu situato a 64 km dalla capitale Malé, 90 minuti in motoscafo

fonte localizzazione: Google maps

The search involves the bodies of four divers: Monica Montefalcone with her daughter Giorgia Sommacal, Muriel Oddenino and Federico Gualtieri. In the hours following the accident, the body of a fifth participant in the dive was recovered: Padovan Gianluca Benedetti.

This was reported by the Maldives National Defence Force, according to which Benedetti's body was recovered lifeless at 6.13pm local time (3.13pm in Italy) by divers engaged in search operations. The body was then transferred to the Fulidhoo health centre in the Vaavu atoll.

The five Italian tourists were travelling on board the Duke of York, an underwater cruise boat belonging to the Luxury Yacht Maldives company. The Maldivian government suspended the ship's licence for them to dive indefinitely to facilitate operations and due to the severity of the accident, the deadliest in the history of the Maldives.

Sub italiani morti alle Maldive, esploravano grotta a 60 metri di profondità

On board the boat 'Duke of York', which carried the compatriots, were also 20 other Italians, who participated in the expedition and are well and undergoing psychological support.

Causes still being investigated

The Ambassador of Italia in Colombo (Sri Lanka), responsible for the Maldives, is in Malè.

The local authorities have confirmed the opening of an investigation to clarify the causes of the accident, but no official version of the circumstances of the death of the five Italians has yet been released.

"Descending to those depths breathing air can lead to so-called nitrogen narcosis, which reduces lucidity, dexterity, and cognitive skills necessary to properly manage the dive". Dr Chiara Ferri, Medical Director of Dan Europe, commenting on the diving accident, told LaPresse.

The specialist pointed out that the environmental context would be particularly insidious. "We are talking about caves and environments with a strong presence of sandy sediment. It takes very little to completely lose visibility and no longer be able to identify the point of entry or exit".

Among the hypotheses being considered is that the group may have been disoriented inside the cave. "If one of the divers had fallen ill, or if the group had lost their bearings in an unfamiliar environment, the uplifting of the sediment could have further aggravated the situation," he explained, pointing out, however, that these are only hypotheses at the moment.

On the other hand, the expert considers the trail of contamination of the cylinders to be less likely. "It is not the hypothesis that I personally consider the most plausible," she said, adding that even oxygen toxicity "would not seem to be compatible with the hypothesised depth parameters".

The Mission

They were in the Maldives for research on behalf of Unige, a trip that the University of Genoa organises every year, researcher Monica Montefalcone and research fellow Muriel Oddenino, two of the victims of yesterday afternoon's massacre.

Also with them, in a personal capacity, were the other three victims, Giorgia Sommacal, daughter of Montefalcone, Gianluca Benedetti and Federico Gualtieri.

Also present in the Maldives, as part of a different research mission, is Unige professor Stefano Vanin, who did not dive.

According to information, Unige's mission did not include diving activities, but only snorkelling. On the boat from which the victims dived were other students from the University of Genoa.

Each year in the Maldives seven people die while diving or snorkelling

Local authorities in the Maldives said that the one to the five Italians is the worst single diving accident in the nation of 1,192 tiny coral islands scattered some 800 kilometres straddling the equator in the Indian Ocean.

In December 2025, a British tourist died during a dive, and her husband, a 71-year-old man wracked with grief, died a few days later of an illness.

A 26-year-old Japanese tourist disappeared after scuba diving near the capital in June 2025.

According to local media reports, over the past six years at least 112 tourists have died in marine accidents in the archipelago, of which 42 died in diving or snorkelling accidents.

Diving Maldives: at that depth every problem can become unmanageable

"I know that cave, it goes down to 65 metres. It is a complex dive and in these daysthe passage of the monsoon with strong currents, also accomplice to the long wave, may have affected it further. At that depth every problem becomes difficult to manage, all it takes is for one of the participants to have a moment of panic to drag the others down".

Roberto Fragasso is an experienced diver who has lived in the Maldives for more than 30 years, where he runs the 'Sinai Dive Club' and every day accompanies tourists to the seabed of the atolls: 'Diving at those depths is in any case forbidden by the Maldives, which have imposed a categorical limit of 30 metres of descent'. As a first hypothesis, he also mentions nitrogen narcosis, also citing the monsoon period, with cloudy skies affecting the visibility of the waters, which are very murky.