John Edward Jones tragically suffered one of the most ‘horrifying deaths imaginable’ after he became trapped upside-down in iconic caves.
The 26-year-old ventured out to the Nutty Putt cave 15 years ago, little did he know it would be the last thing he’d ever do.
As the Mirror reports, his remains are still inside the cave to this day, and his tragic end has been made into a film.
The caves are located in the US state of Utah around 55 miles from Salt Lake City. Discovered in 1960, the caves was renowned for its narrow and winding passages. Although it was widely dubbed as a good ‘beginner cave’ for explorers. Different sections of the cave were labelled according to their difficulty.
The spot was popular among cavers and every year thousands of visitors made their way to the cave system to check it out for themselves. Among those was John and his brother Josh, who visited Nutty Putty in November 2009 alongside a group of friends.
Adventure lover, John, who had a passion for spelunking, chose to explore a section of the cave system known as ‘The Birth Canal’ alongside his brother. The challenging route included a long and narrow passageway which would eventually open up to a larger area. However as John ventured deeper into the cave he mistakenly took an uncharted section of the cave for an opening of the ‘birth canal’.
As he made his way deeper into the passageway John eventually came to a fissure in a rock, thinking it would give him space to turn around and return back. In doing so, it’s likely that he sucked in his chest in order to fit in the space which measured 10 by 18 inches.
However, in his misstep he became trapped upside down in the narrow passage. “Seeing his feet and seeing how swallowed he was by the rock, that’s when I knew it was serious,” his brother Josh told the St. Lake Tribune. “It was really serious.”
After discovering his sibling, Josh attempted to free John. Sadly he was unable to and raised the alarm to volunteers and professionals. Having heard about the incident, local rescue volunteer called Susie rushed to the scene and was the first person to arrive. After tying ropes to her feet, she was able to inch her way down the tunnel and first encounter John’s trapped body three hours after he came into difficulties.
For the next two hours, Susie attempted to free John from his position. But due to the narrowness of the cave as well as the tightness of the angle, getting his body out of the crevice proved difficult.
Over the following hours, other members of the rescue party and emergency services discussed how they could get John out of the cave. Eventually, the team began working on a pulley system and devised a plan to pull him to the surface using a system made of ropes and pulleys. However, it took time to put the system together. By the time the system was ready John had been upside down for hours.
Once up and running, the system appeared to be working and the team were able to start pulling John up. But as he slowly made his way up, tragedy struck when a pulley failed during the extrication process and John plunged back into the crevice.
More hours passed and John remained trapped within the cave system. Sadly the strain on his body became unbearable and he was pronounced dead one day after entering the cave – a heartbreaking tragedy for everyone.
Following his death, rescuers were forced to make a tough decision about how to proceed. Ultimately they decided that attempting to retrieve John’s body was too dangerous and, in consultation with the landowner and John’s family, the cave was permanently sealed with John’s body inside.
To do so, explosives were used to collapse the ceiling near where John’s body was. The entrance to the cave was also filled with concrete. In 2016, the film The Last Descent was released to shine light on the tragic incident and memorialise John’s memory. The movie was produced by James Halasima and had financial support from Josh James, CEO of Domo.
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