Last minute Death

Today’s story is about an infamous caving incident, the reason for its infamy is largely because of a photo that was taken during the event.

On January 30th,1925.A 37 year old man named Floyd Collins walked through this huge forest in Central kentucky inside of a national park .as he walked along his boots splashed in the melting snow and mud on the ground and above him all he heard was the sound of water dripping down amongst the leaves. It was warmer than it had been in several days and so that was why Floyd was out here he was trying to take advantage of the nice weather and so after walking for a while on this muddy slushy Trail ,the trees around Floyd began to thin out and then eventually he reached the edge of the tree line and in front of him was this huge clearing.

Now in this clearing ,the trail he was on continued straight ahead but it came to a stop in front of this huge cavern-like opening in the side of a hill and so without hesitation, Floyd stepped out of the trees into the sunlight and he walked the rest of the trail right up to the opening of this Cavern and he stopped and just stared and smiled.

This cavern-like space on the side of this hill was the entrance to a cave known as sand cave and Floyd had spent the last week coming out to sand cave and exploring the different tunnels but today his plan was to go as deep and as far inside of this cave as he possibly could.

Caves were a huge tourist attraction in this region and Floyd was a very experienced caver who had been caving since he was six years old and he knew that most of sand cave had not been explored and so if he could go in there and explore all the different parts of the cave and map it all out and make sure it was safe it was sure to be a huge Money Maker, he could bring people here and lead them on guided tours.

Floyd left the muddy path he had been walking on and stepped foot inside of this grand entrance to sand cave . It is basically this 250 foot wide cathedral-like space inside of this hill with ceilings high enough you could stand but it's totally dark in there and despite being this big open space it very quickly funnels to this one kind of tunnel that goes straight down and connects to all these offshoot underground passageways many of which have never been explored before.

Floyd walked across this big open entryway he lit his oil lamp and then began mentally preparing himself for what he was about to do which was going to be very claustrophobia inducing even for a very experienced caver.

Floyd reached the back of this huge entryway and he reached this tunnel that would connect to the rest of the cave and he began walking down it and this tunnel was not very restricting you could stand in it ,you could move around in it but it was very short it was 15 feet straight down at an angle where at the bottom of those 15 feet was a square hole in the ground and Floyd having been here the previous week knew that once you go through this hole the real caving begins, where you are now going to be down on your hands and knees wriggling your way through these very tight and restricting air areas ,where you don't really know where you're going, because again a lot of this stuff has never been explored before, but this is why Floyd loved caving ,he loved the adventure and the risk of doing things like this and so Floyd got to this hole he put his oil lamp down on the ground he casually lowered himself feet first into this hole which dropped down several feet and then once he was on firm ground he reached up grabbed his oil lamp and pulled it into the hole with him ,once he was inside of this lower level space,he crouched down and looked around and off to his right was a tunnel that he could crawl through that seemed to lead to a series of other tunnels and so he puts his lamp in front of him he gets down and he begins crawling through this tunnel and after a little while he reaches this kind of fork in the road where he had several options of very narrow tunnels to choose from now.

The previous week Floyd had gone down several of these tunnels and mapped out where they went but there was one tunnel in particular at this Fork that was very narrow it was likely the most narrow of all the tunnels but from where he had seen the last week it looked like it went pretty far without obstruction and so he immediately began going head first into this tunnel where he had no idea where it was going to go.This guy is like totally Fearless just going head first into what most people would consider a nightmare scenario and so the way Floyd would approach these very tight tunnels is, he would put his oil lamp out in front of him and then he'd keep his hands over his head and he'd kind of wriggle his way head first and push his lamp along the way and so that's what he did. He began going into this really restrictive tunnel ,you know it's hard to breathe because the walls are so tight on his chest cavity but as he's going eventually the ceiling begins to slope upward just enough that he can pull himself up onto his hands and knees and kind of catch his breath,by this point Point Floyd was approximately 55 feet underground that's where this little pocket was where he could get up on his hands and knees and breathe and so from this position he still could see with this lamp that this tunnel continued to snake further and further down and his Hope was that eventually it would lead to a big underground chamber ,that was not just big enough to go to your hands and knees on, but was big enough you could stand and walk around,because those were the big tourist attractions .

Floyd knew from his past experience of going into other caves a lot of times those big underground Chambers are full of Native American artifacts and again that was a huge potential Money Maker for people like Floyd

Floyd eventually after catching his breath in this little spot got back down onto his stomach with his hands out in front of him with the lamp out ahead of his fingers and he began going deeper and deeper into this unexplored section of sand cave and as he inched along even though the ceiling remained very tight on top of him .he's totally compressed to the ground, the walls on either side of him began to expand which meant Floyd if he wanted to , could actually turn himself around although he couldn't stand up and so Floyd is making his way down this very low ceiling area when he notices his oil lamp is beginning to flicker which means it’s going to go out soon .

Floyd wasn't concerned about suddenly being in the darkness inside of a cave ,now to most people that would be terrifying but Floyd again was so experienced he was very confident that he could easily make his way out again just by touch he didn't need the light but he did know that trying to move around inside of a cave in the darkness was dangerous and so he decided he really needed to just turn around and go back to the surface and come back the next day.

he was able to turn himself around and drag his lamp until he was facing back and he began inching with his heels and pushing with his arms moving up the tunnel on his back and as he would move, he'd use his head and his hands to push the oil lamps back up the direction he was going and for a little while this system worked great but at some point right as he was getting close to that area where he was able to previously get on his hands and knees and catch his breath ,Floyd accidentally kind of rushed and pushed his lamp too hard and knocked it over which extinguished the light and so suddenly Floyd was cast into total darkness.

now again Floyd was not concerned or really even scared about being in darkness inside of this cave he told himself stay calm. so Floyd just continued to push the now extinguished oil lamp above his head and he continued to inch with his heels but then right before Floyd reached that pocket inside of the tunnel he heard the sound of Falling Rocks somewhere below him kind of near his legs now it's pitch black he can't see anything and so Floyd just kind of held his breath and hoped that whatever was happening wouldn't affect him .but then he felt a shooting pain in his left leg a 27 pound Rock had broken loose from the lowest ceiling and landed on his left ankle.at first Floyd was actually relieved that The Rock had landed only on his left ankle.

Floyd tensed his body and pulled his left leg as hard as he could, but his foot wouldn't budge and so he thought he would just reach down and kind of dig his feet out, he wasn't able to use his hands to clear this rock and so he is pinned underground but Floyd told himself to just stay calm , he knew people were certain to find out he was missing and they knew he had gone to sand cave and they would come.

so He just decided to wait and for an agonizing 30 hours.

finally he hears a voice coming from somewhere near the entrance ,the voice was that of his brother Homer who was also an experienced caver.

Homer was able to navigate from the entrance down all the way to the tunnel that Floyd was and hebegan feeding him sausage sandwiches and giving him sips of water and then Homer would tell him that he just did not have the equipment to help Floyd get out right now but he was going to go back to the surface get men ,get supplies and then come back and save him.

15 hours later Homer would return by himself and so at this point Floyd has been trapped for 45 hours and so he's laying there kind of in and out of Consciousness and he started chiseling at the rocks, the brothers chatted and also ate while homer worked.

After 8 long hours ,homer decided to go home and rest and come back with more men ,but over the course of the next 50 hours Floyd remained trapped inside of this tunnel with the rock pinning his leg and despite Homer and several other men getting down there and very diligently chipping away at this tunnel it just was not happening but at the 130 hour mark ,The Rescuers actually decided to start carving a brand new tunnel that would join up with the side of Floyd's tunnel. I mean this is an even bigger undertaking.

So now they have to build this brand new tunnel to Floyd and so finally on February 16 1925 ,so a staggering 17 days from the time he got first stuck in this cave the rescue team finally punched through and reached Floyd and as soon as they did ,the lead rescuer looked over at Floyd and then he paused ,he turned up and he just said dead”

It would turn out at some point over the next couple of days those rocks began to break free and Tumble down the cave and began striking Floyd until finally one or several of those rocks hit him in the head or chest and killed him.

Before that cave-in first happened a photographer took a picture of Floyd who at the time believed he was going to get out and all the rescuers believed they were going to get him out but shortly after this photo was taken the cave-in would happen

Floyd's body was eventually removed from Sand cave however instead of being buried because of the interest around this cave rescue that ultimately failed ,there was a decision made to actually put Floyd's body on display inside of another cave.

Floyd's body became a tourist attraction and it would remain a tourist attraction for decades ,until finally he was removed from that cave and given a proper burial.