Charles Fromen said:
>I heard on the Televisa News tonight that the French Cavers are to be fined
>$500 pesos (I suppose each) for caving in Mexico with a Tourist Visa. They
>needed a Visa for scientific research?
They shouldn't have needed a scientific (FM3) visa since they were only
sport caving. That was supposedly all sorted out a couple of years ago. One
of the Mexican news articles that David Locklear posted
<http://www.terra.com.mx/articulo.aspx?articuloId=545844> went to great lengths
to stress that they were only sport caving and not doing research. It'll be
too bad if this whole caving-is-automatically-scientific-research thing rears
its head again. :-(
>The Mexican Cavers seemed to have done a good job getting the French Caver out
>he was 186 meters down where he broke his foot.
According to the information we have been getting, including from Antonio
Aguirre Alvarez of ERM and Yvonne Droms from the Belgians, the accident
happened at more like -400 meters, but they were able to get Arthur to about
-250 m on their own. In addition to his foot, he also had broken leg bones and
a damaged knee on the other leg. With neither leg good, it's amazing that he
managed to get that far without a formal rescue. We have also confirmed that
Arthur is a dual citizen, so it is correct to refer to him as either Belgian or
French.
Mark Minton
