An international team of divers has found the bodies of the missing Italian divers who disappeared while diving in an underwater cave in the Maldives last week. All have been located, and their bodies will be brought up within the next few days.
On 18 May 2026, officials from the Maldives and Italy revealed that an international dive team had found the bodies of four Italians who drowned in an underwater cave last week. Along with one body found earlier, this means all the missing divers have now been accounted for.
The discovery came four days after the group of five Italian divers failed to resurface from a dive in the Maldives, Indian Ocean, on Thursday, 14 May. However, none of the bodies have yet been recovered.
The first diver’s body was found on the day of the incident, but search operations were temporarily halted on Saturday, 17 May, after Mohamed Mahudi, a rescue officer with the Maldives National Defence Force (MNDF), died from decompression sickness complications while participating in the search.
Search efforts resumed on Monday with support from teams from Italy, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Additionally, three Finnish experts from the Divers Alert Network (DAN), an international diving safety organization, joined the mission.
“The bodies of the four missing divers have been located inside a cave near the Vaavu Atoll coral island during the joint search and rescue operation,” the MNDF said in a statement, adding that officials would begin diving to recover the bodies within a few days.
Mohamed Hussein Sharif, the government’s chief spokesperson, told AFP that the four bodies were found in a cave larger and deeper than initially expected.
“They were found together in the third section of the cave, which is much larger than we first estimated,” Sharif said. “The plan is to recover two bodies tomorrow and the remaining two the day after.”
The cave is located at a depth of about 60 meters, whereas tourists visiting this popular dive site are normally allowed to dive no deeper than 30 meters.
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Source:cna