On January 8, 2005, Australian cave diver Dave Shaw descended 270 meters (886 feet) into the Boesmansgat cave in South Africa. His mission was to recover the body of Deon Dreyer, a diver who had blacked out and vanished in the silt ten years earlier. When Shaw reached the bottom, a horrific struggle began. As he tried to place the remains into a body bag, the corpse—which had turned into a soap-like substance called adipocere—unexpectedly floated upwards. The body’s movement caused the guide lin