11 July 2018 01:40 pm
According to a mother of one of the boys, the team was meditating in the widely shared video of their discovery by two British divers.
“Look at how calm they were sitting there waiting. No one was crying or anything. It was astonishing,” she told the Associated Press.
The coach who was rescued from the cave on Tuesday, trained as a Buddhist monk for 12 years before he decided to coach the Wild Boars soccer team.
“He could meditate up to an hour,” said his aunt, Tham Chanthawong. “It has definitely helped him and probably helps the boys to stay calm.”
The coach and 12 school boys became trapped in the Tham Luang Cave complex after it flooded on June 23.
The team was then left trapped in the cave for more than two weeks before they were led to safety by rescue divers.
A rescue mission to save the boys ended on Tuesday after all twelve of the football team and their coach were successfully freed from the cave.