Sopici Well Rescue: Man Freed From 13-Meter Shaft
Firefighters from Lazarevac pulled a man out of a 13-meter well in Sopici after he panicked from lack of air while repairing water pipes.
The Lazarevac Fire and Rescue Unit got the call about a man trapped in a well at 12:54 PM on September 19. Earlier that day, the man had climbed down a well 13 meters deep in the village of Sopici, just outside Lazarevac, to repair some water pipes.
Sopici is a village in the Lazarevac municipality, one of Belgrade’s city municipalities.
The space at the bottom of the well is narrow, and at some point while he was working, the man got stuck and could no longer move up or down on his own. The tight space and the shortage of air set off a panic. Witnesses who heard or saw him in distress called for help right away.
Five firefighters responded with one vehicle and reached Sopici in five minutes, a response time that, given the circumstances, mattered a great deal. When they arrived, they found the man at the very bottom of the well, conscious but pinned in place. Reaching him was, they determined, extremely difficult because of the well’s narrow, awkward shape.
Why did the first rescue attempt fail?
The initial plan called for lowering a firefighter in full protective gear with a self-contained breathing apparatus, the standard setup for enclosed spaces where air quality is a risk. That apparatus carries its own air tank on the firefighter’s back, independent of the air inside the space, but combined with the protective suit it makes the wearer considerably bulkier. The attempt did not work. The well’s diameter was too narrow for equipment of that size, and the rescuer in full gear simply could not fit through the opening to get to the bottom.
Rescuers changed tactics on the spot. They began continuously pumping fresh air down the well to keep the trapped man from suffocating while he waited at the bottom in a cramped space with poor airflow. Only after that did they send a firefighter down, secured by ropes instead of the bulky equipment that had failed to fit through the opening, all the way to the 13-meter depth.
The operation ended with the man pulled out safely. He reached the surface conscious and was handed straight to an Emergency Medical Service crew, which examined and treated him on site.
There is no official word yet on the man’s identity, his age, or whether he suffered any injuries. Authorities have also not said whether he was doing the pipe work alone or with help, nor who owns the well in Sopici.
The whole operation, from the initial call to the handover to the medical crew, went off without further complications. The turning point came when rescuers realized the standard equipment would not fit down the well and, rather than sticking with the original plan, quickly switched to pumping in air and lowering a rope-secured firefighter instead. That change in approach, based on what has been released about how the operation unfolded, is what let the rescue wrap up the same day it began.
The exact time between the initial call and the man’s extraction from the bottom of the well has not been made public down to the minute, but the sequence is clear: firefighters on site within five minutes, a failed first attempt with full gear, air pumped into the shaft, and only then a rope-secured firefighter lowered to the 13-meter depth. Each of those steps, as far as is known so far, ran without interruption until the man was safely delivered to the medical crew waiting above ground.
