On January 6 around 8 a.m., Xavier Meniscus, 55, an extreme diver, hit one of the bottoms of Font-Extramar, a sandbank at minus 312 m, after 18 minutes of descent, setting a new record of the world in cave diving (
caving
).
He descended following the cables that he himself had placed up to 286 m during six successive explorations since 2013, discovering the passages to descend himself.
Then relying on the breadcrumbs laid last December up to 300 m by Marseillais Frédéric Swierczynski, author of the previous record at minus 308 m.
“At 312 m, we do not touch the bottom of this drowned chasm.
In front of me, there is still a gallery which flattens out and which goes even deeper,” says Xavier Meniscus who had taken on board analysis probes for the University of Aix-en-Provence.
He joins the very closed world circle of nine autonomous divers to have crossed the 300 m barrier, including only two underground: himself and Swierczynski.
“35 years of experience as a professional diver”
“To get to this point, it’s 35 years of experience as a professional diver and 25 years of sport diving.
At this depth, you have to master everything, have all the experiences in mind to overcome the difficulties that present themselves,” explains Xavier Meniscus, confronted this January 6 with an inner ear problem during the ascent to minus sixty meters… A situation that could have cost him dearly.
“I took the necessary steps to restore the situation,” he breathes.
Because this type of accident was all in my head.
It took me an hour.
Everything ended well.
»
Xavier Meniscus spends his life underwater, in working box dives to a depth of 300 m in the Gulf of Guinea for oil exploitation, or in France for inspections of dams or precious fresh water reserves. .
“My childhood was rocked by the exploits of Commander Cousteau on Sunday TV.
Cousteau himself came to dive at Font-Extramar, like Haroun Tazieff, immense explorers,” continues the Drômois, trained in diving in the 1980s in the 13th Engineer Regiment based in Trier (French Forces in Germany) after four years of sport-study of swimming in Font-Romeu then in Toulouse.
Before embarking on this career as a professional diver, notably at Comex.
“I promised those around me that I would not go deeper”
“Xavier is an exceptional diver, very experienced, with an extraordinary mentality.
He masters everything and carefully prepares his explorations,” analyzes Henri Benedittini, the former director of Sdis de l’Aude and boss of this expedition bringing together eleven experienced volunteer divers, who arrived with their own equipment and at their own expense, just for the pleasure of facilitate the feat of Xavier Meniscus, who is capable of extreme dives with around thirty hours of oxygen capacity thanks to safe and ultra-efficient rebreathers of in-house design.
“My neighbor, Frédéric Badier, is both a diver and an engineer.
He developed them in his garage to fix oxygen and enrich the air we breathe with oxygen,” explains the new world record holder, who has just realized his lifelong dream: going below the 300 mark. m independently.
He is preparing a series of conferences to give around the world.
“I promised those around me who remained in Valence
(Mireille his partner, Nicole his mother)
that I would not go any deeper,” he finally confides.
Thus allowing the combination, for the future, of legitimate pride and serenity.