Audrey Mestre
Audrey Mestre | |
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Born | 11 August 1974 Francisco Rodriguez aka. Francisco "Pipin" Ferreras 1999-2002 |
Audrey Mestre (11 August 1974 – 12 October 2002) was a French world record-setting
Early life
Mestre was born in Saint-Denis, Seine-Saint-Denis, to a family of snorkeling and scuba diving enthusiasts. She began swimming when she was a baby. She became a seasoned scuba diver by age thirteen but did not get full certification until her sixteenth birthday due to French law.[1] She was still in her teens when her family moved to Mexico City and, fluent in the Spanish language, she eventually studied marine biology at a university in La Paz, Mexico.
Relationship with Francisco "Pipín" Ferreras
In 1996 her interest in underwater sports led to her meeting
Death
In October 2002, Mestre died in an early attempt to break the 160 meters NLT (No Limit) free-diving AIDA International's world record that Tanya Streeter had established a few weeks before on August 17, 2002 (at that time this was both men and women's official AIDA record).
On October 4, 2002, with a dive team under her husband's supervision, she made a practice dive off
The dive was controversial and heavily criticized as the setup did not match common freediving safety standards. Much of the diving community's critique targeted her husband Ferreras, who had hurried an underfunded organization for this record attempt. The attempt had been previously planned for a later date, and had too few safety divers, not enough proper rescue equipment, and no doctors at sea or shore. Ferreras was in charge of Mestre's lift bag air tank and did not allow any members of the team to check that the tank had been filled. Mestre was not recovered to the surface until nine minutes into her dive. She had a pulse at the surface, but there were no medical doctors available to treat her and minutes were wasted with Ferreras attempting to resuscitate her in the water. A 2003 article, written by Gary Smith for Sports Illustrated, titled "Rapture of the Deep," chronicled the dramatic rise and ultimate tragedy of Mestre. An ESPN documentary film written and directed by Alison Ellwood in 2013 included video footage of the incident and interviews with crew members and staff.[5]
Awards and accolades
Audrey Mestre was cremated, her ashes scattered at sea. In 2002, she was inducted posthumously into the
In 2013, Mestre's life and career were chronicled in ESPN's No Limits as part of their Nine for IX series.[7]
Sources
- ^ "Audrey Mestre - World Champion Freediver".
- ^ "Audrey's last dive". YouTube. 2002. Archived from the original on 2021-12-22. Retrieved 2008-09-18.
- ^ "IAFD/McCoy Report on Audrey Mestre's Death". Deeperblue.com.
- ^ "The Last Attempt". Deeperblue.com.
- ^ "Nine for IX: 'No Limits'". ESPN.com. 14 February 2013.
- ^ "Member Roster". www.wdhof.org. Retrieved 19 June 2022.
- ^ Cingari, Jennifer (February 19, 2013). "ESPN Films and espnW Announce Nine for IX". Retrieved February 27, 2013.