I will not lie... I didn't know who Sec. Jesse Robredo was... until his name started popping up from broadcast and printed news. Then I found out what happened. Three days ago, Robredo was riding a plane to Cebu when it crash landed in the sea near Masbate. There were four people on the plane: Robredo, his bodyguard, and two pilots.

The bodyguard managed to get out of the plane and come out alive, but the three others weren't found until deep sea divers from the Philippine Navy and foreign volunteer divers went on one of the largest search parties in Philippine history. For two days, they scouted the waters, until one of the German volunteer divers managed to find the remains of the Robredo's plane.

It was found lying belly-side up 180 feet below the water surface level with the nose almost buried down onto the sea bed. With 4 minutes remaining in their oxygen tanks, they managed to surface Robredo's body which was found in the passenger seat of the plane, but unbuckled. The two pilots were still trapped inside the cockpit.

It the middle of the rescue operation, one of the German volunteer divers experienced DECOMPRESSION SICKNESS. Knowing nothing about deep sea diving, I had to ask my good friend Google for help.

As always, Google referred me to my other good friend Wikipedia who always has an answer:

Decompression sickness (DCS; also known as divers' disease, the bends or caisson disease) describes a condition arising from dissolved gases coming out of solution into bubbles inside the body on depressurisation.

So if I understood it correctly, it's when you rise up to the water surface too fast after diving too deep and the pressure on the body gets released too fast.

That was when I was really touched. These divers were VOLUNTEERS... and they decided to help Filipinos find a highly-respected person in their country. They, together with the trained divers of the Philippine Navy, worked together to try to get the pilots out of the plane.

It's sad really. There are a lot of heroes from more than almost 500 years ago who are still known until today. But there are heroes in the country everyday and almost none of them are remembered or recognized.

Given this, I salute these heroes who risked their lives to find the body of another hero, who fell after doing his duty for the country.

You have my utmost respects. *salutes*