As a former Navy EOD diver and demolition specialist, when there's a specific job for

ordinance disposal, I'm one of a handful of people called on.

Fourteen years in the service, mostly underwater clearance and ordnance disposal in the

Gulf and the Horn of Africa.

I got out after a bad dive that took two of my teammates

and left me with nightmares that still wake me,

tasting salt water and diesel.

These days, I take private clearance contracts,

ugly, isolated jobs that most people won't touch,

the kind where they send one man because it's

cheaper than sending a team. I've been doing it for three years now, telling myself it's temporary.

The contract came from a European Preservation Foundation working with the Estonian

government, an abandoned 18th century monastery on the Baltic coast

that the Soviets turned into a coastal defense bunker during the Cold War.

Half the structure is flooded now, slowly sinking back into the sea.

My job was straightforward on paper.

Complete the final inventory of all remaining equipment and hazardous materials,

conduct a structural assessment of the flooded levels,

and carry out controlled demolition of the critical, unstable sections

so the site can be declared condemned.

Ten days alone on a remote, half-submerged rock, with nothing but stone, seawater, and

my own head for company.

...