Maya - Divers Discover World's Largest Underwater Cave System Filled With Mayan Mysteries

Divers discover

world's largest underwater

cave system

filled with Mayan mysteries
Researchers in Mexico discover
the longest underwater cave system
in the world that's full of invaluable artifacts.

PAUL RATNER

21 January, 2018

Divers of the GAM project. Credit: Herbert Meyrl.



Mexican scientists discovered the world’s largest flooded
cave system that extends an amazing 216 miles (347 km)
and is filled with artifacts.

The maze of caves is a major archaeological find that promises
to shed light on the mysteries of the Mayan civilization.

Underwater archaeologist Guillermo de Anda
of Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History
led the Great Maya Aquifer Project (GAM),
which has been exploring underwater caves on the Caribbean coastline
of the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico for decades.

The region has 358 freshwater flooded cave systems
that stretch for over 870 miles (1,400km).

De Anda explained that their accomplishment has wide-ranging significance:

"This immense cave represents the most important submerged archaeological site in the world," said de Anda. ”

It has more than a hundred archaeological contexts,
among which are evidence of the first settlers of America,
as well as extinct fauna and, of course, the Maya culture."​

The current research effort took 10 months
and proved that two caves systems

• the Sac Actun System and the Dos Ojos caves
• are actually part of one continuous
• and, certainly gigantic, cavity in the Earth.

Inside the cave system. Credit: GAM
GAM exploration director Robert Schmittner
told the Mexican newspaper El Pais
how the research team came close a number of times
to proving the connection between the two giant cave systems.

"It was like trying to follow the veins within a body,” said Schmittner. “

It was a labyrinth of paths that sometimes
came together and sometimes separated.
We had to be very careful." ​

Now that the researchers showed that the two cave mazes
are linked, they think another three underwater cave systems
can be added to what is already the longest cave labyrinth in the world.



Diver inside the underwater caves. Credit: GAM
The impressive caves present an invaluable scientific loot,
with divers finding a large amount of Mayan artifacts
like ceramics, remains
(including those of early humans, giant sloths and tigers)
and extinct fauna.

De Anda called the caves a ”tunnel of time
that transports you to a place 10,000 to 12,000 years ago."

Check out this video about the find, which has some great footage:
https://bigthink.com/paul-ratner/wo...filled-with-maya-secrets-discovered-in-mexico