8MB PDF - Association for Mexican Cave Studies

eakdown collapse and a 2~meter pit. Aspart of the group surveyed from there backto their previous station, Serge and theLittle Swiss went ahead down the 20-meterpit. Eventually they came to a deep dropof nearly 140 meters. To avoid the water,multiple rebelays were necessary. A futuretrip saw Serge, Georges, and Richard returnto the 140-meter pit. Beyond the bottom ofthe pit they encountered numerous drops andwaterfalls. They had a difficult timenegotiating the drops without getting wet,and the wind in the passage alwaysthreatened to extinguish their carbidelamps. The passage eventually became verymuddy and then intersected a larger streampassage. They followed the new stream downa series of small drops for 150 meters to asump at a depth of 700 meters. Beforeretreating to the surface they looked atsome high leads back up the passage, butthey were iUlpossible to get into since itwas so muddy. They also mapped 150 metersupstream to a dome and a pit. They took abath in a waterfall and headed out.Another group returned to the 25-meterpit Serge had discovered in the fissurenetwork. They found an alternate routedown to the bottom and explored downstream.The large passage soon turned into acrawlway with lots of sharp formations.They intersected a large cubical room withdimensions of 30 by 30 meters, but acrawlway led out of this room. Theyfollowed it for about 150 meters. Itcontinues with some airflow.The same day another team surveyed thelarge hall, took photos, and discovered avery large pit-passage in the lower sectionof the room. That re-fired interest in thecave and a team returned later to exploreit. They discovered that it connected intoknown cave at the -350 level above the 140­meter pit.About 4 kilometers of passage wasdiscovered in Aztotempa. The depth of -700meters was the deepest point reached by theexpedition. The potential for morediscoveries is great. Two downstream leadsremain, one at the ceiling at the -670­meter level, the other in a passage atabout -250 meters, and there are fourupstream leads. All of the leads hadperceptible airflow.Expedition Members: Patrick Bestgen, MarcBirchen, Serge Delaby, Michel Dupuis,Georges Feller, Richard Grebeude, FrancoisGUinand, Jean-elaude Hans, Philippe Hubert,Jocelyn Kirsch, Jean-Claude London,Francois Saussus, Rene-Marc Thirion, ManuelTries, Francois Vivier, PatrickVanstraelen.BXPEDICION BELGICA 1985El expedicion 1985 a Puebla descubrio un total de 35 kilometros depasajes en varias cuevas. La·s dos mas importantes son Coyalatl y Aztotempa.Coyalatl es una resurgencia cerca de Tlacotepec de Diaz con una longitud de 19kilometros y una altura arriba de la entrada de 240 metros. Aztotempa, 10calizada a los 1400 metros a1trua snm, tiene 4 kilometros de pasajes, yterminaron a -700 metros de profundidad en un sifon. Tambien exploraronmuchos sotanos profundos y cuevas chicas.58