asscciation for mexican cave studies box 7672 ut station austin ...

17The Joya de Salas ... UnsolvedThe exploration of El Sotano de la Joya de Salas was be~un by AMCSmembers in 1965 - yet 12 years later the cave has still not been bottomed.The recent ~~CS success in Sotano de San Agustin encoura~es us to take aclose look at the Joya's possibilities.September, 1973: A group of six Canadian, En~llsh and Texas caversfailed to pass the rimstone barriers that stopped exploration at -1,234 feet.On the way out Peter Lord and Blake Harrison stopped to check a lead thatgoes back underneath the drop that is just below the Angostura de Linda.A narrow, but interestin~ passa~e, Peter pushed on throu~h a squeeze whileBlake stayed behind. The passage dropped steadily down climb-downs to apoint where Peter estimated that he was nearin~ the level of the deepestportion of the cave. Se was in a low water passage that ended in a rims tonedam that came to ~ithin about 8 inches from the ceiling. Beyond, Peterlooked into a large rift passage running at right angles to the passa~ehewas in a "T" junction. There were absolutely no rocks" to be found, butby splashing water over the dam Peter estimated it was about a 70 foot dropto the bottom of the rift. The dam is rotten flowstone and could quicklybe chipped away with ,a hammer.Joya de Salas drains over 100 km 2 of land area. Past the Sima Terrible(-300 ft level) the passa~e becomes constricted and finally sumps at -1234 ft.It seems unlikely that the whole volume of water entering the cave goes thisway. Perhaps the rift passa~e will put us back on the route to the resur~ence.~o cavers have been to the Joya since the CETENAL sheet came out. Thesenew maps now rule out the possibility of a resur~ence to the west, leavin~the ~acimiento del Rio Sabinas as the only likely outlet - 1,400 meters below.Also the map shows several unvisited dolinas 1.5 km S.E. of Joya that lookvery promising.Pe ter Sprouselathmus of TehuantepecDec. 27-Jan. 6Don Broussard and David Honea Investi~ated an uninhabited re~ion inthe State of Oaxaca, lyin~ northeast of Juchitan de Zara~oza," looking forcaves. The area was rumored to have limestone and some cave potential.A few caves were found but were mainly horizontal and did not seem veryprom1sin~. The only access is bv backpackin~ and the limestone area isat least ewo to three days hike from anv vehicular transportation.David Honea