News just in from the British expedition to Sistema Huautla: The divers are back on the surface after a week spent camping on the far side of the two long sumps located at the bottom of the cave system. They found about 1.5 km of new passage and the Sump 9 dive ended up at approx 450m in at a depth of 80m. Everything is back through the sumps and a lot of gear (if not all by now) is either at Camp 3 or back at the 620m depot.
So, they added 80m in depth, which makes Sistema Huautla now 1,555m deep, the deepest cave in the Western Hemisphere again (which it hasn't been for about 20 years), and moves it up the list from world's 12th deepest cave to now the 8th. Bill Steele
