Ancient skeleton found in Mexico cave threatened by train

A prehistoric human skeleton was found in a flooded cave system at the end of the last Ice Age 8,000 years ago, according to a cave-diving archaeologist on Mexico’s Caribbean coast.

Archaeologist Octavio del Rio said he and fellow diver Peter Bruger saw the smashed skull and skeleton partially covered in sediment in a cave near where the Mexican government plans to build a high-speed tourist train through the jungle.

Given the distance from the cave’s entrance, del Rio said, the skeleton couldn’t get there without modern diving equipment, so it must have been more than 8,000 years old, referring to the era when rising sea levels flooded the caves.

“That is. We don’t know if the body was deposited there or if that was where that person died,” Del Rio said. He said the skeleton was located about 8 meters (26 feet) underwater, about half a kilometer (a third of a mile) in the cave system.

Some of North America’s oldest human remains have been discovered in sewer caves known as “edifices” on the country’s Caribbean coast, and experts say some of these caves are threatened by the Mexican government’s Maya Trine tourism project.

Del Rio, who has worked with the National Institute of Anthropology and History on projects in the past, said he reported the discovery to the institute. The institute did not immediately respond to questions about whether it intended to explore the site.

But del Rio said Tuesday that institute archaeologist Carmen Rojas told him that the site is registered and will be investigated by the institute’s Holocene Archeology Project of the state of Quintana Roo.

He stressed that the cave – whose location has not been disclosed due to fear of looting or disturbance – was near where the government had cut a patch of bush to lay tracks for trains, and it could collapse, pollute or close. Through the construction and subsequent development project.

“There are a lot of studies that need to be done in order to properly interpret the find,” Del Rio said, noting that “dating and some sort of photographic study and some grouping” would be needed to determine the exact age of the skeleton.

Del Rio had been exploring the area for three decades, and in 2002, he co-discovered and cataloged the remains known as the Naharon Woman, who died around the same time, or possibly earlier, Nya—the nearly complete skeleton of a young woman who died about 13,000 years ago. It was discovered in a nearby cave system in 2007.

President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador is racing to finish the Maya train project in his remaining two years in office, despite the objections of environmentalists, cave divers and archaeologists. They say that his haste will allow a little time to study the ancient ruins.

Activists say the high-speed heavy rail project will fragment the coastal forest and will often stretch over fragile limestone caves, which could take decades to explore due to flooding, meandering and incredibly narrow.

Caves along part of the coast have already been damaged by construction over them, with cement trusses used to support the weight above.

The 950-mile (1,500-kilometre) Maya Train Line is supposed to run in a meandering loop around the Yucatan Peninsula, connecting beach resorts and archaeological sites.

The most controversial stretch stretches more than 68 miles (110 kilometers) through the forest between the resorts of Cancun and Tulum.

Del Rio said the route through the woods should be abandoned and the train should be built over the already affected coastal highway between Cancun and Tulum, as originally planned.

Lopez Obrador abandoned the motorway after hoteliers voiced objections, and cost and traffic disruptions became a concern.

“What we want is for them to change the route in this spot, because of the archaeological discoveries that have been made there, and their significance,” Del Rio said. “They should take the train from there and put it where they said they were going to build it before, on the highway… an area that was already damaged and destroyed.”