The cave's Spanish name Sótano de las Golondrinas means Basement of the Swallows owing to the many birds which live in holes on the cave walls.
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| The Cave of Swallows - Mexico |
The Cave of Swallows, also called Cave of the Swallows (Spanish: Sótano de las Golondrinas), is an open air pit cave in the Municipality of Aquismón, San Luis Potosí, Mexico. The elliptical mouth, on a slope of karst, is 49 by 62 m wide and is undercut around all its perimeter, further widening to a room approximately 303 by 135 meters (994 by 442 ft) wide.The floor of the cave is a 333 meter (1092 ft) freefall drop from the lowest side of the opening, with a 370 meter (1,214 ft) drop from the highest side,making it the largest known cave shaft in the world, the second deepest pit in Mexico and perhaps the 11th deepest in the world. A skyscraper such as New York City's Chrysler Building could easily fit wholly within it.
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| Cave of Swallows Depth |
Temperatures in the cave are low. Vegetation grows thickly at the mouth, where rains can cause waterfalls cascading into the cave.The cave floor is covered with a thick layer of debris and guano on which "millipedes, insects, snakes, and scorpions" live. There is also a narrow sinkhole in a fault of lower Cretaceous limestone which goes down at least a further 512 m.
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| The Cave of Swallows |
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