MEXICO CITY (AP) 鈥� A prehistoric skeleton has been found in an intricate along Mexico鈥檚 Caribbean coast, an area that flooded at the end of the last ice age 8,000 years ago, according to a cave-diving archaeologist who made the find with others.
Octavio del R铆o, who collaborates with the National Institute of Anthropology and History, said it is the over the last three decades between the tourist destinations of Tulum and Playa del Carmen. Some of the oldest human remains in North America have been discovered in the known as 鈥渃enotes,鈥� with some earlier skeletons dating to around 13,000 years ago.
Del R铆o told The Associated Press this week that the skeleton was found in a flooded cave about 26 feet (8 meters) below the surface after swimming about 656 feet (200 meters) through the cave. Archaeologist recovered the skeleton in late 2025, and it is now being analyzed.
But 鈥渨ith the distance (from the cave entrance) and the depth 鈥� it could not have gotten there at any other time than when the cave was dry, at least 8,000 years ago,鈥� he said. Even now, only expert divers with specialized equipment can access and work in those caves.
The skeleton was on a dune of sediments in a narrower part of an interior chamber, which 鈥渟uggests that it was a funereal deposit where the body was placed intentionally, perhaps as part of a ritual practice,鈥� Del R铆o said.
Even after three decades of making such discoveries, Del R铆o said his pulse quickened. 鈥淵ou can shout even under water,鈥� he said smiling.
Del R铆o said you start picturing the cave, imagining how this person came to be there, thinking about the context.
Luis Alberto Martos, director of archaeological studies at the National Institute of Anthropology and History, said the new find will help to understand how these people arrived at Mexico鈥檚 Yucat谩n Peninsula, which then was a plain with cliffs, not jungle and beaches like now, and how they used the caves.
DNA data support more and more the idea that some arrived from Asia along a land bridge that today is the Bering Strait, though there are also some clues suggesting another route from South America.
鈥淭he puzzle of Yucatan prehistory is becoming better understood,鈥� he said
The hundreds of miles of underwater rivers and cave systems below the Caribbean coast was under former President Andr茅s Manuel L贸pez Obrador. The government cut down swaths of jungle and drove support columns down into the caves to build the tourist train.
Del R铆o, who was one of that project鈥檚 most outspoken critics, said that now Mexican authorities are working to try to designate the entire zone as a national protected area.
Mexico鈥檚 Environmental Ministry confirmed to the AP that the goal is to achieve that designation in 2026.
Ecologists have been trying to protect the delicate caves for years as development and pollution increasingly threaten the underwater waterways.
Besides the area鈥檚 natural value and importance, Martos said the National Institute of Anthropology and History has argued that it should also be protected on the grounds of cultural heritage. That’s because the caves have shown themselves to be 鈥渁rchaeological windows,鈥� also offering up more modern finds like a small cannon and 19th-century rifles, he said.
Divers who are passionate about exploring the flooded caves continue to find fossils, researchers said, although archaeologists have not yet been able to begin recovering them.
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