Salkantay expedition - high altitude diving in the Machu Picchu area - photo report

Underwater archaeology is a rapidly growing field of knowledge that allows researchers to access artefacts hidden in places inaccessible to mere mortals and to conduct research on sites cut off from human influence and thus well preserved.

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Specialists in this field are consistently pushing the horizons of underwater research into new areas of human cognition. Some time ago, underwater archaeologists already reached flooded caves, and underwater cave archaeology, though still elitist and arousing emotions with the class of finds discovered, does not surprise anyone anymore. Thanks to the scientists from the University of Warsaw, the next area of research – high altitude underwater archaeology – has come.

The SALKANTAY 2016 archaeological expedition aimed at field and underwater prospecting of selected high-altitude reservoirs located in the Peruvian Andes, near the Inka Trail – the former transportation route of Tawantinsuyo, the Inca empire.

In the first season of the 2016 study, three Andean lakes located in the area of the famous archaeological site of Machu Picchu were selected as targets: the Humantay lagoon, located in the shadow of Mount Humantay (5473 m), and the Salkantay and Incachiriasca lagoons located in the shadow of Mount Salkantay (6271 m), the highest peak in the Eastern Cordillera (Cordillera de Vilcabamba).

The SALKANTAY expedition collected bathymetric data of four Andean lakes, Humantay (4270m), Salkantay (4467m), Incachiriasca (4735m) and a small lagoon located near Incachiriasca at 4750m, using echo sounder and sonar, as part of the research carried out during the 2016 season. Water samples were also taken. The field prospecting revealed ample evidence of pre-Columbian and even Pre-Inca history in the Humantay lagoon area.

This is where a series of dives was carried out in order to try and find possible larger objects connected with Inca sacrifices and to verify in the field the methodology of high altitude diving, procedures and equipment, which was prepared for the team of archaeologists from the University of Warsaw by Jacek Kot, MD, PhD, from the National Centre for Hyperbaric Medicine in Gdynia (KOMH) and IANTD instructor Przemek Trześniowski from the ALPHA-DIVERS diving club.

High altitude diving requires divers to have specific skills such as perfect trim and maintaining a precise ascent rate, associated with moving the limit of twice the pressure difference between water and surface to a much shallower depth. The maximum allowable ascent speed is significantly reduced and decompression stops must be made at shallower depths.

At high altitudes, it is also impossible to rely on standard electronic measuring devices such as dive computers and digitizers, which may give false depths and thus also incorrectly approximate tissue saturation and desaturation processes. Hence the need for specific equipment and special procedures.

High altitude diving primarily requires divers to acclimatise for long periods of time at the altitude of a given body of water, where the partial pressure of oxygen in the surrounding atmosphere is hypoxic (below the limit of fainting). This, together with the difficult conditions in the Andes, such as strenuous approaches to reservoirs, the variability of weather conditions and low temperatures at night, are the main factors complicating diving at altitude.

Transporting the equipment necessary for diving to high altitudes and hard-to-reach places is also quite a problem. The SALKANTAY expedition was accompanied by 10 mules and a team of mule drivers.

As part of the 2016 underwater research season, dives in the Humantay lagoon at an altitude of 4270m were carried out by Magdalena Nowakowska (Institute of Archaeology UW), Maciej Sobczyk (Centre for Pre-Columbian Studies UW) and Przemek Trześniowski (ALPHA-DIVERS).

The SALKANTAY 2016 expedition was the first part of a multi-season programme of research on Andean lakes, led by Maciej Sobczyk (OBP UW) as part of a broader initiative to explore the satellite sites of Machu Picchu by Prof. Mariusz Ziolkowski (OBP UW). More lakes are planned for the 2017 season.

Source: alpha-divers.co.uk