Brooklyn Man Wedged in Upstate New York Cave Is Rescued After 6 Hours

Source: New York Times

Brooklyn Man Wedged in Upstate New York Cave Is Rescued After 6 Hours

A cave explorer got stuck in a narrow crevice and developed hypothermia. Rescuers brought him miniature Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups to keep his energy up.


Rescuers helping a stuck cave explorer who is wearing a white helmet.
Rescuers on Sunday helped a cave explorer who was stuck in a subterranean passageway at Merlins Cave in Canaan, N.Y. Greg Moore

By Evan Gorelick
May 23, 2026, 3:36 p.m. ET

A group of spelunkers on Sunday was about 400 feet deep in an upstate New York cave when one of them, a Brooklyn man who was belly-crawling through a precarious stretch known as the bear trap, plunged into a crevice and was pinned for six hours, the authorities said.

Three friends tried to free him by chipping away at the rock with a hammer. But that didn’t work, and after a few hours, they all began to develop hypothermia, said Lt. John Gullen, a forest ranger with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, who led the rescue mission.

It took rescuers, including members of the Albany-Schoharie Cave Rescue Team, another three hours and a rock drill to free the man from the passageway, which is part of Merlins Cave in Canaan, N.Y., about 30 miles southeast of Albany.

The man was treated for hypothermia but was otherwise unharmed.

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The boot of the trapped cave explorer.

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https://www.nytimes.com/by/evan-gorelick

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/23/nyregion/merlin-cave-rescue-new-york.html