Severe Drought causes sixteenth century church to emerge

Droughts are are never really associated with anything very positive, in fact quite the opposite, famine, poverty and misery are often results of areas that are lacking rainfall. Sometimes people will often refer to a very unfulfilling part of their life as having a “dry spell” needless to say nothing really good can come out of a drought. Unless of course you are along the Grijalva river in Chiapas, Mexico.

Chiapas has recently been enduring one of the worst droughts in their region, causing the main water reserve, the Nezahualcoyotl reservoir, to take quite a hit, dropping about 82 feet from average water levels. There is a small upside to this that locals as well as historians are pretty stoked about, and that is the re-emerging of the Mexican Temple of Santiago.

The temple was originally built in the mid-sixteenth century by Friar Bartolome de la Casas and his team of monks. According to architect Carlos Navarete, who worked with Mexican authorities on his research about the structure. They arrived with a group of Spanish settlers but soon after, plagues swept the region rendering the church abandoned between 1773 to 1776. This was not much of a surprise as wide spread epidemics were plaguing the Americas around the end of the 1500’s, a result of settlers and traders flooding the area and bringing a slew of diseases and bacteria with them.

This is the second time drought levels have dropped so low revealing the ancient temple. The first being in 2002, with water levels so low enabling visitors to walk around in the ruin. According to AP, Leonel Mendoza, a local fishing man recounted “The people celebrated. They came to eat, to hang out, to do business. I sold them fried fish. They did processions around the church.”

Source and Images: Associated Press

Originally published at interestingengineering.com on October 20, 2015.