Rescuers search for 2 missing potholers in Spanish cave

Spanish police and rescue teams were searching on Monday for two potholers missing since Sunday morning in a 500-metre deep cave in northern Cantabria region.

As many as 38 rescuers including local police officers, rescue teams and volunteers were trying to find them, Francisco Javier Allende, a rescuer, said.

"We believe they may have taken a wrong turn and taken a secondary gallery, so we sent teams in there to find them," Miguel Gomez, another rescuer, told state TV station TVE.

The missing potholers, a man and a woman from central Spain, are experienced, Allende said, while stressing the dangers of the cave, known as Garmaciega-Sima del Sombrero and located in Soba, which has many underground rivers and low temperatures requiring specialised gear.

The rescuers are also working with the theory that the potholers could have left the cave during the night and become lost or experienced an accident in the area, which is wild, isolated and has no mobile phone coverage, Gomez said.

A military rescue team would enter the cave to inspect alternative routes, emergency services said.