Hundreds of tonnes of stone have collapsed from Kelsey Head and smothered the entrance to Holywell Cave at Holywell Bay in the Holywell Cave collapse. The fall has left the cave buried where visitors once entered for sacred spring water and, according to the information available, it may not be lit again for a generation or more.
The size of the rockfall matters because it is not a scrape along the edge of the site. It is a mass of stone that has covered the opening itself, and that raises two possibilities at once: the cave may have been crushed underneath, or the collapse may have sealed and sheltered what remains inside.
Holywell Cave at Holywell Bay
For centuries, people made pilgrimages to Holywell Cave at Holywell Bay to cure their ailments with sacred spring water. The water drips down into the holy well at the top of the cave and then moves through a series of calcareous basins, while the mineral walls show bright green, red and yellow when lit.
Holywell Cave is also known as St Cuthbert's Cave. That makes the loss more than a simple access issue: the place people went to see is the same place that has now been buried at the entrance by the collapse from Kelsey Head.
Photos from Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club
Photos from Holywell Bay Surf Life Saving Club show the scene before and after the rockfall. They provide the clearest record of the change at the site and show how completely the entrance has been smothered by the stone.
Those images also help explain why the story is not just about a fallen cliff. The change at Holywell Cave could keep it dark for a generation or more, yet the same burial may also protect the interior if the collapse did not destroy it outright.
Whether Holywell Cave can reopen
Whether Holywell Cave can be safely accessed or restored after the collapse is not answered in the available information. What is clear is that the entrance has been buried, the lighting may not return for a generation, and anyone who visited the cave for its lit interior now faces a site that has changed at its threshold.
