June Quarterly Meeting

SAVE THE DATE – June 01, 2024
Headliners Club
221 W 6th St, Austin, TX 78701

 

Greetings Fellow Texas Chapter Explorers,

Please save Saturday, June 1st for our next Explorers Club quarterly meeting. It will be held at the Headliners Club in Austin, starting at 6:00 pm for cocktails followed by dinner and a program at 7 pm.

We have had incredible presenters over the past year and I appreciate your support in attending the events. For the next few meetings, I would like to highlight the incredible accomplishments of some of our own Texas Chapter members.

For our June 1st quarterly meeting, our featured speaker will be Texas Chapter member, Bill Steele FE’79.

Exploring the Longest Cave in Texas and the Deepest Cave in the Western Hemisphere

William “Bill” Steele FE’79

Former Texas Chapter chair Bill Steele gives leadership to the ongoing exploration, mapping, and study of the longest cave in Texas, 

Honey Creek Cave, an underground tributary of the Guadalupe River. But the big project of his life is the exploration, mapping, study of, and publishing about Sistema Huautla, located in the Southern Mexico state of Oaxaca, the deepest cave in the Western Hemisphere, 9th deepest known cave in the world, and the 28th longest of all the tens of thousands.

Bill led a flag expedition to Sistema Huautla for six weeks in March and April of this year. It was the 13th Explorers Club flag expedition to this vast cave system, said by the cave experts who have ventured there to be the “world’s most magnificent cave”. In all, Bill Steele has led or participated in 24 flag expeditions since his first one in 1980.  

He joined The Explorers Club as a Fellow member in 1979 at age 30. He retired in 2014 as a national-level director of the Boy Scouts of America. He was one of the creators of their Exploration merit badge, which has been earned by over 20,000 boys and girls since it was launched in 2017. The merit badge booklet mentions The Explorers Club 42 times.

Bill has always been passionate about his cave explorations, his career with the Boy Scouts of America, and the Explorers Club. Please save the date for Bill’s presentation on his ongoing progress in exploring these incredible cave systems.

REGISTER HERE

Pat Madden, MN’18
Texas Chapter Program Chair