In December 1912, workers at a local quarry uncovered a crack in the rocks. There was warm air coming out of the cracks. Brothers, Josef and Chrome Čeněk, were interested in the karst formations in the area. They made the opening bigger, and in January 1913, climbed down a rope 42m into the dark underground space. The rope broke and both men were trapped in the cave. Their lamp was also broken in the fall, so they had to wait eight hours in the dark to be rescued. Over the next few years many other parts of the 1,322m cave system were explored.