ROME — Police say they have made Capri’s Blue Grotto off-limits to tourists after its waters started smelling bad.
The closure was ordered a week after police discovered that raw cesspool sewage was being dumped into the cave’s deep blue waters.
Health and environmental authorities were investigating Tuesday to see if the stink and an unexplained white foam might have been caused by the cesspool dumping in mid-August.
Police have arrested two men who were found allegedly using a hose to pump contents of some of the island’s cesspools directly into the waters.
Seeing the inside of the grotto by rowboat is a popular tourist attraction on Capri, a picturesque island off Naples.