Ottavia Piana, 31, was immediately taken hospital by helicopter after suffering a leg injury in the cave in Fonteno, in the northern province of Bergamo.
She is conscious and otherwise in a good condition, sources said.
“I made a mess. I am very happy to see you,” were apparently her first words to rescuers.
Piana was taking part in an expedition with colleagues above Lake Iseo, when she fell into a cavity and broke her leg just before 6pm while exploring a new passage way in the Bueno Fonteno cave.
Earlier, members of Alpine Rescue managed to sedate her, after lowering painkillers into the area in which she was trapped.
The rescuers climbed down to Piana and used a stretcher to get her out.
“... she’s not a person who knows how to sit still,” Maurizio Finazzi, president of Cai di Lovere told The Republic news outlet, when asked how Piana might have handled being incapacitated underground for so long.
Caving comrades described her as an expert and always cautious speleologist.
“She always moves carefully for her own safety and that of her teammates,” Finazzi said.
In the first hours, the rescuers said they transported her up to about 50 metres and then from a second well, hoisted her on a stretcher until she reached the surface.
In some places, they said, the stretcher was placed in a vertical position, making the ascent even faster, despite the difficulty and the danger for the speleologist.
The rescue effort was made more difficult by the fact that it rained during the night.
The Bueno Fonteno cave is an ancient karst complex, a branched cave that extends for about 34km and is mostly unexplored.
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