leaves to 1 m long, covered with appressed, white scales; sheath elliptic, large; blade ligulate, rounded-subacute, broadly channeled, 40–55 mm wide, laxly serrate with spines 2 mm long. inflorescence: peduncle erect, over 2 dm long, tomentellous-lepidote; pedunclebracts longer than the internodes, triangular-lanceolate, attenuate to a stout brown pungent spine, serrate with spreading dark spines 1.5 mm long; fertile part simple, subglobose, 55 mm in diameter; rachis straight, subdensely tomentellous-lepidote; floral bracts subspreading, 11 mm long, triangular-subulate, pungent, entire, dark, sparsely tomentellous-lepidote. flowers sessile, erect or suberect, nearly 30 mm long; sepals free, asymmetric, ca 10 mm long with a terminal very dark subspreading spine 3 mm long; petals 13 mm longer than the sepals, pale blue when dry, acicular-mucronate, bearing 2 fimbriate scales at base. stamens about equaling the petals, the second series nearly free; anther sublinear, acutish, 3 mm long. pistil: ovary subellipsoid, 7 mm long, ferruginous-furfuraceous; epigynous tube urceolate, very large; placentae subapical; ovules ecaudate.Edited from : Smith & Downs 1979. Bromelioideae (Bromeliaceae) in Flora Neotropica.