It took 38 years of digging----

[RedRoxx]

Another freaking awesome cave, this time in the UK.
Nothing can match pushing virgin passage, where you are probably the first person ever in the cave----

[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=Dumj3Rm16_A[/youtube]

[jumar]

Awesome

[Brewhaha]

That is amazing. It must have felt like a real treasure to explore. But what is the story behind "after 38 years of digging"?

[RedRoxx]

If you go to the website of this cave grotto--this cave was known but it took that many years of digging, ( if like most digs it was worked off and on a few days or weeks here and there) to break through to the "good stuff".

The famous Lechuguilla was a well known pit type cave, and was dug on off and on for years until some cavers broke through---the rest is history, and the cave still going---

We have several "big" caves here in Az that probably go but would take blasting to get to new passage--too small. We have a going dig that we broke thru to about 100 feet of stomach crawl passage with some good air flow this past weekend, so we will be back this upcoming weekend to push this and try to bypass a sump on another cave.

[Scott P]

We have several "big" caves here in Az that probably go but would take blasting to get to new passage--too small.

In 1996, when we were on a trip to the Marble (Grand) Canyon in Mile 36.8 Canyon, an extremely rugged off-trail route we came across a crack in the ground only a few inches wide and maybe a couple feet long. A huge jet of air was shooting out of it. The jet of air was so strong that we could here it from a long way away and we kept wondering what that noise was. A huge waterfall in a dry canyon? When we finally reached it (the noise was a dead give away as to where it was), we could put rocks in the crack and the air would shoot them out. There must be a HUGE cave underground there, but of course it is inaccessible. I don't think the NPS would look to kindly on someone trying to blast a hole to get to it.