Post by Sharon Faulkner on Jul 11, 2006 15:25:19 GMT -5
A few inaccuracies in this article, but a decent overview of Jackson County's abundant natural resource (i.e. caves). Actually, Jackson County has over 1900 caves, which we are very grateful to have.
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Caving: Dangerous but exciting
By Greg Purvis The Daily Sentinel
Published July 11, 2006
Jackson County is, by anyone’s definition, a paradise for sportsmen and outdoor adventurers of all makes and models. Blessed with a temperate climate, long summers, and pristine natural beauty, Jackson County is growing in popularity as a tourist destination. With the increasing popularity of “extreme sports”, one of the county’s most underappreciated natural resources is starting to draw a lot of attention away from the river and mountains that northeast Alabama is best known for. The natural resource in question? Caves.
If caves were gold, Jackson County would be Fort Knox. There are 1,536 known caves in the county — more than half of all the caves in the State of Alabama are located right here. Jackson County has more caves than anyplace in the United States, making this a prime location for the growing sport of caving...or, to use a slightly less-familiar name, spelunking.
Caves have always been places of mystery for humans. Our ancestors used them as a place of refuge: homes that offered some relative safety from a world crawling with predators and potential dangers. Caves offer a kind of natural air-conditioning that would have provided some welcome relief in the extremes of a glacier-covered Ice Age or the tropical heat of southeastern summers. Caves have also provided some of the earliest examples of human habitation, leaving behind artifacts and Neolithic artwork for archaeologists to discover thousands of years later.
Aside from the wealth of historical knowledge that caves can give us, they are also perfect incubators for miniature ecosystems. Most caves share a near-constant temperature, hovering around 60 degrees Fahrenheit. Without highly-variable seasonal temperature changes and regimented cycles of day-and-night, caves are home to some incredibly rare and diverse plants and animals. Biologists have come to rely on many of the local caves in northeast Alabama for studies involving rare flora and fauna, including the rare and endangered Gray Bat that makes its home in Sauta Cave near Scottsboro.
As interesting and invaluable as caves may be to scientists, researchers, and would-be explorers, they are dangerous to those who are not familiar with the specifics of caving. With the number of caves in Jackson County, accidents involving both skilled and novice cavers do happen from time to time. One of the most tragic took place in June 1984 at a local cave called “Valhalla.”
The popular impression of caves usually calls to mind something more closely resembling a wolf’s den than the true example most commonly encountered in the woods. In truth, caves may not look like anything too spectacular at the first glance. Therein lies the danger: what looks like nothing but an animal’s den can obscure a sheer drop hundreds of feet into a rocky crevasse deep in the earth.
Two Georgia Tech students who would today probably be called “extreme sports enthusiasts” for their love of outdoors activities like rappelling, camping, and caving, discovered Valhalla’s entrance through friends and made plans to lower themselves down, by rope, into the throat of the cave.
Bill Torode, a cave expert and member of the National Speleological Society (N.S.S.) based in Huntsville, was involved with the rescue party that, tragically, became a body-recovery effort. “This particular site has a 236-foot drop, and over a mile of cave,” Torode recalled. “It’s a very rare occurrence, when something like this happens. The two young men that were killed were on a shelf, while a third person was actually climbing. A very large piece of rock, about the size of a tractor-trailer, fell, crushing the two men below. They probably never knew what hit them.”
The two young men who lost their lives in that particular Jackson County cave were Samuel Dunseith Crawford and Michael Dean Hanebaum. A marker placed at the site reads: “Spelunking gave them joy.”
Despite the dangers of cave exploring, Torode says that occurrences like that are extremely rare. “When you drive to work in the morning, you know you could be killed. Well, (caving) is far less dangerous,” he said. According to official reports, there are approximately six deaths attributed to caving mishaps per year, or less. “Some years, there are none,” Torode said. “That particular year was a bad year. That was the worst I can remember.”
“Extreme Sports” enthusiasts have taken an interest in caving in recent years. Cavers are often athletically-fit, since a typical excursion could require crawling, walking, rappelling, climbing, and even swimming. “Most of the (caving) that is done by the organized groups and clubs is by ‘sports-cavers’,” Torode said.
Torode’s group, the N.S.S., has 12,000 members nation-wide, and sponsors local caving clubs, called “grottos.” Groups such as the N.S.S. and the Southeastern Cave Conservancy also raise money to purchase caves on private land. This helps protect the delicate ecosystems for scientific study as well as providing a measure of safety by regulating the sites under their control.
The larger groups have members who volunteer their services in Cave Rescue Units and as guides for scientific researchers from colleges and universities. The groups promote cave conservation and safety instruction, as well as assisting in research projects. “Some of our members belong to the Cave Rescue Unit that assisted in the attempted rescue of the two young men killed at (Valhalla),” Torode said. “The Scottsboro Rescue Squad and members of other cave rescue units and rescue squads helped with that one.”
Summer in Jackson County is a time when the great outdoors is at it’s most inviting. Though many of the caves are on private land or have been bought and officially maintained by cave conservation groups, there is always the possibility of hunters, fishermen, campers, and hikers simply blundering into caves. “You’ve just got to be aware,” Torode says.
www.thedailysentinel.com/story.lasso?ewcd=020eb04ce4b6ef90&page=all
--------------------------------
Caving: Dangerous but exciting
By Greg Purvis The Daily Sentinel
Published July 11, 2006
Jackson County is, by anyone’s definition, a paradise for sportsmen and outdoor adventurers of all makes and models. Blessed with a temperate climate, long summers, and pristine natural beauty, Jackson County is growing in popularity as a tourist destination. With the increasing popularity of “extreme sports”, one of the county’s most underappreciated natural resources is starting to draw a lot of attention away from the river and mountains that northeast Alabama is best known for. The natural resource in question? Caves.
If caves were gold, Jackson County would be Fort Knox. There are 1,536 known caves in the county — more than half of all the caves in the State of Alabama are located right here. Jackson County has more caves than anyplace in the United States, making this a prime location for the growing sport of caving...or, to use a slightly less-familiar name, spelunking.
Caves have always been places of mystery for humans. Our ancestors used them as a place of refuge: homes that offered some relative safety from a world crawling with predators and potential dangers. Caves offer a kind of natural air-conditioning that would have provided some welcome relief in the extremes of a glacier-covered Ice Age or the tropical heat of southeastern summers. Caves have also provided some of the earliest examples of human habitation, leaving behind artifacts and Neolithic artwork for archaeologists to discover thousands of years later.
Aside from the wealth of historical knowledge that caves can give us, they are also perfect incubators for miniature ecosystems. Most caves share a near-constant temperature, hovering around 60 degrees Fahrenheit. Without highly-variable seasonal temperature changes and regimented cycles of day-and-night, caves are home to some incredibly rare and diverse plants and animals. Biologists have come to rely on many of the local caves in northeast Alabama for studies involving rare flora and fauna, including the rare and endangered Gray Bat that makes its home in Sauta Cave near Scottsboro.
As interesting and invaluable as caves may be to scientists, researchers, and would-be explorers, they are dangerous to those who are not familiar with the specifics of caving. With the number of caves in Jackson County, accidents involving both skilled and novice cavers do happen from time to time. One of the most tragic took place in June 1984 at a local cave called “Valhalla.”
The popular impression of caves usually calls to mind something more closely resembling a wolf’s den than the true example most commonly encountered in the woods. In truth, caves may not look like anything too spectacular at the first glance. Therein lies the danger: what looks like nothing but an animal’s den can obscure a sheer drop hundreds of feet into a rocky crevasse deep in the earth.
Two Georgia Tech students who would today probably be called “extreme sports enthusiasts” for their love of outdoors activities like rappelling, camping, and caving, discovered Valhalla’s entrance through friends and made plans to lower themselves down, by rope, into the throat of the cave.
Bill Torode, a cave expert and member of the National Speleological Society (N.S.S.) based in Huntsville, was involved with the rescue party that, tragically, became a body-recovery effort. “This particular site has a 236-foot drop, and over a mile of cave,” Torode recalled. “It’s a very rare occurrence, when something like this happens. The two young men that were killed were on a shelf, while a third person was actually climbing. A very large piece of rock, about the size of a tractor-trailer, fell, crushing the two men below. They probably never knew what hit them.”
The two young men who lost their lives in that particular Jackson County cave were Samuel Dunseith Crawford and Michael Dean Hanebaum. A marker placed at the site reads: “Spelunking gave them joy.”
Despite the dangers of cave exploring, Torode says that occurrences like that are extremely rare. “When you drive to work in the morning, you know you could be killed. Well, (caving) is far less dangerous,” he said. According to official reports, there are approximately six deaths attributed to caving mishaps per year, or less. “Some years, there are none,” Torode said. “That particular year was a bad year. That was the worst I can remember.”
“Extreme Sports” enthusiasts have taken an interest in caving in recent years. Cavers are often athletically-fit, since a typical excursion could require crawling, walking, rappelling, climbing, and even swimming. “Most of the (caving) that is done by the organized groups and clubs is by ‘sports-cavers’,” Torode said.
Torode’s group, the N.S.S., has 12,000 members nation-wide, and sponsors local caving clubs, called “grottos.” Groups such as the N.S.S. and the Southeastern Cave Conservancy also raise money to purchase caves on private land. This helps protect the delicate ecosystems for scientific study as well as providing a measure of safety by regulating the sites under their control.
The larger groups have members who volunteer their services in Cave Rescue Units and as guides for scientific researchers from colleges and universities. The groups promote cave conservation and safety instruction, as well as assisting in research projects. “Some of our members belong to the Cave Rescue Unit that assisted in the attempted rescue of the two young men killed at (Valhalla),” Torode said. “The Scottsboro Rescue Squad and members of other cave rescue units and rescue squads helped with that one.”
Summer in Jackson County is a time when the great outdoors is at it’s most inviting. Though many of the caves are on private land or have been bought and officially maintained by cave conservation groups, there is always the possibility of hunters, fishermen, campers, and hikers simply blundering into caves. “You’ve just got to be aware,” Torode says.
www.thedailysentinel.com/story.lasso?ewcd=020eb04ce4b6ef90&page=all