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pasitheahttp://www.holyshiite.com/caver/index.html
This was really interesting but you might want to read it first, then click the cut and
It is really well written right up to the rather lame ending, though it starts off by annoying me with the destruction of a cave. First rule of caving is to do as little damage as possible.
It actually would have been a neat cave if the story was real and there are some very perfectly rational explainations for all of the events that happen in the cave. Especially if it was near the ocean, or lake.
The description of the cave, passages, paranoia your brain makes down deep in a tight crawl, etc are all really good and extremely convincing as a normal caving experience and a slightly overactive imagination. The end is really juvenille though. Bah. It just leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth.
I was totally believing the story right up to the 'my pictures were blank' part. Even if it had stopped at that and not the 'I left my video camera in the cave' I would have been really likely to believe it but those two events plus the lame ending are just too much.
Caves often have multiple levels and he mentioned pools of standing water in parts of the cave. The tunnel he showed may have been carved by water but it was clearly left to being carved by wind for a long long time. Moreover, its completely likely the passage was carved entirely by airpressure, which is why it got thinner near the start and wider further down. The crystal structures at the edge of the camber just before the tight passage are further proof of this as there'd be a ventrilli effect and a backwash of pressure at that point giving the minerals and moist air a place to accumulate (this matches the type of formations he described)
The moving stone is also really easy to explain, given any cave where there are tidal forces. (All large bodies of water are affected by tital forces) Basically, the super-round rock makes a lot of sense. it had simply been ground smooth by decades and decades of motion. There is another entrance to the cave somewhere that is just at sea level. When a wave comes up high enough to completly cap the far end of the tunnel there is a massive concussive wind that gets blasted through the rest of the cave, being forced out whatever nook it can find. When the hole in the cave was small (before they smashed it open) it would SHRIEK loudly for the duration of the wave to roll into the lower cave much like blowing on the top of a bottle. (This would also be why they didn't hear this noise again after they started digging) A really truly unholy sound.
This is also well more than enough pressure to knock the rock stopper out of it's spot to another 'resting point' and it could just as easily be pulled back by the first wave to break the lower seal. This also very easily explains the smell. Ages of rotting seaweed accumulated in the lower entrance stinks to high Hell. There would also be times when the cave would make no sounds and times it would blow continuously due to the changing conditions at the beach side of it. Notice how he mentioned there is a long rumbling sound just before the horrible smell. That would be the wave rolling into the cave and pushing the scent of the rotting vegetation up with it.
Actually, anyone in this area, I can take to a beach cave up near Davenport that has all of these features but the rolling rock. There's even an open tunnel that you can stand in at the right times and experience the kind of air pressure we're talking about when several tons of seawater hit it and completely close it, it will literally knock you off your feet. come to think of it, I actually wouldn't be surprised if he was in one of the caves up near UCSC and he was getting the back end of the lighthouse cave. (Though I suppose there are LOTS of other possible coastal caves) In fact I'd be surprised if most costal caves didn't have this sort of behaviour.
*sigh* The end of the story was really lame and weak. I would have really appreciated a much more mundane or much mroe fantastic ending. This one is just sloppy. (Unless they killed themselves trying to get out in a blind panic which is plausible)
I miss caving and crawling deep past a tight squeeze, turning off my light and just listening to the Earth around me. It's a really incredible feeling.
This was really interesting but you might want to read it first, then click the cut and
It is really well written right up to the rather lame ending, though it starts off by annoying me with the destruction of a cave. First rule of caving is to do as little damage as possible.
It actually would have been a neat cave if the story was real and there are some very perfectly rational explainations for all of the events that happen in the cave. Especially if it was near the ocean, or lake.
The description of the cave, passages, paranoia your brain makes down deep in a tight crawl, etc are all really good and extremely convincing as a normal caving experience and a slightly overactive imagination. The end is really juvenille though. Bah. It just leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth.
I was totally believing the story right up to the 'my pictures were blank' part. Even if it had stopped at that and not the 'I left my video camera in the cave' I would have been really likely to believe it but those two events plus the lame ending are just too much.
Caves often have multiple levels and he mentioned pools of standing water in parts of the cave. The tunnel he showed may have been carved by water but it was clearly left to being carved by wind for a long long time. Moreover, its completely likely the passage was carved entirely by airpressure, which is why it got thinner near the start and wider further down. The crystal structures at the edge of the camber just before the tight passage are further proof of this as there'd be a ventrilli effect and a backwash of pressure at that point giving the minerals and moist air a place to accumulate (this matches the type of formations he described)
The moving stone is also really easy to explain, given any cave where there are tidal forces. (All large bodies of water are affected by tital forces) Basically, the super-round rock makes a lot of sense. it had simply been ground smooth by decades and decades of motion. There is another entrance to the cave somewhere that is just at sea level. When a wave comes up high enough to completly cap the far end of the tunnel there is a massive concussive wind that gets blasted through the rest of the cave, being forced out whatever nook it can find. When the hole in the cave was small (before they smashed it open) it would SHRIEK loudly for the duration of the wave to roll into the lower cave much like blowing on the top of a bottle. (This would also be why they didn't hear this noise again after they started digging) A really truly unholy sound.
This is also well more than enough pressure to knock the rock stopper out of it's spot to another 'resting point' and it could just as easily be pulled back by the first wave to break the lower seal. This also very easily explains the smell. Ages of rotting seaweed accumulated in the lower entrance stinks to high Hell. There would also be times when the cave would make no sounds and times it would blow continuously due to the changing conditions at the beach side of it. Notice how he mentioned there is a long rumbling sound just before the horrible smell. That would be the wave rolling into the cave and pushing the scent of the rotting vegetation up with it.
Actually, anyone in this area, I can take to a beach cave up near Davenport that has all of these features but the rolling rock. There's even an open tunnel that you can stand in at the right times and experience the kind of air pressure we're talking about when several tons of seawater hit it and completely close it, it will literally knock you off your feet. come to think of it, I actually wouldn't be surprised if he was in one of the caves up near UCSC and he was getting the back end of the lighthouse cave. (Though I suppose there are LOTS of other possible coastal caves) In fact I'd be surprised if most costal caves didn't have this sort of behaviour.
*sigh* The end of the story was really lame and weak. I would have really appreciated a much more mundane or much mroe fantastic ending. This one is just sloppy. (Unless they killed themselves trying to get out in a blind panic which is plausible)
I miss caving and crawling deep past a tight squeeze, turning off my light and just listening to the Earth around me. It's a really incredible feeling.
