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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsA Peek Inside the World's Largest Cave
Last edited Thu Jan 17, 2013, 03:07 PM - Edit history (2)
by Katie Hosmer on January 16, 2013
Located in the Quang Binh province in Vietnam, the Son Doong Cave is the world's largest cave. The biggest section of the cave is more than 650 feet wide, almost 500 feet high, and approximately 5.5 miles long. According to the website, parts of the space are so massive that there are caverns big enough to fit an entire city street inside them.
Set along the Laos border, this largest single passage is part of a network of 150 other caves. It is located in a very remote jungle area within Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park and was rediscovered in 2009 by a group of British cavers.
"Son Doong" means "mountain river," and is aptly called such because the formation was created millions of years ago when river water eroded the limestone underneath the mountain. There is still much to discover, but so far, inside, explorers have found a fast-flowing river, giant stalagmites standing more than 230 feet high, and a tiny jungle, nicknamed "Garden of Edam."
more
http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/son-doong-cave-vietnam
shraby
(21,946 posts)derby378
(30,252 posts)TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)FSogol
(45,466 posts)FourScore
(9,704 posts)DemoTex
(25,392 posts)Never saw a thing!
annabanana
(52,791 posts)don't know is vast indeed!
I LOVE finding out stuff I hadn't gotten around to imagining yet!
MynameisBlarney
(2,979 posts)innit?
valerief
(53,235 posts)WillyT
(72,631 posts)Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)Think about that.
That's easily the height of a 20 story building.
UnrepentantLiberal
(11,700 posts)Would love to see that in person.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)The Velebita Pit in Croatia is located in a cave and has a single vertical drop of over 1,900 feet.
The Empire State Building is 1,250 feet.
UnrepentantLiberal
(11,700 posts)I took some cave tours in Oregon and they were beautiful. But nowhere near this scale of course.
Spitfire of ATJ
(32,723 posts)They do a full show now.
Then there's this when it comes to insanity:
http://www.kuriositas.com/2011/12/would-you-stand-on-kjeragbolten.html
snooper2
(30,151 posts)Zorra
(27,670 posts)Scurrilous
(38,687 posts)xtraxritical
(3,576 posts)RC
(25,592 posts)Doesn't even matter is people were living in the cave at the time.
Kali
(55,006 posts)bit I get what you mean, all too often the perspective is Euro/Western-centric
NYC_SKP
(68,644 posts)From the wikipedia entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Son_Doong_Cave
closeupready
(29,503 posts)aint_no_life_nowhere
(21,925 posts)I'm 63 years old but I think I could still handle it. I've been caving since I was 12 and hold Lifetime membership in the National Speleogical Society and am a Cave Research Foundation joint venturer.
I believe the single largest underground room, known as the Sarawak Chamber, is located in Gua Nasib Bagus (Good Luck Cave) in Sarawak (Borneo), Malaysia. The single room is 2,300 feet long, 1,300 feet wide and at least 230 feet high (look at how tiny the human figures are in the far reaches of the photograph).