What's the deepest cave?
Velebit caves
The "Lukina jama" cave is 1431 m deep (2013), the deepest cave in Croatia, 14th deepest cave in the world and the deepest cave in southeast Europe. At its foot, there are ponds and streams including one of the largest known colonies of subterranean leeches ("Erpobdella mestrovi"), which has been ascertained to represent a new species, genus and also family. Other species discovered in the system, include the air-breathing land snails "Zospeum tholussum". Like Lukina jama, Slovacka jama, Velebita and Meduza are also located at the "Hajdučki i Rožanski kukovi" special reserve, a dedicated part of the Sjeverni Velebit national park.
Jarrod Jablonski
Jablonski has been setting records for cave penetration for many years. In 1995 he and Geologist Todd Kincaid pushed the Manatee Springs cave system to . On April 25, 1997, Jablonski along with George Irvine and Brent Scarabin set a new penetration record of in Wakulla Springs. They utilized Halcyon semi-closed circuit rebreathers at an average depth of . In July 1998 Jablonski, again diving with Irvine and Scarabin traveled in Wakulla Springs O-Tunnel. Jablonski and his regular dive buddy WKPP director Casey McKinlay set a world record for the longest ever penetration on a cave dive, at while exploring "Q" tunnel of Wakulla Springs.
This record remains the longest penetration in a deep cave. The new record for the longest penetration at any depth is now held by Jon Bernot and Charlie Roberson of Gainesville, Florida, with a distance of .
Martyn Farr
Farr began caving in 1961 and cave diving in 1971, and within 10 years had established a world record for underwater cave penetration in the Bahamas. He is noted within the cave diving community for his explorations in Wookey Hole in 1977 and 1982, and for completing the first traverse of Llangattock Mountain in Wales in 1986, the execution of which was a televised media event, being the longest and deepest caving through trip in the British Isles. In 1978, Farr discovered also the Pollatoomary cave in the Partry Mountains of the Republic of Ireland. In 2008, his student Artur Kozłowski explored this cave to a depth of 103 metres, which made it the deepest known cave on the British Isles.
Caverna de Santana
Discovered and described at the beginning of the twentieth century as "Caverna do Rio Roncador" by the German naturalist Richard Krone, it had the potential to become one of the deepest caves in the state, but ended up being one of the most important and visited caves in the country. It is the longest cave within the state area with a horizontal projection of 8.373 meters and unevenness of 61 meters. It is widely used for environmental education tours and photography.
Tham Phra Wang Daeng
Tham Phra Wang Daeng, also known as the Cave of the Monk (), is a deep cave located in Thung Salaeng Luang National Park, Amphoe Noen Maprang, Phitsanulok Province, upper central Thailand. It is the longest cave in Thailand, the distance is about 13 kilometers. Buddhist statues and relics, carvings and reliefs, a subterranean river, multiple bat colonies, and a trove of speleothems populate the cave. In 2003, a biological expedition to the cave resulted in the discovery of new fish species, including discoveries in the Balitoridae and Cyprinidae families.
Stephen Alvarez
On another National Geographic assignment Alvarez photographed the deepest cave in the world, Voronya Cave, located 2000 meters beneath the Caucasus Mountains in the breakaway Russian republic of Abkhazia.
Gourgouthakas
Gourgouthakas (; from "small cutting on rocks, in which rain water is collected and from which animals drink water") is a cave located in the Lefka Ori mountains on the Greek island of Crete. It is the deepest cave in Greece, with an explored depth of , and is the 43rd deepest in the world.
GB Cave
The cave was first entered on 19 November 1939, after ten months of digging, by the University of Bristol Spelæological Society, and was named in recognition of the two members, F. J. Goddard and C. C. Barker, who had done most of the work involved in its discovery. The cave is located within the Cheddar Complex and the 17-acre GB Gruffy nature reserve and is close to Charterhouse Cave, the deepest cave in the region.
Cave diving
Jordbrugrotta (also known as Pluragrotta) is a cave in Rana, Norway. It is the deepest cave in Northern Europe.
Canyon
The Yarlung Tsangpo Grand Canyon (or Tsangpo Canyon), along the Yarlung Tsangpo River in Tibet, is regarded by some as the deepest canyon in the world at 5,500 m (18,000 ft). It is slightly longer than the Grand Canyon in the United States. Others consider the Kali Gandaki Gorge in midwest Nepal to be the deepest canyon, with a 6400 m (21,000 ft) difference between the level of the river and the peaks surrounding it.
Ali-Sadr Cave
The Ali Sadr Cave (Persian: غار علی صدر) originally called Ali Saadr or Ali Saard (meaning cold) is the world's largest water cave which attracts thousands of visitors every year. It is located in Ali Sadr Kabudarahang County about 100 kilometers north of Hamadan, western Iran (more accurately at 48°18'E 35°18'N). Because of the cave's proximity to large cities such as Hamadan, it is a highly recommended destination for tourists from all corners of the world. Tours of the cave are available by pedalos.
Alisadr is the world's largest water cave, where you sit in a boat and watch the view.
This cave is located at 48°18'E 35°18'N, in the southern part of Ali Sadr village. The cave is entered at the side of a hill called Sari Ghiyeh which also includes two other caves called Sarab and Soubashi, each 7 and 11 kilometers from Ali Sadr Cave. Apparently, the water in Ali Sadr cave stems from a spring in Sarab.
Baredine Cave
The sightseeing lasts 40 minutes, visitors descend along a 300m long pathway up to 60m below the ground and an underground lake and visit 5 beautifully decorated chambers.
An interesting detail of this adventurous trip is also the encounter with the underground world of animals: visitors will see the cave olm (Proteus anguinus Laurenti), endemic in this dinaric karst region- an animal that can be found only in this karst area.
In one of the chambers you will pass along a 4m wide passage that leads 66m vertically down reaching the deepest point of the cave at 132m.
Quri Qala Cave
Quri Qale Cave or QuraQala (Kurdish: Şkefta QureQela, ئەشکەوتی قوڕەقەڵا Persian: غار قوری قلعه) is a cave located northwest of Ravansar, Iran, and is one of the longest caves in western Asia. First explored in the 1950s, in 1989 it was further opened by an Iranian team. It contains three main chambers, with calcite crystals, stalactites and waterfalls. It is known for its colony of mouse ear bats, and for a number of archaeological finds, including silver plates dating the late Sassanian period.
Vorontsovka Caves
The Vorontsovskaya Cave System (Воронцовская система пещер) is a long chain of caves in the Khosta and Adler districts of Sochi, Russia. It is part of a range of Mesozoic limestones that runs parallel to the Black Sea coast for 400 km. and contains the Voronya Cave, the world's deepest cave.
Lamprechtsofen
On August 19, 1998, a team led by Polish caver Andrzej Ciszewski discovered a connection between Lamprechtsofen and the PL-2 cave system, which established the height difference of the united cave system as . This new discovery made Lamprechtsofen the deepest-known cave in the world for less than three years, since Krubera was discovered in June 2001 to be deep.
Gap Cave
Gap Cave is located just underneath Pinnacle Overlook in the Cumberland Gap National Historical Park, Lee County, Virginia. Currently, the cave has a surveyed length of 18.5 miles and is the 42nd longest cave in the United States and 154th in the world. There are six known entrances: the Gap Cave Entrance (also known as the King Solomons Cave Entrance), an artificial entrance, known as the Cudjo's Cave Entrance, the Stream Entrance, the Soldiers Cave Entrance, the Big Saltpeter Cave Entrance, and the Wellhole. All lead into the same cave, Gap Cave.
Tears of the Turtle Cave
The entrance to Tears of the Turtle Cave was found in 2006. The cave passage is mostly a two to three foot wide fissure that follows a stream downward through numerous rappels. In 2014 a team of nine cavers explored new passage pushing the cave to a depth of 1629 feet and in doing so passed New Mexico's Lechuguilla Cave to become the deepest known limestone cave in the United States. Exploration continued in 2016 when teams returned to push the cave to its current known depth of 1659 feet. On those trips the difficulty necessitated establishing camp in the cave for the first time. This, along with the technical rope work, 39 degree temperature, and remote location of the cave make continued exploration difficult. A return trip is currently planned for 2019.
Bill Steele (cave explorer)
Continuing to explore caves throughout the United States, Steele led and participated in expeditions to Sistema Huautla in Mexico almost every year through the 1980s. In 1987, the Huautla expedition connected the deep cave Nita Nanta to Sistema Huautla; which established it as the second deepest cave in the world. Steele went to Kijahe Xontjoa on the plateau to the east of Huautla with an expedition of Swiss explorers in 1993, and explored depths over 1,000 meters.
List of deepest mines
This list of deepest mines includes operational and non-operational mines that are at least , which is the depth of Veryovkina Cave, the deepest known natural cave in the world. The depth measurements in this list represent the difference in elevation from the entrance of the mine to the deepest excavated point.
Harz
Geomorphological processes have led to the formation of caves in the gypsum, dolomite and limestone layers of the Harz. These dripstone caves include Baumann's Cave, the Unicorn Cave, Hermann's Cave, the Iberg Dripstone Cave and, on the southern edge of the Harz, the Heimkehle.
Because the older formations contained many mineral deposits, they were explored very early on by the mining industry. The mines have often been turned into show mines. For example, the Samson Pit was for a long time the deepest mine in the world. Other show mines are the "Büchenberg", "Drei Kronen & Ehrt", the "Röhrigschacht" show mine, the "Lange Wand" show mine in Ilfeld and the "Rabensteiner Stollen" show mine in Netzkater.
Others have been turned into mining museums, like the Upper Harz Mining Museum in Clausthal-Zellerfeld, the Lautenthal Mining Museum with its pit railway or the Rammelsberg Mining Museum near Goslar, which is a UNESCO world heritage site. The Roter Bär Pit in St. Andreasberg also served as a training mine until the 20th century and is today, preserved true to the original, as a visitor mine.
Ogof Ffynnon Ddu
Ogof Ffynnon Ddu (Welsh for "Cave of the Black Spring"), also known informally as OFD, is a cave under a hillside in the area surrounding Penwyllt in the Upper Swansea Valley in South Wales. It is the second longest cave in Wales and the deepest in the United Kingdom.
List of deepest caves
This list of deepest caves includes the deepest known natural caves according to maximum surveyed depth. The depth value is measured from the highest entrance to the lowest accessible point.
Velebit caves
The vertical shaft "Patkov Gušt", named after a deceased Croatian speleologist is 553 meters deep and the second deepest pitch in the world .
Pierre Chevalier (caver)
Chevalier first visited the Trou du Glaz entrance in 1935, and was struck by the possibility of exploring beyond what was at the time considered technically possible. With Fernand Petzl, Charles Petit-Didier and others, Chevalier completed explorations that connected four entrances (Trou du Glaz, Guiers Mort, P40 and Grotte Annette) and established the Dent de Crolles as the deepest cave system in the world (-658m).
Lurgrotte
The Lurgrotte karst cave is the largest cave in the Eastern Alps of Styria, Austria. It is located about north of Graz and crosses the Tannenben karst region. The cave has two accessible entrances, one at the village of Semriach and the other at the village of Peggau. At the Semriach entrance, the Lur River sinks into the cave. At the Peggau entrance, the Schmelz River emerges from within the cave, flowing to the west and eventually joining the Mur River.
Indian Caverns
Indian Caverns was a show cave in Spruce Creek, Pennsylvania, United States from 1929-2017. It is a horizontal karst cave of Ordovician Nealmont/Benner limestone, estimated to be about 500,000 years old. It is the second-largest cave in Pennsylvania and the largest limestone cave. Indian Caverns consists of two sections, originally separated by a 14-foot wall: the "Historic Cave" and the "Giant's Hall". The "historic" part of the cave is generally low-ceilinged and closer to the surface (as shallow as 15 ft) with a couple of wide rooms and extensive speleothem formation. The Giant's Hall area consists of several large passageways, up to 60 feet high, but with fewer speleothems - though it does include the largest sheet of flowstone in the northeast and a substantial rimstone pool. The lowest point of the cave is approximately 140 feet beneath the surface and the cave temperature is a constant 56 degrees Fahrenheit (13 degrees Celsius).
Tears of the Turtle Cave
Tears of the Turtle Cave is located in the Bob Marshall Wilderness in western Montana and is currently the deepest limestone cave in the United States since passing New Mexico's Lechuguilla cave in 2014. As of August 2016 the cave is known to be 1659 feet deep and 1.32 miles long. The cave consists mostly of roughly 2 foot wide fissure passage passing over dozens of short rope drops. With a mean temperature of 39 degrees F (4 C), it is muddy and poorly decorated.
Belum Caves
The Belum Caves is the largest and longest cave system open to the public on the Indian subcontinent, known for its speleothems, such as stalactite and stalagmite formations. The Belum Caves have long passages, galleries, spacious caverns with fresh water and siphons. This cave system was formed over the course of tens of thousands of years by the constant flow of underground water. The cave system reaches its deepest point ( from entrance level) at the point known as "Pataalaganga". In Telugu language, it is called " Belum Guhalu". Belum Caves have a length of , making them the second largest caves on the Indian Subcontinent after the Krem Liat Prah caves in Meghalaya. It is one of the centrally protected Monuments of National Importance.
Mount Adams (Washington)
In the area surrounding Mount Adams, many caves have formed around inactive lava vents. These caves are usually close to the surface and can be hundreds of feet deep and wide. A few of the more well known caves include the Cheese Cave, Ice Cave, and Deadhorse Caves. Cheese Cave has the largest bore of the caves near Adams with a diameter of and a length of over . Ice cave, which is made up of several sections created by several sinkholes, has an ice section that is long and in diameter and noted for its ice formations. From the same entrance, the tube continues another to the west. Deadhorse Cave is a massive network of lava tubes. It the most complex lava tube in the United States with of passage. These caves are all just outside of Trout Lake. These and many other caves in the Trout Lake area were at one time part of a huge system that originated at the Indian Heaven volcanic field. The most obscure caves around Adams are the Windholes on the southeast side near Island Cabin Campground.
Harwood Hole
Harwoods Hole is a cave system located in the northwest of the South Island of New Zealand. It is one of several important cave systems in Takaka Hill, between Golden Bay and Tasman Bay. Starting at the surface as a 50-metre round entrance and descending 183 metres, Harwood Hole is New Zealand's deepest vertical shaft. Further in it connects with "Starlight Cave". The long rope descent is considered one of the most spectacular parts of the caving experience at Harwood's. Harwood's Hole has an overall depth of 357 m.
Castellana Caves
The Caves of Castellana open in south-eastern Murge, a limestone plateau dating back to the upper Cretaceous (ninety- one hundred million years ago) and rising 330 metres above sea level.
The area of Castellana is characterized by limestone, a sedimentary rock composed largely of calcium carbonate, known as Limestone of Altamura.
The cave system is 3348 metres in length and the point of maximum depth reaches 122 metres. The temperature within the caves is about 18 °C.
The caves are open all year round except for Christmas Day and the New Year’s day. The visit develops along two itineraries: the first is 1 km long and lasts about 50 minutes while the second is 3 km long and lasts about two hours. The tour timetable changes depending on the season. In addition, during the summer there are also guided night tours.
The Grave is the first and the biggest cave of this wonderful speleological complex and it is the only one communicating with the outside. It measures 100 m in length, 50 m in width and 60 m in depth. Going beyond the Grave stalactites, stalagmites, curtains and precious crystals continues to embellish everywhere the caves. The name of the environment are the result through the imagination of the early explorers: the She-Wolf, the Monuments, the Owl, the Little Virgin Mary, the Altar, the Precipice, the Desert Corridor, the Reverse Column, the Red Corridor, the Dome up to the last and the most dazzling one, the White Cave.
Smokey Hole Cave
At nearly 200 metres, Smokey Hole Cave in Manchester, Jamaica is the deepest known cave in the island.
Actun Box Ch'iich'
At -183m, Actun Box Ch'iich' (Cave of the Black Birds) is the deepest cave in the country of Belize. Located above Roaring Creek in the Cayo District, it is one of several caves explored and documented by British and Canadian cavers during a three-week expedition in 1989. The cave contains a small stream and has both an upper and lower entrance, making a through-trip possible.
Dent de Crolles
The réseau de la Dent de Crolles, which lies beneath the summit plateau, is one of the most complex and longest cave systems in Europe, and is considered to be one of the birth places of modern caving. Its first detailed exploration was during World War II by a small team of French cavers which included Pierre Chevalier, Fernand Petzl, and Charles Petit-Didier. Their explorations saw it become the deepest cave in the world at the time with a depth of . The lack of available equipment during the war forced Pierre Chevalier and the rest of the team to develop their own equipment, leading to technical innovation. The first use of the single rope technique with prusik and mechanical rope-ascenders (Henri Brenot's "monkeys", first used by Chevalier and Brenot in a cave in 1934) can be directly associated with its exploration.
Picos de Europa
The Picos de Europa contain many of world's deepest caves, including Torca del Cerro (−1589 m), Sima de la Cornisa (−1507 m), Torca los Rebecos (−1255 m) and Pozo del Madejuno (−1252 m). Discovery of new caves and their exploration still continues.
Coral Cave
The Coral Cave () is a marble cave at the northernmost tip of Jämtland, near Ankarvattnet, Sweden. It was discovered in 1985. So far, six kilometres of it have been explored, making it Sweden's longest cave. Members of the public are not allowed to visit the Coral Cave without a guide.
Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park
Sơn Đoòng Cave (in Vietnamese: Hang Sơn Đoòng, meaning Mountain River Cave) is a relatively recently discovered cave in the national park. Found by a local man and explored and publicly announced by the British cave scientists of the British Cave Research Association, it is regarded as the largest cave in the world. The biggest chamber of Sơn Đoòng is over five kilometers in length, 200 meters high and 150 meters wide. With these tremendous dimensions, Sơn Đoòng overtakes Deer Cave of Malaysia to take the title of world's largest cave. Because the fast flowing underground river in the cave deterred the explorers from going farther, they were only able to estimate the length of the cave using a flashlight.
GB Cave
GB Cave is a cave between Charterhouse and Shipham in the limestone of the Mendip Hills, in Somerset, England, and is close to Charterhouse Cave, the deepest in the region.
Hells Canyon
Hells Canyon is a canyon located along the border of eastern Oregon, eastern Washington and western Idaho in the United States. It is part of the Hells Canyon National Recreation Area and is North America's deepest river gorge at .
Sierra de Tamaulipas
In the southeastern part of the Sierra in the municipality of Aldama, Tamaulipas is a limestone karst area in which many caves and cenotes (water-filled sinkholes) are found, including Zacatón which is the deepest sinkhole in the world with a depth of . In 1994, cave-diving pioneer Sheck Exley died attempting to dive to the bottom of Zacatón.
Ghar Parau
A British led caving expedition to the Zagros Mountains in 1971 led to the discovery of the cave. The cave was explored to a depth of 742 m by the time the expedition was forced to return to the surface. The explorers believed that the cave might go on much further, possibly surpassing the Gouffre de la Pierre-Saint-Martin system, which at that time was the world's deepest known cave.
Baumann's Cave
The cave is frequently mentioned in the early scientific and travel literature as it has been open to the public with guided tours since 1649 when Valentin Wagner was installed as first cave guide. Baumann's Cave is probably the oldest regularly frequented and guided show cave, at least in Germany. Amongst its most famous visitors was Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. The cave's biggest chamber, the "Goethesaal", is named after him and is fitted with seats and a stage for concerts and plays.
John Volanthen
In 2004, Volanthen and Stanton set a world record for the greatest depth achieved in a British cave, cave diving at Wookey Hole in Somerset.
In 2010, Volanthen, Stanton, Jason Mallinson, and René Houben set a world record for the longest cave penetration dive, reaching in the Pozo Azul cave system in the Rudrón Valley in Spain.
Krubera Cave
The biocenosis of Krubera-Voronja is composed of more than 12 species of arthropods of several groups, such as pseudoscorpions, spiders, opiliones, crustaceans, springtails, beetles and dipterans. Krubera-Voronja cave is inhabited by endemic species, including four springtails discovered during the CAVEX Team expedition of 2010: "Anurida stereoodorata", "Deuteraphorura kruberaensis", " Schaefferia profundissima", and "Plutomurus ortobalaganensis"; the last of these is the deepest terrestrial animal ever found on Earth, living below the cave entrance. The beetle "Catops cavicis" inhabits Krubera-Voronja cave and also several caves around the Ortobalagan valley. The subterranean amphipod crustacean "Kruberia abchasica" caught by Gennady Samokhin in August 2013, during dives in the siphon 'Dva Kapitana', dwells at the deepest part of the Krubera Cave (at the depth of -2,175 metres).
Endless Caverns
The present mapped extent of Endless Caverns is , making it the 20th longest cave in Virginia and the 176th longest in the United States. Its deepest measured point is below the surface.
Callao Cave
Jackpot Cave in Sitio Tumallo, Bgy. Quibal also Peńablanca is allegedly the country’s second deepest cave with a surveyed depth of about and a surveyed length of . It has a walking passage, winding streams and various-sized pools, multi-depth shafts and drops for lots of rope works.
Lazareva Pećina
The Lazareva Pećina, which translates Lazar's Cave, is the longest explored cave in Serbia. Located in Bor municipality, near Zlot, the cave is also sometimes referred to as Zlotska Cave. According to 2012's "Recent Landform Evolution: The Carpatho-Balkan-Dinaric Region", the cave is long. The cave is situated near the entrance of the deep canyon carved into the mountains by the river Zlotska.
Xe Bang Fai River
Xe Bang Fai River Cave, also known as Khoun Xe Cave (Tham in Laotian is "Cave"), is an immense river cave located in a remote corner of Khammouane Province. It is believed to be one of the largest river cave in the world with enormous passages some 120 meters tall and 200 meters wide, and subterranean channel 7 km long.
Vikos Gorge
The Vikos Gorge, with a length of , walls that range from deep, and a width ranging from to just a few meters at its narrowest part, is listed by the Guinness Book of Records as the deepest canyon in the world in proportion to its width, though some gorge lobbyists contest that claim. The main part of the gorge stretches from the village of Vikos to Monodendri, and attains a depth of about .
Table Mountain (Butte County, California)
The largest cave is located at Phantom Falls, and the deepest cave is at Little Phantom Falls, and actually requires crawling. Both are located in Coal Canyon. A small cave is also located at Flag Falls and Beatson Falls.
Anou Boussouil
In 1950, it was explored to a depth of ; at that time it was known as the second-largest pit in the world. An expedition in 1980 found that the cave reaches a maximum depth of . It was briefly known as Africa's deepest cave before Anou Ifflis was explored to a depth of .
Titan (cave)
Titan is a natural cavern near Castleton in the Derbyshire Peak District, and is the deepest shaft of any known cave in Britain, at . The existence of Titan was revealed in November 2006, following its discovery on 1 January 1999 after cavers discovered connections from the James Hall Over Engine Mine to both Speedwell Cavern and Peak Cavern. Previously, the deepest known underground shaft in Britain had been Gaping Gill on the slopes of Ingleborough in the Yorkshire Dales.
István Cave
The cave is still being explored, but only a part can be visited. Its deepest known area is named "Hell". The most beautiful dripstone structures are the "Mammut's Mouth", "Fairyland", "Column Hall" and "Concert Hall". Due to water filling the cave in 1958 and 1974, the inner caverns are presumably connected with water drains.
Ellison's Cave
Ellison's features a number of underground vertical pitches including the two deepest pits in the continental United States: Fantastic (586 feet) and Incredible (440 feet). These two pits lie on opposite sides of the cave. Nearby and parallel to Fantastic are Smokey I (500 feet), Smokey II (262 feet), and other extremely deep pitches. There are over 7 routes to reach the bottom level of the cave from the Fantastic side. Fantastic and Smokey I both extend to TAG Hall, a passage at the bottom of the cave. To reach Fantastic, or the large pits on the Fantastic side, cavers must also descend the Warm Up pit (125 feet).
Lechuguilla Cave
The cave was visited infrequently after mining activities ceased. However, in the 1950s, cavers heard wind roaring up from the rubble-choked cave floor. Although no route was obvious, people concluded that cave passages lay below the rubble. Led by Dave Allured, a group of cavers from the Colorado Grotto gained permission from the National Park Service and began digging in 1984. Since the breakthrough into large walking passages occurred on May 26, 1986, explorers have mapped over of passages, making Lechuguilla the eighth-longest cave in the world and fourth-longest in the United States. Lechuguilla was also the deepest known cave in the continental United States until the exploration of Tears of the Turtle Cave in 2014. Drawn by the cave's pristine condition and rare beauty, cavers come from around the world to explore and map its passages and geology.
Wyandotte Caves
The main entrance to Wyandotte Cave is 220 feet (67 m) above the level of the Blue River. Wyandotte Cave is known for its long open passageways and large rooms. With 9.2 miles (14.806 km) of passageways on five levels it is the fifth longest cave in Indiana. Included in its formations is Monument Mountain. At 135 feet (41.148 m) tall, Monument Mountain is considered to be the world's largest underground mountain. Wyandotte Cave is also home to a great many helictites, which are considered rare. The cave is also home to the tallest stalagmite in the world, known as the Pillar of the Constitution, but this is only visible on crawling tours.
Cave diving
Hranice Abyss, or Hranická Propast, is the world's deepest known underwater cavity. It beat the previous record holder, Pozzo del Merro in Italy, by . Polish explorer Krzysztof Starnawski, who has explored the upper parts of the flooded fissure for decades, has determined the depth to be at least . As of 2017, divers have yet to reach the bottom of the cave.
Oudomxay Province
Chom Ong Cave, the longest cave in Laos, is located in Ban Chom Ong, 45 km to the northwest of Oudomxay town and is the biggest known cave in northern Laos. The cave was explored by a team of cave researchers during 2009, 2010 and 2011 and reported to be 18.4 km long and considered as the second longest in Laos and 9th longest in South East Asia. The average dimensions of the cave is 20–25 m in width and 20–30 m in height. It has two passages, one is a stream and the other has fossils and both connect to a large hall which is 100 m long, 30 m wide and of varying height of 30–50 m up to the roof. It has a stream inlet in the north and the stream outflows in the southern end.
Ellison's Cave
Ellison's Cave is a pit cave located in Walker County, on Pigeon Mountain in the Appalachian Plateaus of Northwest Georgia. It is the 12th deepest cave in the United States and features the deepest, unobstructed pit in the continental US named Fantastic Pit. The cave is over 12 miles long and extends 1063 feet vertically.
Yarlung Tsangpo Grand Canyon
The Yarlung Tsangpo Grand Canyon or Yarlung Zangbo Grand Canyon () or simply the Tsangpo Canyon, Brahmaputra Canyon or Tsangpo Gorge, along the Yarlung Tsangpo River in Tibet Autonomous Region, China, is the deepest canyon in the world, and at 504.6 km (314 miles) is slightly longer than the Grand Canyon in the United States, making it one of the world's largest. The Yarlung Tsangpo (Tibetan name for the upper course of the Brahmaputra) originates near Mount Kailash and runs east for about 1700 km, draining a northern section of the Himalayas before it enters the gorge just downstream of Pei, Tibet near the settlement of Zhibe. The canyon has a length of about 240 km (150 miles) as the gorge bends around Mount Namcha Barwa (7782 m) and cuts its way through the eastern Himalayan range. Its waters drop from about 2,900 m near Pei to about 1,500 m at the end of the Upper Gorge where the Po Tsangpo River enters. The river continues through the Lower Gorge to the Indian border at an elevation of 660 m. The river then enters Arunachal Pradesh and eventually becomes the Brahmaputra.
Siebenhengste-Hohgant-Höhle
In 2010, it was the world's 11th longest cave, with a 154-km development. It is also the world's 22nd deepest cave at 1,340 m deep.
Sima Pumacocha
Sima Pumacocha (possibly from Spanish "sima" deep and dark cavern/abyss, Quechua "puma" cougar, puma, "qucha" lake) is a limestone cave located in the Lima Region, Yauyos Province, Laraos District, in central Peru near the village of Laraos, high in the Andes mountains. At 638 meters deep, it held the record for deepest known cave in South America from 2001 to 2006 when it was surpassed by Abismo Guy Collet. With the entrance being 4372 meters above sea level and the depth being over 500 meters, it is the highest major cave in the world. and It is located at .
Nettlebed Cave
Until April 2010, when the nearby Ellis Basin cave system was found to be deeper, Nettlebed Cave was thought to be the deepest cave system in the southern hemisphere. It drops 889 metres below its upper entrance (Blizzard Pot) to its lower exit (the Pearse River resurgence), and its 24 kilometres of cave passages make it New Zealand's third longest cave.
Ogdens Cave Natural Area Preserve
With nearly of the cave mapped, Ogdens Cave is the longest known cave in Frederick County. Several rare invertebrate species are found within the cave, including the thin-neck cave beetle ("Pseudanophthalmus parvicollis"), two amphipods, an isopod, and the Appalachian springsnail ("Fontigens bottimeri"). These species are sustained by nutrients delivered by the cave's stream and by various animals, such as bats and crickets, that come and go from time to time.
Lamprechtsofen
As of 2014, Lamprechtsofen is the fourth-deepest cave in the world, since two more Georgian caves have since been discovered to be deeper. Sarma Cave is and Illyuzia-Mezhonnogo-Snezhnaya Cave is .
Neffs Cave
In 1952 the Salt Lake Grotto of the National Speleological Society was established, and several weeks later the grotto's members obtained permission from the National Forest Service to explore the cave. They spent nearly eleven hours in the cave but had not reached the end of the main passage before they had to turn back. Teams from the grotto returned in 1953 and 1956, and in the last visit they succeeded in reaching the bottom of the main passage. They calculated a vertical depth of 1186 feet (361 meters), which was later revised to the present figure of 1163 feet (354 meters). Neffs Cave is the 13th deepest cave discovered in the United States.
Chevé Cave
Chevé Cave was discovered in the mid-1980s by Bill Farr and Carol Vesely. Since then it has been pushed to the depth of , making it the second deepest cave in the Americas. The cave system has the greatest proven depth potential in the world as proven by a dye trace from its main entrance to the resurgence 2547 meters lower. The current terminus of the main Chevé system is a large breakdown pile reached after diving through two sumps. It is just over 9 kilometers from the entrance, making it currently one of the most remote underground locations on earth. Due to the logistical difficulties of continuing exploration from this point, current expeditions are focusing on finding mid-way entrances that might provide a quicker route into the middle Chevé system.
Blauhöhle
The Blauhöhle is the largest cave system in the Swabian Alps in southern Germany. The Blauhöhle presumably originated in a time when the Danube still flowed through the Blau valley. Since the shifting of the Danube, several small rivers, the Schmiech, the Ach, and the Blau, have flowed through this valley. The cave system begins about 21 meters under water at the base of the Blautopf. It continues west and northwest, rising and falling several times until after a horizontal distance of about it comes above the level of ground water and opens into the second big air-filled chamber. The maximum depth of the cave under water is .
Deer Cave
Deer Cave was known as the largest cave passage in the world until the discovery of Sơn Đoòng cave in Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park in Vietnam. It is part of the Gunung Mulu National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site characterised by amazing caves and karst formations in a mountainous equatorial rainforest setting. 
The Clearwater cave, with approximately of known passages, is considered the longest cave system in Southeast Asia. It is recognised for its clear underground stream, popular with tourists. The Wind cave is located on the same trail leading to Clearwater cave, and is known for its blowing wind. It contains a chamber dubbed King’s Room, a cavern containing huge columns of stone on both the ceiling and the floor. The Lang cave is the smallest of the caves open to the public. However, its size allows up-close opportunities to see some of the common cave inhabitants such as bats and swiftlets.
Noon's Hole
Noon's Hole (Irish grid ref H12684431) lies about 5 km northwest of the centre of Boho, in the townland of Old Barr in the parish of Devenish, County Fermanagh, close to the border with Boho parish. The cave is under part of the escarpment on the east side of the Glenade Sandstone uplands. At , this pothole was thought to have the deepest shaft in Ireland, but this honour was passed to the nearby Reyfad Pot, which contains an entrance shaft of . The continuation of the cave system (incorporating the Afternoon Series and High Noon's) contains of passage, and it connects to the resurgence at Arch Cave through three cave dives, making this system the 8th deepest in Ireland, at .
North West Highlands Geopark
The area contains a number of limestone caves. The most well known of these is Smoo Cave, a large sea cave near Durness. This cave is unique within the UK in that its outer chamber was formed by the action of seawater, while the inner chambers were formed by fresh water. Its entrance 15 metres high, is the largest entrance of any sea cave in the British Isles. Archaeological excavations have found evidence of human habitation dating back to the Mesolithic period. The cave became well known after Sir Walter Scott visited it in 1814. Another notable cave site is the Inchnadamph Bone Caves. At these caves, remains of Eurasian lynx, brown bear, Arctic fox, reindeer and polar bears have been found; as well as human remains dated between 4,515 and 4,720 years old. Uamh an Claonaite, Scotland's longest cave is partly located below these Bone Caves.
Tés
The Alba Regia cave is the third deepest cave in the country. Its exploration was begun in 1975 and due to the hostile environment it took for quite a long time. In October, the entrance test hole, which depth is almost five meters, was dug. Exploratories went along the next 30 metres through strait routes full of scree. Then, beyond some crannies, they reached the so-called "Explorer branch" of the cave in which the first stalagmites could be seen. At the bottom of the test hole, sunk in extremely difficult circumstances, the channel was opened on 24 October. The air temperature of the inner passages of Cave Alba Regia is about 7 degrees lower than the Hungarian average 8,1-8,5°C. During the exploration, the strong enrichment of carbon dioxide in some passages became apparent. It is Istvan Eszterhas who collects and converses the wildlife of the cave that was wholly closed until its discovery. He started trapping in 1976, and even in that year he could differentiate between 21 species. In 1977, the number of cave creatures increased to 56, and in 1979, it was as high as 70. The cave can be visited only with a permission and a professional guide.
Hellhole
Hellhole is a large and deep pit cave in Germany Valley, eastern West Virginia. It is the 7th longest cave in the United States and is home to almost half of the world's population of Virginia big-eared bats. At 518 feet (158 meters), Hellhole is the deepest of several caves in the Valley.
Castleguard Cave
Castleguard Cave is a limestone cave located at the north end of Banff National Park in the Rocky Mountains of Alberta, Canada. With of surveyed passages (as of 2007), it is Canada's longest cave, and its fifth deepest at . Castleguard Cave ascends gently from its entrance and terminates beneath the Columbia Icefield.
Bill Steele (cave explorer)
Charles William Steele, Jr. (born October 17, 1948), known as “Bill Steele,” is a cave explorer. He is a speleologist who has led and participated in expeditions to many of the longest and deepest caves in the USA, Mexico, and China. He has explored more than 2,500 caves across North America and Asia and has written two books chronicling his expeditions: "Yochib: The River Cave", and "Huautla: Thirty Years in One of the World's Deepest Caves.” TV shows such as National Geographic Explorer, NOVA and How’d They Do That? have aired programs on his expeditions.
Thiên Đường Cave
Thiên Đường Cave (Paradise Cave) is a cave in Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park, UNESCO's World Heritage Site, 60 km northwest of Đồng Hới city.
Thiên Đường Cave is located on an elevation of 200 meters above the sea level, near the west branch of Ho Chi Minh Highway, in Son Trach Commune, Bố Trạch District, Quảng Bình Province, Vietnam. The cave was discovered by a local man in 2005 and the first 5 km of this cave was explored by explorers from British Cave Research Association in 2005, the whole 31 km was explored and publicly announced by the British cave explorers. This cave is 31 km long, longer than Phong Nha Cave which had been considered the longest cave in this national park. The height can reach to 72 m and 150 m wide. The limestone formation is also more spectacular than that of Phong Nha Cave. The British cave explorers were impressed by the beautiful and spectacular stalactites and stalagmites inside this cave and they named it "Thiên Đường Cave" ("Paradise Cave").
In 2012, a new species of troglobiontic scorpion species, "Vietbocap thienduongensis" was found in here.
Karst Underwater Research
In January 2013, KUR divers found that Phantom Spring is the deepest underwater cave yet measured in the United States at a depth of .
Carreg Cadno
Ogof Ffynnon Ddu, Britain's deepest cave lies under the northern slopes of Carreg Cadno. The vertical interval between the sink of the Byfre Fechan stream at Pwll Byfre and its resurgence at Ffynnon Ddu is 300m / 1000 ft. The national nature reserve has been established to protect both the surface features and the vegetation and habitats which they provide and also the extensive cave network beneath.
Tuckaleechee Caverns
Tuckaleechee Caverns () is a set of caverns and AAA GEM attraction in Townsend, Tennessee, near the Smoky Mountains. The caverns were discovered in the mid-19th century and were opened to the public by Bill Vananda and Harry Myers in 1953. The caverns are known for the "Big Room", an immense cave/cavern room that a football stadium could fit inside. The caverns have stalagmites reaching 24 feet tall with flow-stone formations hundreds of feet in length and width.
Open MARCH 15 to NOVEMBER 15
Tuckaleechee Caverns also has the tallest underground waterfall in the country named "Silver Falls", a 210-foot two-tier waterfall. The cavern originates at White Oak Sinks in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The Caverns host a seismograph system monitored by the United States Department of Defense,CTBTO and the United States Geological Survey (USGS).
Badami cave temples
Caves 1 to 4 are in the escarpment of the hill in soft Badami sandstone formation, to the south-east of the town. In Cave 1, among various sculptures of Hindu divinities and themes, a prominent carving is of the Tandava-dancing Shiva as Nataraja. Cave 2 is mostly similar to Cave 1 in terms of its layout and dimensions, featuring Hindu subjects of which the relief of Vishnu as Trivikrama is the largest. The largest cave is Cave 3, featuring Vishnu-related mythology, and it is also the most intricately carved cave in the complex. Cave 4 is dedicated to revered figures of Jainism. Around the lake, Badami has additional caves of which one may be a Buddhist cave. Another cave was discovered in 2015, about from the four main caves, with 27 Hindu carvings.
Siddha cave
Siddha Cave or Siddha Gufa is a cave located in Bimalnagar, Tanahu District, Nepal. It is the largest cave in Nepal and second largest cave in South Asia. It's around 0.5 kilometer inside and around 2500 people can feet inside. If you would like to go over Siddha Cave then you have to vehicle from Kathmandu on Prithvi Highway which will take around 4 hours to Bimalnagar, then you have to walk up hills on steps. It will take around 1.5 hours from Bimalnagar to reach to Cave.
New Athos Cave
The New Athos Cave (; ; ) also Novoafonskaya, Novy Afon Cave, or New Afon Cave is a karst cave in the Iverian Mountain in Abkhazia (Georgia) near New Athos. It is one of the largest caves in the world with the volume of its void of about 1,000,000 m³.
Macocha Gorge
The Macocha Abyss (Czech: "Propast Macocha", literally the "Stepmother Abyss"), also known as the Macocha Gorge, is a sinkhole in the Moravian Karst cave system of the Czech Republic located north of the city of Brno, near the town of Blansko. It is part of the Punkva Caves and the Punkva River flows through it. The sinkhole is about 138.7 meters deep, which makes it the deepest of its kind (light hole type) in Central Europe.
It is a popular tourist attraction for casual visitors to the region, in addition to cavers and advanced technical divers.
Gagra Range
The range is mostly made up of limestone, with pronounced karst topography and is characterized by many deep canyons created by rivers. The deepest cave in the world, the Veryovkina Cave, is located in the Arabika Massif of the Gagra Range.
Moncodeno
The most notable of these are the Alto Releccio, with a depth of , making it one of the deepest caves in Italy, as well as the "Icebox of Moncodeno", a cave, visited by Leonardo da Vinci that stays icy even in summer.
Riesending cave
The Riesending cave () is a pit cave in Untersberg and the deepest and longest in Germany. It was discovered in 1996. In June 2014 it became well known because of a large effort to rescue a lead speleologist.
Arroyo Seco, Querétaro
The area’s location over the Huasteca Karst and the erosion of limestone has given rise to numerous pit caves. The largest of these in the Sierra Gorda is located in Arroyo Seco, called the Sótano de Barro, located in the Santa María de los Cocos community. The Sótano del Barro is one of the largest cavities of the world by volume, measuring 15 million cubic metres, surpassed only the Sima Mayor de Sarisariñama in Venezuela. In comparison, the Sótano de Las Golondrinas has a volume of only five million meters cubed. Its widest diameter measures 420 meters and its average width is 200 meters. It has a total depth of 455 meters with a direct drop of 410 meters. Its perimeter is surrounded by dense vegetation, which is a sanctuary for green macaws. It requires a walk or mule ride of about two hours through dense forest to reach. The walls of the pit cave are mostly vertical and partially covered by vegetation. At the bottom of the cave there is a small forest on a floor which was sea bed 100 million years ago, which measures 220 meters long and 100 meters wide. Despite its depth, the bottom of the pit cave receives an abundance of sunlight allowing for the growth of trees and other vegetation, making it an isolated mini forest. The bottom also has a number of small caves, with the largest fifty meters long. This pit cave has been classified as the deepest in the world although this has recently been challenged by those who wish to include those pit caves which are not continuous such as the Stary Swistak in Austria, which has a total depth of 480 meters.
Kinderle Cave
The entrance to the cave is located at an altitude of 94 m and is connected to an inclined tunnel. In the tunnel is a glacier measuring 720 square m and a thickness of 8 m. Various stalagmites grow on the glacier. The length of the cave is 8130 m, including 230 m under water. The volume of the cave is 229600 cubic meters, the floor area is 39400 square meters. The average width of the pass is 5.4 m, the height is 7.1 m. The amplitude of the corridors is 215 m, this is the deepest cave in the Urals. Around the cave grows cannabis, so the Bashkirs called the cave Kinderle. They kept meat on the glacier in the summer.
Pettyjohn Cave
Pettyjohn Cave (also known as Wilsons Cave, Pettyjohn's Cave, Petty John's Cave, and other similar spellings) is a karst cave located in Walker County, Georgia on the east side Pigeon Mountain in the Appalachian Plateau of Northwest Georgia. It has a surveyed length of 31,490 ft and reaches a depth of 235 ft. The cave is accessible via a path from a gravel parking area on the side of Rocky Lane. Out of the 242 listed, it is 119th longest cave in the United States as declared by the Georgia Speleological Survey.
Laurel Caverns
Laurel Caverns, is the deepest cave in the northeastern United States and the largest in volume. Located in Farmington, Pennsylvania, it sits on Chestnut Ridge near Uniontown, about southeast of Pittsburgh.
Cades Cove
The fracturing and weathering of the limestone and sandstone in Cades Cove has led to the formation of several caves in the vicinity, the two largest of which are Gregory's Cave and Bull Cave. Bull Cave, at 924 feet (281 m), is the deepest cave in Tennessee. Trilobite and brachiopod fossils have been found in Gregory's Cave.
Chevé Cave
In 2004, an international caving expedition led by the U.S. Deep Caving Team discovered a new cave they named J2. The entrance of J2 located 5 kilometers northeast of the Chevé Cave entrance. J2 appears to head in the direction of Chevé Cave, with a predicted intersection beyond the tunnel collapse that stopped the team in 2003. Current expeditions are underway to find a connection between J2 and Chevé Cave, which will produce a cave system more than 2 kilometers in depth. The integration of the entire system will produce a 2,597 meter deep cave and would represent the deepest cave in the world.
Tsumeb
One of the largest and deepest underground lakes in the world lies a little to the east of Tsumeb, on a farm called Harasib. To reach the water in the cave one has either to abseil or to descend an ancient, hand-forged ladder that hangs free of the vertical dolomite walls of the cave for over 50 m. Here, too, SCUBA divers have descended as deep as they have dared (80 m) in the crystal-clear waters and have reported nothing but deep blue below them from one ledge of dolomite to the next with nothing discernible in the depths.
Gunung Mulu National Park
The national park has three notable caves: Sarawak Chamber, one of the world's largest underground chambers, Deer Cave, the largest cave passage in the world, and Clearwater Cave, the longest cave system in Southeast Asia. The Sarawak Chamber is long, wide and at least high, yielding a volume of and an unsupported roof span of . Meanwhile, the Deer Cave is at to in diameter. As of October 2018, Clearwater Cave has of explored passages.
Mount Paraw
Paraw cave or Ghar Parau is located in 3050 meter above sea level which is the highest cave in the world and well known as Everest of world caves. this cave has 751 meter depth and with D5 degree of difficulty recognized as one of hardest caves to caving. The British caving team which discovered the cave named their group Ghar Parau foundation. Five professional cavers have lost their lives in this cave.
Krubera Cave
Krubera Cave (; Also known as Voronya Cave, sometimes spelled Voronja Cave) is the second deepest known cave on Earth after the Veryovkina Cave. It is located in the Arabika Massif of the Gagra Range of the Western Caucasus, in the Gagra district of Abkhazia, a breakaway region of Georgia, currently under Russian occupation.
Levan Maruashvili
Levan Iosifovich Maruashvili ( born 25 October 1912, Novocherkassk, Russian Empire, — 5 December 1992, Tbilisi, Georgia) was a prominent Georgian geographer. Doctor of Geographical Sciences (1954), professor (1965). Honored Scientist of the Georgian SSR (1966) and Abkhaz ASSR. Honorary member of the Russian Geographical Society (1985). He introduced a new concept of karst-sphere into the science. Krubera Cave, which is the world’s deepest known cave (2197 m), was discovered by the Georgian researchers in 1960 by the leadership of Professor Levan Maruashvili.
List of longest caves
Caves are found around the world. The largest form in areas of karst landforms whose rocks erode easily. Preferable conditions for cave formation are adequate precipitation, enough plants and animals to produce ample carbon dioxide, and a landscape of gentle hills which drains slowly. The highest concentrations of long caves in the world are found in the Pennyrile of southern Kentucky, United States, in the Black Hills of South Dakota, United States, and in the Yucatán Peninsula, Mexico.
Pit cave
During World War II, a team composed by Pierre Chevalier, Fernand Petzl, Charles Petit-Didier and others explored the Dent de Crolles cave system near Grenoble, France. It became known as the deepest cave in the world () at that time. The lack of available technical equipment during the war forced Chevalier and his team to innovate and develop their own. The scaling-pole (1940), nylon ropes (1942), use of explosives in caves (1947), and mechanical rope-ascenders (Henri Brenot's "monkeys", first used by Chevalier and Brenot in a cave in 1934) can be traced historically to the exploration of the Dent de Crolles cave system.
Jaskinia Niedźwiedzia
Jaskinia Niedźwiedzia (pronounced Yaskeenya Niecwiedza and translated as Bear Cave) - is the longest cave in Śnieżnik Mountains part of Sudety mountains discovered in 1966, located near village Kletno in Poland. Famous from many excavations of the cave bear (Ursus spelaeus).
Hranice Abyss
The Hranice Abyss (), the English name adopted by the local tourist authorities, is the deepest flooded pit cave in the world. It is a karst sinkhole located near the town of Hranice (Přerov District). The greatest confirmed depth (as of 27 September 2016) is 473 m (404 m under the water level), which makes it the deepest known underwater cave in the world. Moreover, the expected depth is 800–1200 m.