The Land Down Under

Above ground, Indiana has little unexplored terrain. But underground, untold miles of undiscovered rock formations, impressive rooms and winding, narrow passages await cavers -- a peculiar breed of underground adventurers.\nGraduate student Laura Hohman is a fanatical caver. On the rear bumper of her green Toyota Echo is a yellow sticker with a black bat.\nHohman, 24, says her favorite part of caving is seeing something others can't or won't.\n"You're a lot more cut off," explains Hohman, who says she has always been athletic and adventurous. "It's practically silent down there. It's complete and total darkness."\nCommitted cavers explore Indiana's underground mazes for science, adventure or just for fun. Some were drawn by the sheer thrill and found a weekend pastime. Others were looking for exercise and found a way to get their heart beating. Still others were curious and found a passion they're still chasing. In Bloomington and Southern Indiana, caves are part of a vast subterranean drainage system, or karst, says Sam Frushour, director of the field services section of the Indiana Geological Survey.\nComposed of soluble mid-Mississippi limestone, karst valleys southwest of Bloomington drain into Richland and Clear Creeks, and the Mitchell Plateau to the South boasts thousands of sinkholes and hundreds of caves, Frushour says. Karsts are irregular limestone regions with sinks, underground streams and caverns. \nMonroe County has more than 400 caves, featuring a variety of entrances: springs, sinkholes, vertical shafts and deep pits, he says.\nTom Sollman, a director for the Indiana Karst Conservancy, says that although the spirit of adventure attracts most loyalists to caving, there's something that fosters each person's life-long love for caves.\n"With caves, you're the first there. That's what gets you started," he says. "What keeps you going is one goal -- something like photography, mapping or geology."\nFor Sollman, conservation kept him interested in caving. He caves to protect caves. The Indiana Karst Conservatory is buying caves to protect them -- through fundraisers, grants and from money generated by Indiana's environmental license plate.\nFor Bruce DeVore, another director for the Indiana Karst Conservancy, his favorite aspect is to look for "historic graffiti."\n"It's really neat to see signatures from the 1830s and realize people have been coming here for years," says DeVore, who enjoys exploring a cool cavern on hot summer day and long, underground crawls.\nWhile graffiti from the past is novel, DeVore emphasized new graffiti is another story -- it's entirely unacceptable. Today, scientists know more about protecting caves, he says, and so we must be more conscious. In its manual for beginning cavers, the National Speleology Society cites a creed it says all cavers must follow: "Take nothing but pictures. Leave nothing but footprints. Kill nothing but time."\nMany caves in Bloomington have not been well kept, primarily because of use by students. A notable example, Buckner's Cave, has been repeatedly trashed by college students.\nClean-up efforts by the IU Spelunking Club are more effective when people are willing to keep an eye on caves and maintain their beauty.\nBut for all of caving's wonder, the sport carries serious risks.\n"The greatest danger is going in without proper equipment and training," says Anmar Mirza, an experienced caver from Bloomington.\nThe danger of caves is magnified by their novelty, which tends to draw inexperienced cavers, Frushour says. But the simple lack of information makes caves even more dangerous.\n"These places are wet, dirty, nasty," Frushour says. "Some people don't realize what they're getting into, so they only do it once."\nOne danger of caves stands out: They flood.\nFloods have killed five people in Southern Indiana. All five victims were IU students.\nIn February 1975, three students from IU's Fort Wayne campus drowned in Salamander Cave, south of Bloomington. In July of 1961 two IU students from Bloomington drowned in Show Farm Cave in Orange County. In both cases, it had either rained or was raining before they entered the cave.\nIn these, as in most cases, taking precautions -- like checking the weather before caving -- would have eliminated most of the danger of the caves, Sollman says.\n"The caves aren't the problem," Sollman adds. "The dangerous part is getting to the caves."\nTo learn about safety and to get to the right caves, beginning spelunkers can rely on regional caving clubs for the correct equipment and knowledgeable guides.\nFor those who are unfortunate and do get stuck or lost in caves, there are people in Bloomington who teach and train cave rescue teams for the National Cave Rescue Commission. Though there is no cave rescue team in Monroe County, they are often available to perform rescues as needed. A member of the commission, Hohman has participated in a number of local cave rescues.\nA few years ago, Hohman participated in an overnight rescue in Kentucky. Her team was called in when the rescue became too difficult for a team they had trained. In a rescue that took several hours, Hohman helped remove on a stretcher a man who had been badly injured in a fall. He stepped across a ledge, the ledge gave way and he plunged into a deep shaft. He broke his leg and several other bones. After securing the man on a stretcher, it took the rescue team several hours to gingerly remove him from the cave.\nThe IU Spelunking Club offers tours of a variety of experience levels and access to professional equipment. For a once-a-year $10 charge, members can go on as many trips with veteran cavers as they want. The club meets at 7:30 p.m. on the first Thursday of every month in Geology Room 143.\nIU Outdoor Adventures also offers tours through local caves, for a per-trip fee. \nThe best advice for first-time cavers is to avoid bad habits -- such as littering and unauthorized caving -- from the beginning, Devore says. Beyond that, remain calm in all caving situation, he adds. In a cave in Sloan's Valley Cave System several years ago, DeVore got stuck for several minutes.\n"I panicked," he says. "You need to keep your head about you. Either you're comfortable in there or you're not."\nUnquestionably comfortable in caves, Hohman was eager to get back underground last month after a long absence from caving. Her exploration of caves has led her from the karst formations of southern Indiana and Kentucky to grand underground caverns in South America and to the Western Belize Regional Cave Project, of which she is a participant.\nBut work on an IU graduate degree and a part time job at the Mathers Museum have lately kept Hohman from her favorite pastime.\nIn Trapdoor, Hohman was a little less adventurous than her fellow veteran cavers, who explored alternate routes and climbed vertical passages.\nShe wasn't afraid to admit she wasn't comfortable climbing "The Christmas Tree," a "chimney" rock formation requiring an upward climb of approximately 20 feet. Despite her vast experience, Hohman says every caver should know -- and respect -- their own limitations. \n"I'm sure I could make it up there," Hohman says. "It's getting down that might be a problem"