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Sharing the Secret of Kartchner Caverns By Pat Agnew BENSON, Arizona, December 13, 2001 (ENS) - There is a rush in visiting a underground cavern, a tightening in the back of the knees, as if a skyscraper elevator had just dropped away beneath you. There is a sense that you are abandoning all things familiar for darkness. I felt it as I entered the airlock at the entrance to Kartchner Caverns State Park near Benson, Arizona. After Mammoth Cave and Carlsbad Caverns, languishing in the dust of cave death, it was exciting to think of seeing a living cave much as the first explorers had seen it.
Of the top 10 caves in the world, only two are in the United States.
Kartchner is one of them. Lechuguilla Cave in New Mexico is the other.
Millions of dollars have been spent to preserve Kartchner Caverns and make
them accessible to the public. Lechuguilla may never be accessible as it
underlies private land and is off limits except to invited experts.
Few decisions about public monuments in nature have begun with 14 years of secrecy as did the made for Kartchner Caverns. In 1974 Randy Tufts and Gary Tenen were college buddies, amateur cavers in the mountains of southern Arizona. If this cavern near the Whetstone Mountains had not heaved a sigh and given up its secret as they were walking by, it might still be hidden. The two had once before examined this sinkhole with a narrow crack in it. It seemed to lead nowhere. But caves exhale, and on this day there was a breeze smelling of bat guano blowing from the crack, the tantalizing indication of a cave. They squeezed through the crack to a room which others had explored before. At its end they found a small hole blowing air. They wriggled through to find themselves in Xanadu, as they later dubbed the cave, and realized they were the first explorers. Tufts and Tenen confided the secret of the cave to a select group of cavers, who kept their mouths shut. They also confided in James Kartchner and his family, under whose land the cave was located. The Kartchners, too, guarded the secret. Plans for preserving the caverns were discussed and discarded over in the years. In 1984, Tufts and Tenen approached Arizona State Parks, and when Ken Travous became director in 1987 he made acquisition of the caverns a priority. The Nature Conservancy purchased an option on the property to hold for the state of Arizona until the legislature could act. In May 1988, the state bought the option and planning began. Nearly $29 million was committed and spent, and in November 1999 Kartchner Caverns opened to the public. In most commercially available caves, preservationists do not get there first. The planners and construction experts at Kartchner broke new ground. Seismometers were used to measure the effects of the blasting necessary to create tunnels to the cave. No heavy equipment was allowed in the cave. Arizona's desert air is dry, and the cave formations owe their existence to the 99 percent humidity inside. The destructive effects of allowing outside air into the cave were understood and air locks were installed. Algae growth in commercial caves is inevitable. The lighting necessary to viewing causes algae to sprout. Visitors bring in the heat of their bodies and exhale carbon dioxide which encourage algal growth. To control their impact, visitors entering Kartchner pass through an air curtain that blows lint from their clothing. Kick plates along the trail inside collect any foreign materials on their shoes that could alter the fragile ecosystem. Touching or breaking cave formations is punishable by law. The oil in a fingertip can cause formations to stop growing. No food or drink, no chewing gum or cigarettes, no flash photography, no video - those are the rules. The tour is an enchanted hour. There is time to listen to the sounds of the cave, the dripping water which created it. Strolling by formations called cave pearls, fried eggs, bacon, and soda straws - visitors can study the fantastic stone drapery and totems and relish the colors of the stone, backlighted to bring out the shading. There is a Hummingbird Garden, and a theater named for Tufts and Tenen where a preview film is shown. An amphitheater in the Throne Room allows visitors sit and let their eyes do the climbing as formations are highlighted and described by the guide, including the 58 foot pillar named Kubla Khan, reaching from floor to ceiling. Reservations are required, as controlling the number of visitors and monitoring the cave conditions will determine how successful the effort will be to keep the cave alive. Kartchner Caverns State Park is roughly 50 miles from Tucson and 160 miles south of Phoenix, Arizona. Reservations must be made on the phone, not online. Call 520-586-2283. Links: Kartchner Caverns State Park: http://www.kaet.asu.edu/wildaz/caverns/cavern.html Arizona State Parks: http://www.pr.state.az.us/parkhtml/kartchner.html Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2001. All rights reserved. |
