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Krubera/Voronya Cave Facts

Krubera/Voronya Cave Facts
Krubera Cave, also referred to as Voronya Cave, is the world's deepest (known) cave, located in Abkhazia, Georgia. Exploration has reached as far as 2,197 meters, making it the only cave known to exist on the planet that reaches further than 2,000 meters. The name Krubera Cave is derived from the name of the Russian geographer Alexander Kruber. The alternative name Voronya Cave is translated to mean 'Crows' Cave' in Russian. Crows Cave was appropriate because the Kiev speleologists noted the presence of several crows at the entrance in the 1980s. A cave diver named Gennadiy Samokhin was responsible for reaching the lowest reported depth in the cave in 2012, at 2,197 meters.
Interesting Krubera/Voronya Cave Facts:
Krubera Cave is one of five caves in the Arabika Massif mountain block to reach depths more than 1,000 meters.
It is believed that the caves of Arabika Massif, including Krubera Cave, were formed as the mountains began to rise approximately five million years ago.
Krubera Cave's Arabika Massif mountain block was written about in the early 1900s by Edouard-Alfred Martel, a speleologist from France. He published papers after visiting the massif.
In 1909 and 1910 Alexander Kruber began to study Arabika. He published writing about Arabika. Krubera Cave was later named after him.
From the early 1910s to 1960 exploration of Krubera Cave was mostly ignored by the geology community.
In the 1960s it was discovered that Krubera Cave could reach more than 310 meters.
In the 1980s exploration of Arabika Massif began to more common, led by Alexander Klimchuk. By 1987 the cave had been explored as deep as 340 meters.
In 2010 exploration of Krubera Cave reached 1,710 meters.
In 2012 a team of cave divers set up camp in Krubera and the new record of 2,197 meters was reached by Gennadiy Samokhin.
Krubera Cave is a deep, mostly vertical cave system. Passages in the cave system can be narrow and difficult to pass or wide and very large.
In order to explore the caves completely cave divers need to be prepared to put on scuba gear because tunnels in the caves can sometimes become flooded. Flooded tunnels are referred to as sumps.
Some of the passageways in Krubera Cave had to be widened to make it possible for cave divers and explorers to venture further.
The cave system that includes Krubera starts high in the mountains at approximately 2,256 meters.
There are 12 arthropod species in Krubera Cave and a beetle called the Catops Cavicis that is endemic.
The deepest living terrestrial animal found on earth can be found in Krubera Cave. This is a 3mm cellembole with no eyes and is believed to survive on fungus and organic material. It can live as far down into the earth as 1,980 meters.
A cave in Mexico's Oaxaca region is set to be explored in 2017 and some believe it may be deeper than Krubera Cave's depth record. However there are many more caves to be explored around the world that some believe will prove to be even deeper.


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