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Susan Montoya Bryan | The Associated Press
7/24/2008 - 7/25/08
FORT STANTON CAVE, N.M. — Hundreds of feet beneath Earth's surface, a small group of seasoned cave explorers venture where no human ever has set foot . With each careful step they take, their headlamps illuminate walls covered with mud, gypsum crystals and mineral deposits left behind by microscopic organisms eating through fractured rocks.
The real attraction, though, is under their shoes.
A quick pass of a headlamp over the cave floor reveals a massive formation that resembles a white river flowing between the cave's banks. As the light shines more intensely on the odd and seemingly endless formation, an intricate crust of tiny calcite crystals comes into focus.
They've reached Snowy River — already the longest-known continuous cave formation in the world, with no end to it yet in sight.
"I think Snowy River is one of the primo places underground in the world and there's still so much left that we haven't discovered. We don't even know how big it is," says Jim Goodbar, the senior cave and karst specialist for the Bureau of Land Management.
The survey expedition by members of the Fort Stanton Cave Study Project in early July added several thousand feet of known terrain to the spectacular formation, which now measures four miles long.
The best part, the cavers say, is that the passage they've been following under the rolling hills of southeastern New Mexico is getting larger and the air flow is strong, suggesting there's still more of Snowy River to be discovered.
The select few who have walked on the formation say there appears to be nothing else like it. Early studies of Snowy River point to its uniqueness: already, some three dozen species of microbes previously unknown to science have been uncovered.
The potential scientific advancements that might be gleaned from the place, as well as the formation's uniqueness, have prompted New Mexico's two U.S. senators to push for Fort Stanton Cave and Snowy River to be designated as a national conservation area. Such a designation would protect the cave and the surface above, and could lead to research funding for scientists who have myriad questions about the cave and its connection to everything from hydrology and microbiology to the search for life on other planets.
"It's certainly a national treasure and very well worth protecting in its own right, even without Snowy River. With Snowy River, it puts it in the class of world-class caves," says John McLean, a retired hydrologist and member of the cave study group.
"It's a beautiful anomaly," says Penny Boston, a New Mexico Tech professor and associate director of the National Cave and Karst Research Institute. Boston says extreme environments like Snowy River provide scientists an opportunity to explore life on the fringes.
She has collected micro-organisms that she believes are responsible for the manganese crust that covers much of the walls in the Snowy River passage. Once thought to be ancient and inactive, the microbes are busy in Boston's lab, breaking down materials and producing mineral compounds.
Boston and other scientists plan to take core samples of Snowy River to look for either microbes that have been entombed in the calcite layer or fossil evidence of past microscopic life.
"The idea is that we're practicing to go to Mars, we're practicing to go to Europa and all of these other places," she says, adjusting her headlamp to get a better look at the cave walls. "It's very difficult to even prove some of the things we've studied here on this planet are alive. Imagine how much harder that is when you translate that to a robotic mission millions of miles from Earth."
Elsewhere in the cave, Boston points to tiny yellow blotches and large patches of shimmering material, both examples of bacteria unique to the underground habitat. Like microbes on the surface, Boston says those in Fort Stanton Cave could prove useful in the development of antibiotics or products for cleaning up contaminated sites.
Other scientists are looking to the cave to learn more about the region's geology and how water makes its way through the arid environment.
Last summer, cavers were surprised to arrive at Snowy River and find it flowing with water. It had been dry when first discovered in 2001 and during trips in 2003 and 2005.
It took several months for Snowy River to dry out, leaving scientists with another set of questions about where the water came from and where it went so quickly.
"We think we have years of questions that need to be answered, years of opportunities for scientists," New Mexico BLM director Linda Rundell says.
The problem, Boston says, is scientists are "stuck at the starting gate" with only limited funding to unlock the cave's potential. Core samples, water sampling and DNA analysis of the microbes can cost big bucks.
"There's not enough money," she says. "It's very unclear where the national leadership is going in terms of science, so it's one of the toughest environments for getting the funding that I've experienced in a 30-year career."
Boston and her colleagues are writing three or four times more research proposals a year than they used to and are getting fewer responses in return.
"It's a tough time to really be trying to do this, even for something as amazing as the Snowy River find," she says. "It's a heartbreaking game."
Another challenge is deciding how to best manage the cave to preserve its pristine nature while allowing for research. Areas of Fort Stanton Cave are open to cavers who get permits from the BLM, but Snowy River — deep in the cave behind locked metal gates — is off-limits.
"I think that these special places that we have, we should really step up and take notice of," Goodbar says. "The world is changing ... and so, the more we can take these areas and have them protected, I think the better off we'll be by having some places that are still sacred."
7/24/2008 - 7/25/08
FORT STANTON CAVE, N.M. — Hundreds of feet beneath Earth's surface, a small group of seasoned cave explorers venture where no human ever has set foot . With each careful step they take, their headlamps illuminate walls covered with mud, gypsum crystals and mineral deposits left behind by microscopic organisms eating through fractured rocks.
The real attraction, though, is under their shoes.
A quick pass of a headlamp over the cave floor reveals a massive formation that resembles a white river flowing between the cave's banks. As the light shines more intensely on the odd and seemingly endless formation, an intricate crust of tiny calcite crystals comes into focus.
They've reached Snowy River — already the longest-known continuous cave formation in the world, with no end to it yet in sight.
"I think Snowy River is one of the primo places underground in the world and there's still so much left that we haven't discovered. We don't even know how big it is," says Jim Goodbar, the senior cave and karst specialist for the Bureau of Land Management.
The survey expedition by members of the Fort Stanton Cave Study Project in early July added several thousand feet of known terrain to the spectacular formation, which now measures four miles long.
The best part, the cavers say, is that the passage they've been following under the rolling hills of southeastern New Mexico is getting larger and the air flow is strong, suggesting there's still more of Snowy River to be discovered.
The select few who have walked on the formation say there appears to be nothing else like it. Early studies of Snowy River point to its uniqueness: already, some three dozen species of microbes previously unknown to science have been uncovered.
The potential scientific advancements that might be gleaned from the place, as well as the formation's uniqueness, have prompted New Mexico's two U.S. senators to push for Fort Stanton Cave and Snowy River to be designated as a national conservation area. Such a designation would protect the cave and the surface above, and could lead to research funding for scientists who have myriad questions about the cave and its connection to everything from hydrology and microbiology to the search for life on other planets.
"It's certainly a national treasure and very well worth protecting in its own right, even without Snowy River. With Snowy River, it puts it in the class of world-class caves," says John McLean, a retired hydrologist and member of the cave study group.
"It's a beautiful anomaly," says Penny Boston, a New Mexico Tech professor and associate director of the National Cave and Karst Research Institute. Boston says extreme environments like Snowy River provide scientists an opportunity to explore life on the fringes.
She has collected micro-organisms that she believes are responsible for the manganese crust that covers much of the walls in the Snowy River passage. Once thought to be ancient and inactive, the microbes are busy in Boston's lab, breaking down materials and producing mineral compounds.
Boston and other scientists plan to take core samples of Snowy River to look for either microbes that have been entombed in the calcite layer or fossil evidence of past microscopic life.
"The idea is that we're practicing to go to Mars, we're practicing to go to Europa and all of these other places," she says, adjusting her headlamp to get a better look at the cave walls. "It's very difficult to even prove some of the things we've studied here on this planet are alive. Imagine how much harder that is when you translate that to a robotic mission millions of miles from Earth."
Elsewhere in the cave, Boston points to tiny yellow blotches and large patches of shimmering material, both examples of bacteria unique to the underground habitat. Like microbes on the surface, Boston says those in Fort Stanton Cave could prove useful in the development of antibiotics or products for cleaning up contaminated sites.
Other scientists are looking to the cave to learn more about the region's geology and how water makes its way through the arid environment.
Last summer, cavers were surprised to arrive at Snowy River and find it flowing with water. It had been dry when first discovered in 2001 and during trips in 2003 and 2005.
It took several months for Snowy River to dry out, leaving scientists with another set of questions about where the water came from and where it went so quickly.
"We think we have years of questions that need to be answered, years of opportunities for scientists," New Mexico BLM director Linda Rundell says.
The problem, Boston says, is scientists are "stuck at the starting gate" with only limited funding to unlock the cave's potential. Core samples, water sampling and DNA analysis of the microbes can cost big bucks.
"There's not enough money," she says. "It's very unclear where the national leadership is going in terms of science, so it's one of the toughest environments for getting the funding that I've experienced in a 30-year career."
Boston and her colleagues are writing three or four times more research proposals a year than they used to and are getting fewer responses in return.
"It's a tough time to really be trying to do this, even for something as amazing as the Snowy River find," she says. "It's a heartbreaking game."
Another challenge is deciding how to best manage the cave to preserve its pristine nature while allowing for research. Areas of Fort Stanton Cave are open to cavers who get permits from the BLM, but Snowy River — deep in the cave behind locked metal gates — is off-limits.
"I think that these special places that we have, we should really step up and take notice of," Goodbar says. "The world is changing ... and so, the more we can take these areas and have them protected, I think the better off we'll be by having some places that are still sacred."
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