Boy Scouts of America

Girl Scouts of America

and others:

BSA Exploring Caves:

Natural cave exploration requires a lot of advance planning. Many maps (Reference: definition of cartogarphy) are needed.

First a road map is needed to find the cave region. Then a topographic map is needed to find the cave entrance (note, if a house is nearby, get their permission first). A map of the cave interior should also be available with the scale or size dimensions noted.

Before entering a cave, responsible people should be personally contacted, and often a log is kept at a nearby location where you sign with number in party, date, time in, expected time out, and time out.

Dr. Bob Benchoff in The Dragon's Throat!

The caves shown here are in the Laurel Highlands area of the Appalacian Mountain Range. These are located just a few mountains from the world famous Laurel Caverns.

One value scouting brings, is kids get more fun in group activities off the beaten path, than the typical tourist.

Caves in their natural undeveloped settings offer great values with regard to discoveries, and also with regard to pristine, back to nature serenity.

Great care must be given to not disturb the natural wonders that took thousands of years to create, in some cases.

Final preparations for spelunking.

Here Scout-Masters, standing, prepare lighted hardhats, personal rigging, and make other checks. Seated to the left is Mary Ann Iacobucci, one of the non-scout people to join our party. Waving is Dr. Bob Benchoff who prefers to carry as little extra equipment as possible to be able to fit into small spaces more easily, to go where no man has gone before.

Frank Manno (not seen here, taking the photo) headed this scouting expedition and many others, and has great experience in the field. Frank is of a technical background. He and Dr. Bob Benchoff have worked laboratories together and performed nuclear power plant inspections.

Dr. Bob Benchoff giving the final instructions.

This is the entrance to Lemon Hole Cave. It is a 40 foot drop straight down, before leveling to a nearly horizontal floor.

Although emergency ropes were available, Dr. Bob Benchoff taught the expedition party how to safely scale the walls freehand, using the three hold point method (only move one limb at a time). Dangerous swinging, as monkeys do, was not permitted (Reference: definition of brachiate).

At the bottom of the entrance was a large bat cavern. To the left was the main passage. To the right was a section that caved-in from time to time.

Shortly prior to this expedition, other people went in there and caused a bone breaking avalanche requiring a rescue team respond, and a lady was air lifted by helicopter for hosptialization.

Hopefully this will not discourage girl scouts and/or others, but it is a good reminder to be aware and careful in new and strange situations.

Dr. Bob Benchoff was sure to mention that this journey was not a highway, it was the senic route, and everyone should take their time, be cautious, and enjoy the adventure.

So many bats, and no ball.

Below the bats is a mixture of soil (Reference: definition of loess) and bat droppings (Reference: definition of guano). Not seen, yet in the soil are many bugs that eat things that fall. A bat that dies and falls might be eaten overnight.

Aside from microscopic life, cave creatures exist near the mouths of the caves, and are very less likely to be found deep within caves. Great caution should be used when entering a cave.

It is very important for each spelunker to have very powerful flashlights, and backup flashlights. Planning should include discussions of event duration, string, markers, and candles.

Snakes and animals might be in a cave, so entering should be with plenty of light, while thoroughly examining all areas slowly to see if any creature is there.

Caves with old stalagtites (hanging from the ceiling) and old stalagmites (rising from the floor) are generally safer, than caves that have jagged rocks that have relatively recently fallen. Climbing in caves having jagged rocks is too dangerous because the rocks move too easily.

If traveling a quarter mile or less into a wide cave, air circulation may not pose a problem, but remember that carbon dioxide and radon are heavy gasses, and spreading-out the team with a few yards between each person can help safeguard against asphyxiation.

Beautiful scenes worth the trip.

Above is a cave wall where a stalagtite and a stalagmite met. Also along the wall are vertical webs of calcite (a form of calcium). Sometimes the webs have darker discolorations that eventually flow down the webs.

When a flashlight is held behind a web, you can see it's translucence. If a web has darker discolorations and is back-lit, it appears as bacon, and so those formations are called bacon strips.

Here is Dr. Bob Benchoff at the end of Bear Cave, contemplating how that tiny underground stream carved that giant cave over time.

It is very important for safety reasons to have an expert meterologist in your spelunking expedition to reasonably ensure that flooding will not occur while the team is in the cave(s).

Also, as with the catacombs of Bear Cave, it is very important to have a geophysicist because it is very easy to become lost if proper preparations are not performed along with the right work along the way. With experience and geophysics degrees, Dr. Benchoff added a measure of security.

Nonetheless, if Dr. Benchoff was injured and lost consciousness, it was vital that another experienced expert was there. In this case it was our expedition leader, Frank Manno, who coordinated with BSA leadership to bus the scouting troops to the cave entrances, and to meet with others that wanted to join our expeditions.

The above picture of Bear Cave is below a section called the Keyhole, because it is shaped similar to an old style keyhole, round at the top and triangular underneath.

To get there, one would crawl through a round hole to where the floor changed from flat, to a tight crack, to a crevasse until there was no more floor and the person was at the top of the triangle. (Experts only please) Then the person would drop ten or fifteen feet to land beside the stream.

The whole time in the caves, spelunkers should be listening for changes in water noise (a signal to get out immediately).

To get out of the Keyhole, there are no foot holds or hand holds, so the cognizant spelunker jumps; and then using their fleshy parts, not their bones, wriggles up, as a worm would do.

Unexplored.

The above is a picture of an unexplored cave section at the end of Concave, also known as Vicky's Cave. Such a find is rare, yet such findings are there for you, if you accept the exploration challenge.

The above unexplored cave section can't even be seen by humans (unless the rock is cut away, and we don't want that). Frank Manno reached his camera in the small opening as far as he could to get the photo of the cave room.

Due to the growing calcite formations, the room below the above room is no longer accessable, as the entrance has shrunk to half it's original size in just one year. The lower cave room was covered with popcorn formations. Popcorn is ball calcite resembling popcorn, but very hard.

Outside of Concave is a shear rock cliff where Dr. Bob Benchoff and the ROTC went rappelling. ROTC stands for Reserved Officers Training Course, the group being out of California University [formerly CSC] of Pennsylvania that Dr. Bob Benchoff headed (old site and some of it's links have been no longer hosted).

Scouting is not all about exploring the outdoors. It is largely about building character and responsibility to our nation and to God.

Mental excercises help scouts prepare for the future, including advancing sufficiently so as to help other scouts along the trail you formed.

Below we find a highly decorated BSA leader playing Chess against a sensationally quick expert.

BSA Eagle sitting next to Coordinator Dr. Scott gru Bell.

Scott heads Community Chess Clubs, CCC, located throughout the Carolinas. Chartered via Dr. Bob Benchoff, President and CEO of VGC Foundation, Scott has acquired officiating status with the National Chess Federation and has therefore held and officiate CCC regulated games.

CCC quickly grew in membership and spread regionally into other communities, eventually with a television series known as the "Wizard Of Chess". Scott and Bob often discussed the I.Q. raising properties for helping the public.

Scott authored many chess books including Christian Chess.

For JESUS Christ ICCDBB high level Faith Sermon click here.

Special thanks to Frank Manno.

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