UM IM CAVE 06 LOST WORLD CAVE

Herbert Daniel Gebauer - 06/01/2018

One of the pothole that been noticed around and beneath the -Lost World Doline- is situated at an unknown location somewhere in the vicinity of Khaidong village on the eastern flank of the Shnongrim Ridge. The pothole cave drops into interlinked cave passages of which nothing is known except offering tape spotters a distance of 3.2 km, which was considered addable to an amount of accumulated metres associated with the Krem –>Liat Prah (BROOKS, S J 2004: 30). SITUATION 2004: The entrance of the Um Im 6 Cave lies in an unidentified spatial relation without any orientation only a few metres away from 2-5 and also in the floor of the Lost World Doline (JARRATT, A R 2004a, 2004b). APPROACH 2005.02.15: Beginn with the approach 2005.02.15 for –>Um Im Cave 5 up to the obvious sandstone rock step near (±5.6 m) 25°21'37.3”N: 92°31'23.8”E (WGS84). To left (East) a path continues downhill for another 25 m to reach NNE side of Lost World Doline at point (N25°21'37” E 092°31'24.2” EPE 5.7) here a path through bamboo leads down into the doline. This path gets steeper towards base of doline and at mid point path passes between rock wall and limestone pillar.At base of doline left [without orientation] leads after 15 m to Um Im 6 entrance (Brooks, S J 2005.02.15 Mss: Um Im 5 (Shnongrim) 15-2-2005). CAVE DESCRIPTION: In this cave, once again, an enormous, frightening boulder ruckle had to be pushed and the good Dr. B. [Antony 'Tony' Boycott] got the short straw on this one. He wormed his way downwards between boulders as big as the Hunters' until a lack of ladders to descend the gaps between them curtailed his exploration. These were eventually provided and the ruckle pushed to a depth of some 35 m to where it opened up into solid cave at a stepped 30 m pot. Quentin [Cooper / Cowper] rigged this with one of the world's most frightening take-offs; the hanger being in the underside of a boulder weighing hundreds of tons and not only forming the ceiling of the 30 m potbut also holding up all 35 m of choke above. Below the pot a large, active and beautifully decorated river passage bore off downstream to reach yet another boulder choke after ???m. Valiant attempts to pass this initially failed but by a stroke of luck we had a jar of fluorescein with us and some of this was chucked into the stream –mainly for the benefit of the video. Next day a party finishing off the survey were amazed to hear voices and then even more amazed as Mark, Jonathan [Davies] and Brian M. [MacCoitir] emerged from the choke having pushed upstream from Krem Um Im 1. They had seen the green water and this inspired them to greater efforts - a marvellous and superbly timed stroke of luck. Um Im 6 (and by definition Um Im 2-5) were now part of the rapidly expanding Liat Prah system [note 1]. … an obscure hole at the base of the 30 m pot was cleared by Quentin in the hope of passing the upstream sump of this cave. … a couple of hundred metres of filthy and unpleasant phreatic tunels were surveyed and the main way on desperately search for. It just had to go. Our last chance was a tiny inlet canal with thick mud under the water and a definite collector's item. With nothing left to survey we went for it and after 30 m of misery the passage improved slightly in that we were no longer scared of disappearing forever into the quicksand of Shit Creek. A good echo hinted at better things ahead and suddenly we gained a view of black space as we entered a 15 m high gore passage at right angles. […] A massive dry tunnel bored off upwards at right angles. This was later mapped for several hundred metres and contained some stupendous formations. A huge side passage turned out to be an oxbow to the main drag and provided an airy balcony for the video team and some awe-inspiring views of the river passage below – this being reached by turning left at the initial entry point. This 15 m high by 8 m wide tunnel carried the main stream which was soon found to issue from an ipenetrable choke on the right-hand side after 200 m. Ahead the passage increased in size and gained height to form a gigantic, breakdown-floored square tunnel which we surveyed in a straight line for 390 m to a point where the boulder floor met the ceiling. The heat and lack of draught indicated that a way on was unlikely but a wristwatch altitude measurement indicated that The Great Trunk Road was not far from the surface. On the way back a small but interesting inlet, the Shnongrim Subway, was found which well might be explored further next year (JARRATT, A R 2004a: 29-30). SPELEOMETRY 2004.03.16: 2261.15 m (Brooks, S J 2004.03.16 Survey Summary 2004) SPELEOMETRY 2004.04.16: 2261.15 m (Brooks, S J 2004.04.16 Survey Summary 2004) SPELEOMETRY 2004.05.11: 2339.30 m (Brooks, S J 2004.05.11 Survey Summary 2004) SPELEOMETRY 2008.01.20: The survey of Um Im 6 Cave contributed by March 2007 a survey length of 2255.84 m to the Labit Cave System of Krem –>Liat Prah (Arbenz, T 2008.01.20 Mss). PELEOMETRY 2015.05.30: The survey of Um Im 6 Cave contributed 2372.93 m of survey length (note 2) at a vertical range of ±92 m (+20.15 m, -71.90 m) to Krem Liat Prah (Arbenz, T 2015.05.30 UmIm_6_plan.pdf). CAVE LIFE: A selection of seemingly ancient bovine jawbones, limb bones and a horn, found in Um Im 6, have been given to Tony Audsley who will attempt to identify them (JARRATT, A R 2004a: 30).PELEOMETRY 2015.05.30: The survey of Um Im 6 Cave contributed 2372.93 m of survey length (note 2) at a vertical range of ±92 m (+20.15 m, -71.90 m) to Krem Liat Prah (Arbenz, T 2015.05.30 UmIm_6_plan.pdf). CAVE LIFE: A selection of seemingly ancient bovine jawbones, limb bones and a horn, found in Um Im 6, have been given to Tony Audsley who will attempt to identify them (JARRATT, A R 2004a: 30).