AA CAVE, Kopili, 400 m
25.458300,92.616700
Description
Not only a cave entrance at 736.39 m asl (GANGOPADHYAY 1978: 220 figure 4) above the Kopili River but also a south-east facing cave entrance, which possibly functions as a seasonal spring of water (draining from south-west towards north-east) at 730.91 m asl (GANGOPADHYAY 1978: 220 figure 4) above the Lumkindong (N25'32': E092°37'30”) or »Lumkingdong« (GANGOPADHYAY 1978), give access to an about 400 m long, walking sized, and generally horizontal master cave passage (note 1), which contains speleothems, at least 30 unexplored continuations (probably rift cave passages), and an only partly explored lateral maze of cave passages about 5 m or 10 m above the floor level (at around 735 m asl). ETYMOLOGY: No autochthonous, indigenous or locally known cave name has been identified for what was reported as an anonymous known solution channel DUTTA, BOSE & SAIKIA (1970: 409-410) subterranean solution channel DUTTA & THOMAS (1970: 1033 fig. 3); GANGOPADHYAY (1978: 219 figure 3) subterranean solotuion channel GANGOPADHYAY (1978: 220 figure 4) subsurface solution cavity GANGOPADHYAY (1978: 221-222). SITUATION: At an unspecified location somewhere a) in the area covered by the Kopili »Hydel« (hydro-electric) Project (N25°22': E092°33' to N25°32'30”: E092°44') b) on the interfluve between the orographically right bank of the Kopili River and the Lumkindong (N25'32': E092°37'30”) c) approximately south-east from the I.B. (inspection bungalow) at the hot spring of Garampani d) and less than 400 m from what had been before 1970 a junction where three motorable tracks meet. CAVE DESCRIPTION: GANGOPADHYAY (1978: 218) interpretes his »Fig.3« (a kind of cave location map) to »illustrate a part of the feasibilty study stage engineering geological map of a limestone reservoir (Kopili Project). The initial first phase planning stage map indicated the presence of numerous sinkholes and karstic condition in the Tertiary limestone in the area. The map was then prepared plotting the features like rock units and their attitudes, sinkhole locations and cavity pattern. The morphology and karstic nature of the terrain have been shown by contour and special [mostly offhand created] symbols. Even the projections of subsurface solution channels [i.e. cave passages] which were separately prepared by underground mapping [note 2] have been marked in this map. It revealed definite subsurface connection to cause leakage of the stored water under resevoir condition.« CAVE DESCRIPTION: The cave surveys, which have been published (note 3) on scales of about 1: 3750 (reduced to less than 15% from the original 1: 500), show »solution channel« (cave walls) without floor details, some structural details (joints), gradients (1 in 50 and 1 in 80), the flow direction of water, and indicate more than 30 apparently unsurveyed leads, which are generally shown to peter out (but, perhaps, are penetrable and continue) but in three or four cases are »clay filled joints« (rift cave passages?). The ground plan is accompanied by a longitudinal section with one relational cross section and an attempted three-dimensional view of a passage crossing where the surved main cave passage intersects lateral cave passages at a higher level. CAVE POTENTIAL: The published cave surveys show at least 30 apparently unexplored continuations.
NOTE 1: Master cave: »A low level trunk passage streamway cave with many tributaries. The French equivalent, "collecteur", is more descriptive of the master cave's true role« (LOWE & WALTHAM 1995: 24). NOTE 2: Engineering geologists mapped (part of?) this cave on a scale of 1: 500 (GANGOPADHYAY 1978: 220) for the Geological Survey of India in the course of a feasibility study stage of the Kopili Project or »Kopili Hydel [hydro-electric] Project« (DUTTA & THOMAS 1970: 1033 fig 3A; DUTTA, BOSE & SAIKIA 1970a, 1970b; GANGOPADHYAY 1978: 220 figure 4). The surveyor's attention was clearly focused on relative elevations which are shown on the longitudinal section of the cave survey with a precision of 0.01 m. NOTE 3: GANGOPADHYAY (1978: 218) refers here to »Gangopadhyay, S 1970: Engineering geological study of the reservoir areas of Kopili Project, Assam.- Ind. Jour. Power and River Valley, Proc. Sem. Eng. Problems« which, however, I was neither able to trace nor to see. Carol Hindley (Natural Sciences Library, University College of Swansea, 08 Feb 1986) confirms: »We have not been able to trace this article. The British Library could not find the article in the Journal volume. We have searched various databases and have not been able to trace it. It may be that it was not actually published. Lack of volume number and pages is suspicious.«
Caves nearby
| Distance (km) | Name | Length (m) | Depth (m) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2.2 | LAR IH 1.2 (Krem) | ||
| 2.2 | LAR IH 1 (Krem) | ||
| 2.2 | LAR IH 2 (Krem) | ||
| 2.2 | LAR IH 1.3 (Krem) | ||
| 2.3 | CRAB SHELL CAVE (aa -) | ||
| 2.7 | KOPILI INLET TWO | ||
| 2.8 | KHANG MASI (Krem) | ||
| 2.9 | Um u Siar 2 (Krem) | ||
| 2.9 | UM U SIAR 1 (Krem) |