Fisher Ridge Cave System facts for kids

The Fisher Ridge Cave System is a huge cave system found in Hart County, Kentucky, United States. It's located close to the famous Mammoth Cave National Park. As of November 2019, explorers had mapped over 130.001 miles (209.216 km) of its passages! This makes it the fifth-longest cave in the United States and the tenth-longest in the entire world.

Discovering the Cave

Long, long ago, Native Americans were the first to explore parts of the Fisher Ridge Cave System. They left behind cool clues like a checkerboard pattern scratched into a big rock. They also left pieces of charcoal from their torches, which are about 5,000 years old! Even ancient footprints were found in the cave. It's thought these early explorers used a different entrance than the ones we know today.

The cave was rediscovered in January 1981 by a group of cavers from Michigan. Cavers are people who explore caves as a hobby. This group had a hunch that a big cave might be hidden on Fisher Ridge. One of the cavers, Chip Hopper, dug into a sinkhole and found what they called the "Historic" entrance.

It quickly became clear that this was a huge discovery! The cave had many long, branching tunnels. The cavers named it the Fisher Ridge Cave System. In just one year, they mapped almost 10 miles of passages. They even formed a group called the Detroit Urban Grotto, which is a local club of the National Speleological Society. Their main goal was to keep mapping this amazing new cave.

Exploring the Cave's Depths

The exploration of the Fisher Ridge Cave System can be divided into several exciting periods.

Early Exploration (1981-1992)

From 1981 to 1992, cavers explored nearly 50 miles (80 km) of the cave. A major discovery in 1981 was "Fisher Avenue," a passage stretching over two miles. This became a main pathway in the cave. Another entrance, called "Remington," was dug open, making it easier to reach Fisher Avenue. A third entrance came from connecting to a smaller nearby cave called "Splash."

Explorers found active underground rivers like Fisher River, Stinky River, Detroit River, and Thunder River. As they pushed north, they found older, higher tunnels like Larry's Borehole, Grand Ave, and Ice Cave Ave. In 1983, a flood opened up a new part of the cave, leading to over 10 miles of discoveries in the southern end. This included the South Fisher Extension and a tall canyon called the Big One, which is 80 feet high!

Pushing North (1990s)

In the 1990s, explorers started pushing towards Northtown Ridge, located to the northwest. They discovered "Chartres Ave," a large walking tunnel over a mile long, after crawling through a 1000-foot-long passage. From 1993 to 1996, the Fisher Ridge Cave System grew by another 30 miles!

This included major passages like Northtown Avenue and Doll's Head Trunk. They also found the Lost Carbide Trunks and Park Avenue, a large stream passage at the water table level. Trips into these areas often took several days, requiring cavers to set up base camps deep inside the cave.

New Entrance and Continued Exploration

Because of long travel times and two times when floods trapped cavers during their Northtown Ridge trips, the Detroit Urban Grotto decided to create a better way in. They started working on a new entrance, which was the fourth and final one for the cave system. This new entrance was finished in 1997. It made exploring under Northtown Ridge much easier and safer.

By 2001, after 20 years of hard work, explorers from the Detroit Urban Grotto had mapped 100 miles of the Fisher Ridge Cave System! In the next 20 years, they added another 30 miles of discoveries throughout the cave. Today, explorers come from all over the country to explore this amazing cave system.

What the Cave Looks Like

The Fisher Ridge Cave System has two large main parts. These parts are connected by a 1,000 feet (300 m) long crawlway. The Northtown Ridge section of the cave is about 80 miles (130 km) long. It has many large, dry tunnels that remind explorers of the famous Mammoth Cave.

The Fisher Ridge section is about 50 miles (80 km) long. It includes several active underground streams. It also has two major sections of mid-level tunnels. A continuous set of old, abandoned tunnels stretches for 5.5 miles (8.9 km) from one end of the cave to the other. These include Fisher Avenue, Hunky Dory, Chartres Ave, Dolls Head, Northtown Ave, and Park Ave. These passages eventually drain into the Green River (Kentucky). They are only briefly interrupted by places where the ceiling has collapsed or where dirt has filled the passage.

Is it Connected to Mammoth Cave?

Even though the Fisher Ridge Cave System is very close to the Mammoth Cave system, they haven't been found to connect yet. The closest point between them is only about 600 feet (180 m)! However, this close point is high up in the ridges between unrelated passages, which makes it hard to find a connection there.

Also, there's a natural drainage divide between the two cave systems. This means water flows in different directions in each cave. Experts think that if a connection exists, it's probably deeper down in the active underground rivers. This is because valleys tend to separate older, higher cave passages over time.

Some surveyed passages of Fisher Ridge Cave System actually run inside the boundary of Mammoth Cave National Park. But even there, there's almost a mile between Fisher Ridge and the Flint Ridge passages in Mammoth Cave. Cavers have different ideas about whether the caves will ever connect. Early explorers in Fisher Ridge didn't want to focus on finding a connection. However, explorers from both Fisher Ridge and Mammoth Cave have continued to search thoroughly, but so far, no connection or promising passages have been found.