What is the Appeal of Crawling Through Crevices Underground? – IOTW Report

What is the Appeal of Crawling Through Crevices Underground?

Thursday, 29 June 2023, 1:00 BFH Uncategorized 29

The dude’s light goes out. It’s nightmarish.

29 Comments on What is the Appeal of Crawling Through Crevices Underground?

  1. never did this as a hobby … ’cause … why? had a brother-in-law that did this … & quit .. ’nuff for me
    did the same type of claustrophobic stuff when we crawled into furnaces, etc … you really have to fight the enclosure death/grave fear

    funny that I had no fear of climbing high towers to do lamping, electrical or climbing & entering elevated water towers or standpipes. never bothered me.

    but, those claustrophobic furnaces, underground pipelines & tanks where I could barely turn my head without grating my hardhat off & breathing anything resembling air, gave me some serious mental challenges that I had to talk my screaming brain through to get the job completed.

    claustrophobia is a real, debilitating fear

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  2. Why do people do this?

    People are…..stupid? I mean, there’s plenty of bodies on mountain tops, the bottom of the ocean, various jungles…

    In the old days, people explored to find stuff and/or open it to the public if it was big enough to charge admission. There was an incentive.

    Now it’s nerds who want to go the deepest or go through the narrowest passage. Gah. Having a youtube vid doesn’t seem like reward enough.

    Not even clicking on it.

    10

  7. Did some spelunking years ago. I still have my carbide lamp sitting on a shelf in the living room. Only went in winter when bears and critters are usually hibernating. Caught my jacket unfire with the lamp once. Ah those were the days.

    5

  8. Southern Illinois has some caves, a lot of people would never suspect. I was there for college and became real good friends with a local who introduced me to all kinds of cool nature spots. One forest, off a dirt road in the middle of absolutely nowhere, unsuspecting, completely flat ground, was a small hole in the ground. I had no clue at the time, but my friend brought a couple flashlights and he said let’s go. I said you’re Fn nuts, no way! It looked like an abandoned well shaft. I eventually got curious and he convinced me. After a brief slither down and thru a small tunnel it opened up into a beautiful giant underground room with all those stalactites and stalagmites. I was amazed, it was one of the coolest things I’d ever done. We’d spend the next 2 hours slithering around, there were a couple spots I could barely fit thru and those were scary because it was hard to move, and more so because they seemed more difficult going the opposite direction to get out of the cave. Well we didn’t have to backtrack because it all ended in a similar way we went in, just about a half mile away from where we started. Popped up out of a small hole in the same forest, but now I was lost.

    I returned to that same cave many times, bringing all kinds of friends. I’m glad I did it then, but probably wouldn’t do it now. It really was fun, as a college student.

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  11. I don’t mind people doing stupid stuff to entertain themselves.
    I do mind the millions in taxpayer dollars that goes into rescuing these idiots when they get stuck.

    6

  17. VeedonFleece at 2:14 am

    People do this because it is AMAZING!
    —————————-

    I believe they do it for the thumbs up, the likes, and the money.
    So, go for it, but you’re on you’re own IFSHTF. Stockton Rush did it for ego, and the other 4 were just as egotistical. They all admitted that they’re doing it for the thrill, they didn’t care about the risk. I’ve never had the desire to go caving, sky diving, or stupid stuff that I know would kill me. Heck,another reason why I didn’t get the jab. Listen to the voice in your head, it’s the voice that will save your life.

    2

  18. Hey, “pursuit of happiness” is an unalienable right, and life sure would be less interesting if we all pursued the same things.

    The attraction? There are many, but one of the most personally fulfilling moments for me was walking across a long unmarked stretch of perfectly dry sand, looking into a cave room full of perfect gypsum crystals, and knowing I was the first human being to see that perfectly beautiful sight.

    Spelunking is akin to aviation in that both at not inherently dangerous but are utterly unforgiving of carelessness or error. BTW, going into a cave without multiple light sources is the height depth of stupidity.

    4

  19. I went with a large group of my fellow nerd classmates from my HS on an all-day Saturday science field trip (Saturday Science Seminar) to Gardner Caves in NE Washington up by Metalline Falls back in the late 60’s and went down deep inside that narrow cave entrance. I did OK but I also suffer from claustrophobia, and even though I was young, tall and extremely skinny at 16 or so, going down into that cave caused an awful lot of anxiety for me. There were some very tight, narrow passageways going down into that cave. I never went back; spelunking is not for me. There were other Saturdays like when we went to the University of Montana in Missoula for a science fair and a great, glorious all-day field trip across Wash. state trip to Seattle to visit the Seattle Science Center which were far more fun. One of my friends won a prize for inventing and demonstrating a newfangled ruby laser at the time. We all were nerds and had a great time with the best science teacher ever who eventually was named a Wash. state teacher of year. Mr. Finley also was a mentor to my youngest brother, a customer of my dad’s and my brothers auto shop and a became a very good friend. He was an extremely good man who had an enormous impact on a lot of nerdy kids back then.

    4

  22. ecp AT 6:45 AM

    SIU late sixties… Yep. Many interesting things and areas down there.

    Small area little known on the refuge (Crab Orchard) that only the locals knew at the time as access was limited by using backroads. On one side of 57 was open to hunting (geese) and the other side part of the refuge closed to access and hunting that they would fly out of in the morning.

    When shown the way to walk in was warned and shown an abandoned well. Walking in before shooting time in the dark could easily got you dropped into it. Maybe twenty feet down before water, but the interesting part was the snakes swimming at the bottom. Moccasins? Might have added to the difficulty in trying to get out and climb up. At one point we found that Bambi had fallen in obviously never made it back out.

    Also at one point one of us took a prof from school out there hunting and showed him. Bothered him enough that soon after the forrest service came out and drove four posts around the top with barbed wire circling it. Took all the fun away as you couldn’t even get close enough to look down in it for possible additions.

    2

  23. I watched a Navy SEAL talk about part of their training. They have to enter a torpedo launch tube with scuba gear and be locked in. After about ten minutes, the outer door can be opened so they can swim out into the ocean. Once inside and the pressure equalization process starts, neither door on the launch tube can be opened for any reason. This SEAL was very claustrophobic and said it was the most difficult challenge he ever experienced. If you succumb to the fear and panic in that tube, you are totally screwed. They cannot let you out no matter what.

    2

  24. I was a hard-core caver for many years in my mis-spent youth (Still have my carbide lamp on the shelf, too, Deplorable Second Class). First rule: THREE independent sources of light!!!

    I did it because I am a geologist and naturally interested in such things and as a way to see places that literally no one else has ever seen.

    Alas, caving is a younger persons game, and I don’t bend as easily as I did 30 years ago!

    4

  25. Probably a re-chargeable light. Lithium batteries are great until they reach terminal voltage, then it’s (ahem) lights out! He shoulda brought a solar panel to re-charge it with…

  29. A spelunker dude back in the 1930’s got caught deep in a cave somewhere back east. He could not be freed so he died there. Before that a ghoulish but intrepid journalist went down close enough to interview him and take his picture. It’s probably on the internet somewhere. His skeleton may still be there for all I know.

    I went into a cave in the Sierra foothills back in the 1990’s. About 15 of us went down a ladder one at a time to get to the main cave room. A few days later I thought to myself, this is California, even a mild tremor could have closed up the cave, leaving us gasping for air in a dark place with death as the likely outcome.

    It’s as dangerous as going down 12,000 feet to the ocean floor in a tin can.

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