This Article first appeared in
AAC(UK) Newsletter 185
published Spring 2010
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Austria Underground 2009
by Edvin Deadman
The Austrian Alps are famous for their breathtaking scenery and serious mountaineering challenges. However, inside the mountains themselves a pristine, undiscovered world is waiting to be found. In July and August 2009, Cambridge University Caving Club returned to the Totes Gebirge Mountains to continue exploring the cave systems of the Loser Plateau. After four weeks of bolting down airy, vertical pitches, extruding ourselves through tight squeezes, bivouacking in the mountains, and enduring everything the weather could throw at us (from blazing sunshine driving rain — the latter both above and below the ground…), we returned to the UK with just under 3km of new cave passage surveyed. And there is plenty more still to find!
In mid-July, a fleet of cars in various states of disrepair, and crammed to the roof with caving gear converged on our base camp, the campsite at the Gasthof Staud’ nwirt near Bad Aussee. Much of the first week was spent toiling across the limestone plateau at the top of the Loser Panoramastrasse, teetering under the load of rucksacks full of gear, which had to be transported to our mountain bivouac, ‘Top Camp’. Once there, the rainwater collection system was set up, together with solar panels used to charge drill and lamp batteries, and tarpaulins which, if we were lucky, would keep the worst of any rain off us as we camped. The weather was very kind at this point — so much so that we were reduced to melting snow for water.
After a few caving trips to rig the caves to the limit of the previous years’ exploration, we were finally ready for the exciting bit - exploring potholes!
CUCC first explored the caves of the Loser Plateau in 1976, and we have returned almost every year since. The most notable cave in our area is the SchwarzmooskogelhOhlen system; 55km long and over 1km deep. More recently, two new caves, SteinbrOckenhOhle and Tunnockschacht, had been discovered. By inputting the cave measurements from previous expeditions into the computer at base camp, we knew that the southern-most reaches of SteinbrOckenhOhle lay only a few metres away from an area of the SchwarzmooskogelhOhlen system known as KaninchenhOhle. Similarly, the northernmost reaches of SteinbrOckenhOhle were tantalisingly close to Tunnockschacht. The goal of this year’s expedition was therefore to continue exploration of SteinbrOckenhOhle, KaninchenhOhle and Tunnockschacht, with a view to ultimately finding connections between the three caves.
With three caves to explore each containing dozens of possible leads and many new vertical shafts of unknown depth, every last scrap of rope that we could muster was taken underground. Any new passages or pitches that were explored were carefully measured using laser-based rangefinders, clinometers and compasses. The results were then plotted on the computer at base camp to slowly build up the 3D picture of the inside of the mountain and to enable us to produce cave surveys later.
A return trip to the furthest reaches of KaninchenhOhle took about 6 hours. We started drill-bolting our way down some of the numerous, gaping chasms that are to be found there. The first such pitch was an impressive, clean washed 50m deep shaft. Frustratingly, the only way on at the bottom was a narrow rift, far too tight for any human to fit down. This soon became a familiar story as the expedition progressed. Another lead dropped down a series of beautifully sculpted cascades before once again terminating in an impossibly tight rift. Finally, in the last week of the expedition an exciting new pitch series was found. By the time that both the rope and our time had run out, no floor had been reached! In all, just under 800m of new cave was found in KaninchenhOhle, and hopes for a future connection to SteinbrOckenhOhle are high.
Meanwhile, in SteinbrOckenhOhle itself, we returned to explore a large pitch series that had been discovered at the end of last year’s expedition (exciting finds just before de-rigging begins seems to be an ongoing theme!), at the bitter end of a very unpromising looking body sized tube. At the bottom, a new horizontal level was discovered, containing well over 500m of large passages.
Tunnockschacht is the most recently discovered of our caves and up until this year it consisted of several kilometres of passages mainly existing on a single horizontal level. Last year, many pitches were ‘dropped’ in search of lower levels. However, they all ended in blockages with no way on. This year the breakthrough finally came. A 100m pitch named ‘The Usual Suspects’ was explored and a horizontal level was found at the bottom. During the initial exploration of the Usual Suspects pitch, a huge thunderstorm struck on the surface and a flood pulse swept through the cave. The pitch rapidly became a waterfall, and the three cavers exploring the passages below were forced to wait, shivering for several miserable hours whilst the water levels dropped sufficiently to enable them to prusik out of the cave. Subsequently, an alternative route was found, which will enable future cavers to ascend and descend the pitch away from any water. Just under 1.5km of passages were found in Tunnockschacht.
The maze-like nature of the Austrian Alpine caves is such that there are hundreds of open leads left for us to explore, from gaping shafts to tiny passages. This year we found more new leads than we ‘ticked off’! We will just have to return next year.
We would like to thank the Austrian Alpine Club (UK), the GPF and the CEC for their invaluable support and funding this year. We would also like to thank Lyon Equipment, Tunnocks, Dorset Cereals, CurTec and Kohinoor Foods for their kind donations. Finally thanks also go to our Austrian contacts, the Wilpernig family of the Gasthof Staud’ nwirt, Robert Seebacher of the HOhlenkunde in the Obersteier and the managers of the Loser Panoramastrasse.
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Last updated: 20 February 2010