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| Justin Bailey Rappelling into Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
Emerald Lake Cave is a Nevada vertical cave that has some very interesting geological and hydro thermal features that has recently gone through some hydrological changes.
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| Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
Back in the 60's, this cave was reported to be a total of 190ft. in length and over 90ft. of vertical
depth. One of the interesting aspects about this cave is that there was a large body of water that left questions as to what might be beyond the lake and if there was submersed passage that could have potentially connected to a large aquifer.
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| Jamie Goodwin rapping into Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
One trip brought a raft into the lake and found that the water was deeper than they were comfortable to dive into. This trip noticed that the water table, inside the cave dropped. A few trips afterwards found that the waterline in the paleokarst dropped substantially.
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| Dakota Drew and Justin Bailey in Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
I was intrigued to visit this remote cave so I brought out a crew whom consisted of Jamie Goodwin, Justin Bailey, and Dakota Drew.
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| Justin Bailey rappelling into Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
We showed up around 2 am and got to sleep so we could get an early start into the cave. After breakfast I headed over to the entrance to rig and prepare the group to descend into the cave. I had the impression that we would be rappelling right into water from a 60ft sheer drop, but the cave itself was a steep down sloping breccia entrance with boxwork and some dead animals at the bottom of the first room.
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| Jamie Goodwin rappelling into Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
Sagebrush and bones were also found in the bottom of the drop. We continued down through a small passage that took us into the main room.
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| Adam Haydock walking around the entrance of Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada.PHOTO BY: JUSTIN BAILEY |
The temperature got warmer and a lot more humid but the the first thing that I noticed is that the water was all gone. It appeared to seep back underground where the saturation point diminished.
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| Dakota Drew rappelling into Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
I am glad I did not actually bring my diving gear into the cave but it was really interesting to visit yet another hydrothermal cave that left some interesting corrosion residue in the veins and some mammilary like circular formations on the walls and ceiling.
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| Dakota Drew in Emerald lake cave, Nevada |
Unfortunately there is no dive so we took some photos of the cave and we all started to exit the pit.
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| Jamie, Justin and Dakota in Emerald lake cave, Nevada |
The group exited the cave and they went for a ridgewalk in the area while I got some sketching practice in and surveyed the first room.
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| Corrosion Residue in Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
Once they came back we headed back out and left out for Ely to visit another cave on the following day.
Before we left a farmer stopped by to talk to us about the cave and mentioned that he has noticed that the water has dropped substantially, over the past 50-60 years.
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| Jamie Goodwin rappelling into Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
I mentioned what our findings were in the cave and he was not surprised to hear that the water has receded. He was worried that he will eventually have to move and the grassland basin will turn into a dried out playa.
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| Justin Bailey at the pool with formations above in Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
I am glad we got to visit this cave and the group appeared to be excited to visit a seldom visited cave with some scientific significance. It wasn't as vertically adventurous as we hoped for but I was really impressed with the beauty and the oddity that this hydro thermal cave provided.
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| Adam Haydock Sketching the entrance room in Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada PHOTO BY: JUSTIN BAILEY |
There is a map that was already made for this cave but it was nice to work with the distox2 ( thank you Ron) and to get some practice in sketching.
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| Emerald Lake Cave, Nevada |
