![]() Opened to tourists in 2013, the three-million-year-old river cave is easily one of the most beautiful places on Earth. “So far we’ve only explored about 30% of Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, so there’s a lot more to be discovered,” says Limbert. Within the immense limestone cavern, there are various microclimates and diverse scenery including two jungles, made possible by dolines – openings created by collapsed ceilings – where sunlight streams in. ![]() We realized right away that it was major.”Īfter the BCRA explored and measured the cave, they proclaimed it the largest in the world in 2010 – so big that you could fit a New York City block with 40-story skyscrapers inside it, according to Oxalis’s estimations. “Khanh spent many, many years trying to rediscover the mouth of this cave and, finally, in 2009, he led us there. He felt a blast of wind and heard the rush of a river inside… But after he left, he couldn’t find it again, because it’s surrounded by foliage,” says Limbert, who was part of the British Cave Research Association (BCRA) team that first set foot inside Son Doong. “While hunting in the jungle, Khanh came across the opening. One of the world’s most precious natural wonders, Son Doong was inadvertently discovered by Vietnam resident Ho Khanh in 1990. “No one had ever set foot inside Son Doong until 2009 … and this latest discovery shows there are still an awful lot of things to uncover on this planet. “I think it’s incredible that something as important as the world’s largest cave is still being explored and better understood,” says Limbert. This is the best time of year to dive, because water levels are relatively low, and visibility is better than usual – though still only about one to two meters. The divers plan to return in April again next year. “Now that we know how deep it is, we’ll bring the special gases with us next time to enable long, deep dives,” adds Limbert. The team wasn’t expecting the tunnels to be so deep, because the other caves in the area are quite shallow. Hence, they believe the offshoot reaches a depth of 120 meters and continues for about 1 kilometer,” explains Limbert. “When the divers reached 78 meters, they plumbed the depth below using a line and a lead weight. Limbert says that the Oxalis team already knew that the water from Son Doong joined Thung Cave, through dye-testing, but no human has ever gone into these subterranean rivers.ĭuring the mission, divers were able to reach a depth of about 78 meters while diving on air (oxygen and nitrogen) before turning around. “They wanted to do something interesting during the trip, so we came up with this idea of diving Son Doong, which had never been done before.” We invited them on a trip to Son Doong to thank them for their great effort,” says Limbert. “The divers did an amazing job rescuing the children in Thailand. Oxalis, which is the only company licensed to bring travelers into Son Doong Cave, invited the British divers – Jason Mallinson, Rick Stanton and Chris Jewell – to visit the cave following the Thai rescue expedition. He tells CNN Travel, “Any cave in the world will be able to fit comfortably inside Song Dong when it’s connected – it’s just outrageous in size.”īritish divers Jason Mallinson, Rick Stanton and Chris Jewell - who helped rescue the trapped soccer team in Thailand in 2018 - recently dived in Vietnam's Son Doon Cave. “It would be like someone found a lump on top of Mount Everest, making it another 1,000 meters higher,” says Howard Limbert, technical advisor of the Quang Binh-based Oxalis adventure tour company and one of the cave experts who helped organize the dive. When it’s officially connected with Thung Cave, it will add an additional 1.6 million cubic meters in volume. Son Doong currently measures a total of 38.5 million cubic meters (about 1.35 billion cubic feet). Last month, a trio of British divers – the same divers who aided in the rescue of the trapped soccer team in Thailand in 2018 – ventured to Phong Nha-Ke Bang National Park, in the jungle-filled Quang Binh Province of central Vietnam, to explore the cave’s waterways.ĭuring the groundbreaking dive, they discovered an underwater tunnel that connects Son Doong (meaning “Mountain River Cave”) with another enormous cave called Hang Thung. Thanks to discoveries made during a recent expedition in Vietnam, it appears the world’s largest cave, Son Doong, is even bigger than previously thought.
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