Optymistychna Cave

The land above the cave

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When Optymistytschna Petschera (Ukrainian Оптимістична печера; German as " Optimistic cave " ) is a gypsum karst cave on the western edge of the plate Podolian in western Ukraine. Characteristic of them are straight and narrow crevices and passages that connect the larger, provided with various gypsum crystals and efflorescence cavities together. In the geological layer in which the cave is located, is an approximately 20 m thick Tertiary marine deposits of limestone, limestone, clays and loams.

Dimensions

The Optymistytschna Cave ( Ukrainian: печера Оптимістична; German: optimistic, full of hope ) in Ukraine is the longest gypsum cave in the world, with measured 236 km transition length is also the third longest cave in the world. It reaches a maximum of 15 m in depth.

She belongs to a number of mostly giant gypsum caves in Podolia. Not far from the Optymistytschna Cave is another great gypsum cave, Ozerna (Russian: Ozernaja ) ( Lage48.76416666666725.966944444444 ), with a total length of 127 km, the second largest gypsum cave and five tenth longest cave in the world.

Geographical location

The gypsum karst area with the two giant cave systems and many smaller gypsum caves located on the plateau of Podolian plate about 12 km southwest of the town Borschtschiw, 15 km north of the river Dniester, the village Koroliwka. Nearest large towns are Kamjanez - Podilskyj the east and Chernivtsi in the south. Approximately 100 km north from the bustling city of Ternopil ( Ternopol ). The gypsum karst region of Podolia is only part of a vast gypsum karst that extends to the north of the Carpathians from the border with Romania to the Prypjatsümpfen and into Poland; one of the largest contiguous gypsum karst areas, far greater than the gypsum karst areas of Asia Minor, the Urals or the resin. Eleven caves with transition lengths over 1000 meters are known so far in Podolian Karst, including the five longest gypsum caves of the earth.

The Optymistytschna is located in a mostly about 15 to 30 m thick layer of plaster from the Upper Tertiary ( Neogene ). In the central and western part of the cave, the thickness of the gypsum rock takes on 60 - to 70 m. Your consistently applied in almost perpendicularly intersecting fracture systems corridors forming a huge network, one in plan labyrinthine maze mostly lower, often verlehmter passages. Partial cave passages have been smothered in alluvial deposits. In the cave- forming gypsum formation clay minerals and other impurities (carbonates ) are stored, which remained as a fine-grained sediment in solution and removal of the plaster. To save cavers long, just crawling to overcome passages, spacious walk-in trenches dug in the sediment of the gears.

Discovery and exploration

The Optymistytschna Petschera was discovered by cavers M. Lemberger Sawtschin, V. Vasilyev, I. Katschkowsky, I. Maljawina in 1965 and systematically explored in the next two decades. The cave was first explored in 1966, when on May 8, M. and A. Sawtschin Soljar when excavating a water channel came to a narrow entry hole that led into a labyrinth of caves after about 100 m. In the years between the discovery and 1975 Ukrainian cavers from Lvov ( Lviv ) and Ternopil were instrumental in the exploration of the largest gypsum cave. It belonged in 1977 to 280 known gypsum caves in the gypsum karst areas of the former Soviet Union, which represented approximately 90 % of the known gypsum caves of the earth. The Optymistytschna soon became one of the caves with the most extensive tunnel systems.

Since then, about 50 research companies were carried out in the Optymistytschna. In recent years, the research activity has slowed noticeably, there are hardly carried out surveys. The total length of their measured transitions was given in 2006 with 215 km. The network of cave passages is partially applied very closely, so as to extend the floor plan of the cave only to an area of ​​about two square kilometers. This peculiarity of Podolian gypsum caves resulted in the technical literature to designate as a maze cave ( Irrgartenhöhle ).

The temperature in the cave is about 8 ° C in the western parts of the cave ( in the more powerful gypsum layer), in the eastern parts of 9-10 ° C. The shape of the transitions in the Optymistytschna depends on the fracturing and layering of gypsum, their binding to the narrow fracture system caused by the grid-like, labyrinthine character of the cave. Add the finely crystalline gypsum of the lowest floor transitions occur with roundish, low flat or narrow, cleft- like profiles. In coarsely crystalline gypsum is round or rectangular profiles were made ​​with horizontal ceilings or in the form on the top of standing triangles. In transition areas can be found up to 10 m high galleries with highly structured profiles. At sites of intense fracturing or collapsed ceilings are large halls. Tubular fireplaces extend into the overlying limestone layers to collapse such vents located high dome-like spaces formed with domed ceilings.

In publications of Polish geologists, local historians and archaeologists to find the first mention of the cave. In the older literature, the cave is often mentioned in the Russian spelling of her name Optimistitscheskaja, in reports in English as Optimist Cave.

Touristic development and guides

So far, the Optymistytschna Petschera has not yet been developed for tourism. Individual tours must be arranged through direct contact with the speleological clubs in Lemberg, Tarnopol or Khmelnitsky. The National Park Authority " Podilskij Towtry " in Kamjanez - Podilskyj can also organize individual tours to the many others findable in the wider environment gypsum karst caves ( Kristalnaja, Atlantida ).