National record set at Roaring River Spring
Above left, Mike Young, head diver of KISS Rebreathers, takes new safety line down to a record depth of 472 feet inside Roaring River Cave Saturday. The depth establishes Roaring River Spring as the deepest in the nation. Photo by Randall Purdy Photography, used with copyright permission from TLBass Telepictures.
Above right, Mike Young, owner and head diver of KISS Rebreathers, answers questions after his nationally record-breaking dive into Roaring River Spring Saturday. Photo by Sheila Harris. |
November 14, 2021
Sheila Harris
During their last dive of the year into Roaring River Spring, the KISS Rebreathers team, headed up by diver Mike Young, of Fort Smith, Arkansas, slipped “easily" (according to Young) to a depth of 472 feet into the spring on Saturday, surpassing their state record of 451 feet, set on October 24. With Saturday’s dive, they broke a previous national record of 462 feet, set at Phantom Spring Cave in West Texas.
“There was about a 90 percent chance we would have to abort Saturday’s dive without reaching our goal of 470 feet,” Young said. “Randall (Purdy) and I were both using some new and replacement pieces of equipment, so we were prepared to cut the dive short and come back to the surface if we had any problems. Luckily, we didn’t have to. Everything just fell into place perfectly.”
Although there is still nothing that could be called a “bottom” of the spring in sight, according to Young, the sides have narrowed into a tunnel which angles downward.
“I’m definitely seeing the effects of water flow,” he said.
In addition to the discovery of the narrowing passageway, chief underwater photographer, Randall Purdy, captured (on video) some footage of a cave-adapted creature which looked somewhat like a white salamander with no legs, one which swam quickly away from the light.
“I’ve never seen anything like it before,” Mike Young said, “not in any of my cave explorations anywhere in the world.”
Diver/cartographer Jon Lillestolen submitted a photo and video of the creature to Dr. Michael Sutton, who manages the biology database within the greater Missouri cave database, works with the Cave Research Foundation (CRF), and has spent 30 years researching Missouri cave life. Sutton responded that the creature is likely the Grotto Salamander (Eurycea spelaea). He plans to add a tentative identification to the Missouri cave biology database. The grotto salamander is a blind, cave-adapted salamander which, Sutton says, is common in caves in Barry County.
Young said he and Purdy achieved the record depth of 472 feet in Roaring River Cave and were back up to the restriction which exists at a depth of 225 feet below the surface, within 29 minutes. The preponderance of the almost three-hour dive was then spent in decompression (or “deco,” as it’s called by the divers) at various depths for different intervals of time.
While Young and Purdy dove deep, other members of the team remained above the restriction to continue mapping and exploration efforts. Gayle Orner, of Madison, Wisconsin, the only female member of the team, attempted to find a possible passage connecting the known air bell (the Colossal Dome) in the upper cavern, with the newly-discovered surface air bells in the second cavern.
“If such a passage exists,” she said, “I didn’t find it.”
According to Mike Young, after the weekend dive, further expeditions will be on hiatus until their application for a 2022 permit is reviewed and prospectively approved by the Department of National Resources (DNR).
“We’re not scheduling a dive for December,” Young said, “and with the typically large amount of rain we get in the spring, we don’t anticipate being able to deep-dive again until June of 2022, and that’s only, of course, if our permit is approved.”
Young says there is plenty of mapping to do in the caverns without having to dive deep.
“We’d like to find out just how large that bottom cavern is,” he said.
Sheila Harris
During their last dive of the year into Roaring River Spring, the KISS Rebreathers team, headed up by diver Mike Young, of Fort Smith, Arkansas, slipped “easily" (according to Young) to a depth of 472 feet into the spring on Saturday, surpassing their state record of 451 feet, set on October 24. With Saturday’s dive, they broke a previous national record of 462 feet, set at Phantom Spring Cave in West Texas.
“There was about a 90 percent chance we would have to abort Saturday’s dive without reaching our goal of 470 feet,” Young said. “Randall (Purdy) and I were both using some new and replacement pieces of equipment, so we were prepared to cut the dive short and come back to the surface if we had any problems. Luckily, we didn’t have to. Everything just fell into place perfectly.”
Although there is still nothing that could be called a “bottom” of the spring in sight, according to Young, the sides have narrowed into a tunnel which angles downward.
“I’m definitely seeing the effects of water flow,” he said.
In addition to the discovery of the narrowing passageway, chief underwater photographer, Randall Purdy, captured (on video) some footage of a cave-adapted creature which looked somewhat like a white salamander with no legs, one which swam quickly away from the light.
“I’ve never seen anything like it before,” Mike Young said, “not in any of my cave explorations anywhere in the world.”
Diver/cartographer Jon Lillestolen submitted a photo and video of the creature to Dr. Michael Sutton, who manages the biology database within the greater Missouri cave database, works with the Cave Research Foundation (CRF), and has spent 30 years researching Missouri cave life. Sutton responded that the creature is likely the Grotto Salamander (Eurycea spelaea). He plans to add a tentative identification to the Missouri cave biology database. The grotto salamander is a blind, cave-adapted salamander which, Sutton says, is common in caves in Barry County.
Young said he and Purdy achieved the record depth of 472 feet in Roaring River Cave and were back up to the restriction which exists at a depth of 225 feet below the surface, within 29 minutes. The preponderance of the almost three-hour dive was then spent in decompression (or “deco,” as it’s called by the divers) at various depths for different intervals of time.
While Young and Purdy dove deep, other members of the team remained above the restriction to continue mapping and exploration efforts. Gayle Orner, of Madison, Wisconsin, the only female member of the team, attempted to find a possible passage connecting the known air bell (the Colossal Dome) in the upper cavern, with the newly-discovered surface air bells in the second cavern.
“If such a passage exists,” she said, “I didn’t find it.”
According to Mike Young, after the weekend dive, further expeditions will be on hiatus until their application for a 2022 permit is reviewed and prospectively approved by the Department of National Resources (DNR).
“We’re not scheduling a dive for December,” Young said, “and with the typically large amount of rain we get in the spring, we don’t anticipate being able to deep-dive again until June of 2022, and that’s only, of course, if our permit is approved.”
Young says there is plenty of mapping to do in the caverns without having to dive deep.
“We’d like to find out just how large that bottom cavern is,” he said.
At left, an unidentifiable cave-adapted creature was captured on video by Randall Purdy, chief underwater photographer for KISS Rebreathers, Saturday within the depths of Roaring River Cave. Head diver Mike Young says he's never seen anything like it. Diver/cartographer Jon Lillestolen submitted a photo and video of the creature to Dr. Michael Sutton, who manages the biology database within the greater Missouri cave database and works with the Cave Research Foundation (CRF). Sutton identified it tentatively as a Grotto Salamander (Eurycea spelaea), common in caves in Barry County. Photo by Randall Purdy Photography, used with copyright permission from TLBass Telepictures.
Above, KISS Rebreathers diver and chief underwater photographer, Randall Purdy, of Kearney, Nebraska, displays the new camera and housing he invested in for the Roaring River dive. The new camera, he says, is capable of recording at a depth of 600 feet sub-surface. Photo by Sheila Harris.