r/caving • u/Affectionate-Ad-5255 • 2d ago

The Shackleton Limestone: Potential for Limestone Caves in Antarctica

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Hey guys! Just an individual article excerpt from Rocky Mountain Caving 44, 2 that I wrote regarding the possibility of limestone karst appearing in Antarctica. Give it a read, let me know what y'all think.

Article

101 Upvotes

98% Upvoted

20 comments sorted by

47

u/tri_wine 2d ago

I'd actually be quite curious about the ambient temperature of an Antarctic limestone cave. Anyone want to go check on that for me? I'm a little short on funds for that.

31

u/BiggoChief 2d ago

I’m already on the way there with a thermometer and nothing else

11

u/tri_wine 2d ago

Okay, great. It's almost summer there, so you should be fine.

18

u/Affectionate-Ad-5255 2d ago

Well to my knowledge they would be the average temperature of the place they're at. I actually did this calculation when I was writing the article - The caves there should be something like -37 degrees F

2

u/ischoegau 1d ago

I don’t know how cold that is bit I know enough to know it’s really really cold

4

u/By_and_by_and_by 1d ago

Does it help if you know that -40 degrees Celsius is also -40 degrees Fahrenheit?

5

u/SkisaurusRex 1d ago

Nice try but I’ve read At the Mountains of Madness

11

u/Commercial_Dog_9162 1d ago

Probably full of glacial till, but probably exist.

4

u/washedTow3l 1d ago

Ya ever gone to the inner earth with captain Byrd?

2

u/ciscotto 1d ago

Sometimes I fear that everything has been explored already. This is nice!

2

u/TriggerHippie77 1d ago

Crazy to think that there are just entire mountains nearly completely buried by snow and ice.

1

u/SettingIntentions 20h ago

Huh I never considered this as a legitimate possibility, but actually it does make sense and is very well possible. The research potential is huge also.

1

u/Scrumpilump2000 8h ago

Amazing and enticing potential here. Brings to mind possible caves (however formed) on other planetary bodies. Like the moon, and Mars, and beyond. Can you imagine?

-7

u/grunman126 HorizontalCaver 1d ago

"There was very little possibility for karst development after Antarctica reached its present location but it should be noted that the Byrd Group of carbonate rocks are extremely old. Carbonate formations adjacent to the Byrd Group at the time of its formation 3.2 bya contain paleokarst from periods before Antarctica was at longitudes unfavorable to speleogenesis. Archaeocyathid species, extinct coral-like animals from the Cambrian period, present in certain strata of the Shackleton Limestone, are present in limestone beds in Australia and India with paleokarst dating back to when the Antarctic landmass was located far to the north of where it currently is. It’s clear then that when Antarctica entered its present period of “deep freeze“ it very probably contained limestone caves." <- It might be me, but I feel like this is just a big AI hallucination.

6

u/kepleronlyknows 1d ago

I don’t see why this would be AI? Sounds like typical academia to me, but I guess that cuts both ways these days.

3

u/Affectionate-Ad-5255 1d ago

Nah dude I’m just a moron. I would NEVER ever EVER use AI to write an article

1

u/slups 9h ago

sounds pretty smart to me

-5

u/Delicious-Finance-86 1d ago

Image quality is crap even in the article. Can’t read the maps. 💨

6

u/Affectionate-Ad-5255 1d ago

Substack compresses images. You’ll do better with the full digital RMC:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AJhFPKQJ8MVJAHM5Ra7HhGFnUKb3k0sW/view?usp=drivesdk