Lost River - Karst Information Portal

modular NCRC trainings have occurred. For
those unfamiliar with cave rescue training, for
such a small geographic area southern Indiana
has had a lot of cave rescue training, and the
people involved have had a very high degree
of practical cave rescue experience, a degree
matched only by a couple of other places in
the U.S. Indiana has the highest number of
cave rescue trained people in the U.S. on a
per capita basis. It should be emphasized that
no Indiana NCRC instructor has ever been
paid to teach NCRC curriculum and all have
heavily subsidized the training other cavers
have received by volunteering their time and
money to keep training affordable.
All good things must come to an end though,
and in this case, we are fortunate. By the turn of
the century, many of the caves formerly heavily
traveled had either been completely closed by
landowners, or had had their access controlled
by organizations such as the Indiana Karst
Conservancy. The infamous Buckner Cave had
a patron, Art Gahimer, who took over turning
away the riff-raff and partiers, and the number
of cave rescues dropped dramatically. What
was for a 15-year period a rescue every month
The Pillared Palace in Wyandotte Cave.
Photo by George Jackson.
From the John Benton photo collection.
The National Cave Rescue Commission
somewhere in the state, has turned into one
every year or so. Buckner Cave is now controlled
by the Richard Blenz Nature Conservancy and
major cleanup efforts have been implemented
and much of the graffiti and garbage is being
cleaned up.
We seem to be breaking the cycle of people
who think of caves as party places, cavers are
more aware than ever of the need for safety
and conservation, and a number of problems
that might have been rescues in the past are
being handled by people on their own trips.
This is a good thing. One of the unfortunate
consequences of cave rescues occurring is
landowners closing off access to their caves.
Publicity from cave rescues causes more
people to think of exploring caves on their
own. Bureaucrats seek to legislate activities
and insurance companies put pressure to cut
off access. Indiana is blessed with a very high
density of caves in a fairly small geographic
region, and it is up to responsible cavers to make
sure that we can continue to do what cavers do
best, getting one of our own out when they are
in trouble.
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