In his report of a March 17 underwater exploration of the Jasper Blue Spring (aka the Jasper Blue Hole), cave diver Jason Richards announces that the spring is now considered to be the longest underwater cave in America outside of Florida! Included with Florida's underwater caves, it's the 19th longest. On this latest dive, Jason explored about 200 feet of a side passage in the far reaches of the cave. The main passage passes below the west fork of Pryor Creek, becomes as small as ten feet wide by four feet high, then grows larger to 30 feet wide by five to six feet tall. Jason believes this indicates the cave will likely get larger and deeper farther in.
This latest dive lasted 349 minutes, went to a depth of 144 feet, and explored over 1,500 feet of new passages. Jason and his coleagues hope to get a couple more dives in over the next few weeks.
Click the following link to see an overlay of the dive route on a topo map. Download Jasper Blue Spring 16MAR13
Read a June 2012 post about earlier explorations of the Jasper Blue Hole here.
Bob Butters
Comments