<h2><center>CUCC Austria 1999 - Mission statement</center></h2>
<p>1999 will see the twenty third annual summer expedition to Austria
by the Cambridge University Caving Club. A number of major goals are
set out for this year's expedition, along with a great deal of other
work both on new projects and continuing documentation of previous
exploration.
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<p>For eleven successive summer expeditions, C.U.C.C., and its post-graduate
sister club ex-Cambridge Speleologists, have been exploring the
<ahref="../../smkridge/161/top.htm">Kaninchenhöhle</a> cave system in
the Totes Gebirge of Austria (about 80 km east of Salzburg). A major goal of
the 1997 trip was to link the cave with a deep shaft system,
<ahref="../../smkridge/161/136.htm">Steinschlagschacht</a>, first explored
by the club in 1983. This was successfully achieved by
means of some rather spectacular traversing of a ledge system 40m above the
floor of a large chamber, giving an increased depth of 507m for the combined system. After the 1998 trip, a new deep point was reached, making the cave
534m deep and 22.4 km long, ranking as one of the major caves of Europe.
<p>To the south of Kaninchenhöhle lies another major cave,
the southern Schwarzmooskogel system. Parts of this were explored as
long ago as 1938, but the major central part of the cave,
<ahref="../../smkridge/41/41.htm">Stellerweghöhle</a>, was explored by
CUCC in 1980-85, to a depth of 973m and a length of some 7km. Other parts of
the cave have been explored by both French and German groups, and the total
length of this cave was over 20km before some new exploration in 1998 by
ArGe.
<p>After 1997, the gap between these two systems is about 130m, in passages
at much the same level. The 1998 expedition eliminated some of the more
obvious leads working from the Stellerweg end, using the nearest entrance,
which leads into a spectacular ice-decorated chamber. Various climbs down and
up were pushed, finding some new passage, but no convincing way on towards
Steinschlagschacht.
<p>A major goal of the 1999 expedition will be to search for new passages in
the area of this gap, via the Steinschlagschacht entrance. Linking the two
systems would involve us not only in exciting new exploration, but also in a
great deal of tie-up surveying to establish definitive figures for the length
and depth of the combined system. Current survey information suggests that
the linked cave would be well over 42 km long and 1056m deep, making it the
third or fourth longest cave in Austria. This would also put it among both
the fifty or so deepest caves in the world <b>and</b> the fifty or so
longest. Few caves make it so far up both the long <u>and</u> deep lists -
truly a cave of world significance.
<p>Our German friends from Stuttgart, <blang=de>Arbeitsgemeinschaft
Höhle und Karst Grabenstetten e.V.</b> (ArGe) have explored 7km (up
to the end of 1997 - more this year, too) in one of the linked caves in the
southern system and are still working in cooperation with us in the area. We
are also in contact with the French <blang=fr>Groupe Spéléo de
Clerval - Baume les Dames</b> (GSCB) who explored part of this system in the
1980's. Liaison with these groups, as well as with the local Austrian cavers
<blang=de-at>Vereines für Höhlenkunde in OberSteier</b> (VfHO) is
an important part of the work both on the expedition and during the
year-round documentation effort that goes on at home in the UK.
<p>Other areas of Kaninchenhöhle also merit attention, with over 230
unfinished ways on <ahref="../../smkridge/161/qmtodo.htm">documented</a>
in the cave. Some of these were quite remote when first found,
but have been made much more accessible since the discovery
