Length: 306m Depth: 71m Extent: NW-SE 160m

Alt: East Entrance 812m West entrance 809m

Location: At the foot of a gully cutting the southwestern end of Steller, a major cliff band SE of the Loser - Bräuning area. A couple of hundred metres north of the Youth Hostel at the NE corner of Altausseer See.

Approach: If you follow the lakeside path (shortest approach from Altaussee on north side of lake) there is a junction where the path to Hochklapfsattel departs. A short way west of (ie. before) this junction is a bridge over a normally dry stream bed. Follow the stream bed up for a short way until it splits, then follow the apparently smaller branch to the right (east). Scramble up rocks to the East Entrance. This is marked on the Alpine Club 1:25000 map.

Although the Altitude given is 812m, it doesn´t seem that high, and 812m is exactly 100m above lake level, which is a little suspicious. If you accept instead the phrase "climb 70m higher" in the original kataster description, the altitude comes out about 780 to 785m, which puts the final sump at almost exactly the level of the lake.

Map: 28.1 cm E, 15.4 cm N, sheet 15/1 Alpine Club 1:25000 map

Entrance Photo: CUCC were shown some photographs of 1 & 2 in flood, when a truly enormous river emerges from both entrances and numerous impenetrable cracks. This explains the vegetation-free state of the twin river beds leading down towards Altausseer See.

References: There are descriptions (in German) of dives in the terminal sump in 1985 and 1988. A further follow-up article is awaiting scanning in...

Underground Description: Seasonally active cave. Ends in a 'Lake', which is a sump pool, apparently higher than the level of Altausseer See, and close to the surveyed level of the Stellerweg sump.

Access to the final sump is guarded by short siphons in each of the two passages going to the far end of the cave. These can be drained, but care should be taken to ensure they are drained towards the entrance, otherwise the final sump will become muddy. Visited by Mike Thomas and Pete Lancaster in 1989, as far as the short sumps.

A note on the geology : The north shore of the lake follows a large fault with a big throw, so that this cave is in the same block of limestone as the Stögerweg area caves. The Austrians think there is no hydrological connection between this cave/resurgence and the lake level, since vauclusian resurgences in the lake appear to be in a very different block of limestone which has been down-faulted relative to the plateau. However, it seems more likely that these risings are actually on the fault, and that the lake level, and the level of the sumps in this cave and in Stellerweghöhle are closely related.

Survey: A4 survey in Mitt. der Sektion Ausseerland 18(4), Oct. 1980, facing p 86. This is dated 1935, 1960 and looks like a third generation photocopy of a larger survey - the quality is very poor.

Explorers: Höhlenforschervereinigung Altaussee, 19xx

Sektion Ausseerland 1960

Dived by Verein für Höhlenkunde in Obersteier in 1984 and 1985, when the final sump went to about -20m. On the first occasion they spoiled the visibility in the sump by not being careful enough about how they drained the sump on the approach route.