Arkansas Caves as Bomb Shelters

Most cavers in Arkansas know or have heard of Hail Bryant. He, along with Hugh Shell and assorted others, were some of the first modern explorers of Blanchard Spring Caverns and many other Ozark caves. Some time ago, Hail donated many of his old caving records, photos, rocks and fossils to Lyon College. After almost 11 years on the Lyon College faculty, I finally made time to study the Hail Bryant Collection.

Hail Bryan in Blanchard Cave

I just finished cataloging part of the collection -- reports on the suitability of Arkansas caves as potential bomb shelters. Unfortunately, none of the reports are dated, but a notation on one of them has a date of 1962 -- the same year as the Cuban missile crisis. Close to 150 reports are in the collection, and by the report designation numbers, even more caves were investigated. Fortunately for the caves and people of the world, nuclear war was avoided, and the Cold War ended. Many of the reports suggest using heavy machinery to make caves more suitable as shelters, which would have permanently destroyed irreplaceable speleothems, and removed vital habitats for many endangered species.

Here's the report for Rowland Cave, which at the time was a commercial show cave. At present, Rowland Cave is managed by the U.S. Forest Service, and is a protected sanctuary for endangered gray bats.

Stone County
Name: Rowland Cave Ownership: J. & Rena Harkleroad
St. Loc. Code: 51SG-0003 Location: [omitted by DJT]
Facility No.: 01149 Inspected by: Bryant & Shell

1. Habitability Factors [for people]
a. Moisture: small stream, small lakes in western area
b. Snakes, bats, etc.: none
c. General condition: excellent
d. Safety of formation: excellent
e. Lighting: 900 ft. commercial area
f. Water: constant stream in western area

2. Accessibility
a. Distance/name of nearest town: 3/4 mile / 56 Ark.
b. Type and condition of avenues: Gravel in good condition
c. Time required to travel to facility: 5 minutes

3. Space
a. Area: 52,275 sq. ft. b. Volume: 986,000 cu. ft. /
1,000,000 cu. ft unusable
c. Evidence of natural ventilation: None - small water aeration
d. Estimated capacity: 2,000 by volume

Comments and/or recommendations: Commercial excellent cavern - limestone - wide entrance in sink area - diversion ditches extant need improvement - above and around entrance - many small passageways afford surplus volume - on rare occasions water inundates much of the central area - some scaling necessary in small area - rubble in western area needs dirt cover - other than rare flooding in central area, very desirable shelter, much leveling done by previous owner.

In short, they are saying that Rowland Cave already has electricity and lighting, an ample supply of water, and can hold 2000 people in the event that a shelter is needed. What about the bats? I can only guess that either the inspection was done while the bats were away, or that the bats were living deeper in the cave than the main commercial area of the time.

This is Rowland Cave as it looks today.
Signs warn that the cave is closed in order to protect
the gray bats, an endangered species.

Looking for Caves in the Snow

Last Sunday (3 Jan 2010), Don O. and I went looking for caves on the property of some friends -- Cheryl and Steve S. They live in a small valley in North-central Arkansas, and the hills around them have many areas of exposed bedrock. Arkansas had one of its rare snow days on Saturday so I decided that the snow might make searching for caves easier. Caves in this region tend to be 58 degrees F or so year-round. A cave entrance, even a small one, should show up as bare ground in the snow.

Cheryl showed Don and me around the property, and we found several areas where the rocks were bare, but no openings were evident. After about an hour of hiking, the sole of my boot separated from the rest of the boot, and was making a flopping noise every time I took a step. We returned to my car, and I changed into a spare pair of boots.

We resumed our hike. This time, Cheryl took us over to her neighbor's property where we found a sunken area that was about 15 feet in diameter and 5-6 feet below the surrounding level. Several smaller areas within the sink felt deeper, but they were will with leaves and debris. Two fairly large trees grew from within the sink. There is a good chance of a cave associated with this sink, but we decided to postpone doing any digging until the snow disappeared and the weather improved.

As we returned to the car, Cheryl told us that during the summer, the hill tended to be much cooler than the air out on the pasture -- more so than could be accounted for by the shade. The previous owner told her that there is a cave on the property, but she doesn't know where it is. Previously, she showed me a small pit near their barn. It drops about eight feet down, and connects to a small tunnel that extends horizontally for 10-15 feet -- not much of a cave.

Even though we didn't find any caves on this trip, the we enjoyed the hike. As we drove home alone the snowy back-roads, I was struck by the similarity of the scenery with that of Northeastern Washington State in the winter. My parents used to live just South of the Washington-British Columbia border, and visiting them in the winter required long drives on snowy roads as well.