What Threatens Caves |
This is a picture of the damage caused by the batteries pictured above.
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There are also much larger scale threats. In rural areas, many people see sinkholes and cave entrances as convenient dumping sites, throwing cars, refrigerators, garbage, or dead cows into the sinkhole. Toxic substances leaching from cars and appliances, and organic carbon from decaying animal flesh enter the cave system. One cave in Indiana was on the receiving end of a massive gasoline spill that killed most of the life in the cave. We have a very poor idea of how connected the surface of the Earth is with the subsurface environment. What we do aboveground can really impact caves and our water supplies that often flow through these caves.