Kruber's Cave, also Krubera Cave ( or ; ), also known as Voronya Cave (sometimes spelled Voronja Cave), is the deepest known cave on Earth. It is located in the Arabika Massif of the Gagra Range of the Western Caucasus, in the Gagra District of Abkhazia, a disputed region of Georgia.

Location and background

thumb|Map of the Arabika Massif, showing the location of Krubera Cave and its projected resurgences

The Arabika Massif, the home of Kruber's (Voronya) Cave, is one of the largest high-mountain limestone karst massifs in the Western Caucasus. It is composed of Lower Cretaceous and Upper Jurassic limestones that dip continuously southwest to the Black Sea and plunge below the modern sea level.

To the northwest, north, northeast, and east, Arabika is bordered by the deeply incised canyons of Sandripsh, Kutushara, Gega and Bzyb rivers. The Bzyb River separates Arabika from the adjacent Bzybsky Massif, another outstanding karst area with many deep caves, including the Snezhnaja-Mezhonogo-Iljuzia System () and Pantjukhina Cave (). To the southwest, Arabika borders the Black Sea.

The Arabika Massif has a prominent high central sector with elevations above the tree line at ~. This is an area of classical glaciokarstic landscape, with numerous glacial trough valleys and cirques, with ridges and peaks between them. The bottoms of trough valleys and karst fields lie at elevations of , and ridges and peaks rise to . The highest peak is the Peak of Speleologists () but the dominant summit is a typical pyramidal horn of the Arabika Mount (). Some middle- to low-altitude ridges covered with forest lie between the central sector and the Black Sea. A plateau-like middle-altitude outlier of the massif in its south sector is Mamzdyshkha, with part of the plateau slightly emerging above the tree line.

Among several hundred caves known in the Arabika Massif, fifteen have been explored deeper than and five deeper than .

Kruber's Cave is located at above sea level in the Ortobalagan Valley, a perfectly shaped, relatively shallow, glacial trough of the sub-Caucasian stretch, which holds the advanced position in the Arabika's central sector relative to the seashore. Since 1980 Soviet, and later Russian, Moldavian and Ukrainian cavers have been undertaking systematic efforts in exploring deep caves in the Ortobalagan Valley, resulting in exploration of the Krubera Cave to its current depth and of the surrounding caves, now mostly connected to it. The subterranean amphipod crustacean Kruberia abchasica caught by Gennady Samokhin in August 2013, during dives in the siphon 'Dva Kapitana', dwells at the deepest part of the Krubera Cave at a depth of .

The subsurface biotic community is heavily dependent on surface sources of organic carbon that come from water percolating from the surface, sinking streams that enter the cave system, and the activities of animals that move in and out of the caves.

See also

  • Geography of Abkhazia
  • Geography of Georgia
  • List of caves
  • Speleology
  • List of deepest caves

Notes

References

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Bibliography

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