Location: Bố Trạch district, Quảng Bình Province Map
Son Doong Cave is a massive natural cave located in Bố Trạch district, Quảng Bình Province in Vietnam on the border with Laos. It is the largest underground system situated within borders of the Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park. Its name in Vietnamese is translated as "Mountain River cave" after an underground river that formed it for the past 2.5 million years. Son Doong Cave was discovered in 1991 by a local man named Hồ-Khanh, but it was was not explored until 2009 when a group of British speleologists from the British Cave Research Association descended here. An expedition led by Howard and Deb Limbert conducted an exploration of the underground tunnels and claimed it was much larger than Phong Nha Cave that was fought to be the largest in the country at the time. Parts of the ceiling have collapsed, opening huge skylights in the roof. This allowed light in allowing different species of plants to grow in this small ecosystem.
Son Doong Cave is barely explored, but it is probably the largest cave in the World. It reaches a depth of at least 150 m (490 feet) with a length of more than 9000 meters or 30,000 feet. It largest room measures more than 5 km in length, 140 meters wide and over 200 meters high. For more information you can read an article in the National Geographic.
The limestone mountains in the Vietnam-Laos border area have many
caves such as Phong Nha cave, which have been known for a long time, but
Son Doong cave was only discovered in 1991 when Ho Khanh - a local
resident - accidentally found it while hiding. Enter the cave entrance
to avoid the rain. It wasn't until 2009 when the British Royal Caving
Association expedition came to this area to explore that Ho Khanh
informed them. It was with great difficulty that he found the cave
entrance, which was located deep in the jungle with quite rugged
terrain, far from the main road and undetectable on Google Earth. Under
his guidance, they went deep into the cave, took photos, took
measurements and collected scientific data.
Because Ho Khanh was
said to be the first person to discover this cave, the expedition team
asked Mr. Khanh to name the cave. Mr. Khanh took his name as the name of
the cave, calling it Ho Khanh cave. The expedition recognized the name
given by Mr. Khanh, but a few days later they asked Mr. Khanh for
permission to rename the cave "Son Doong" and he agreed. The name "Son
Doong" was created by combining the pre-existing place name "Doong" with
the Sino-Vietnamese word "son" (Chinese character: 山, meaning mountain).
Near the front door of Son Doong cave, there is a village of Van Kieu
people called Doong village.
On April 14, 2009, the delegation of
the Royal British Cave Association led by Howard Limbert announced the
discovery of the cave and said that the scale of Son Doong cave is
indeed the largest in the world.
In January 2010, explorers
returned to Son Doong to learn more about this cave system.
Son Doong Cave was formed about 2-5 million years ago, when river
water flowed through limestone that was buried along a fault line. The
water eroded and created a giant underground tunnel under the mountains.
In places where the rock is soft, the ceiling collapses to form holes,
which over time form giant cave domes.
The cave is 150 meters
wide, more than 200 meters high, and nearly 9 kilometers long. The
estimated capacity of Hang Son Doong is 36.8 million cubic meters
(equivalent to 15,000 Olympic swimming pools).
With such size,
Son Doong Cave has surpassed Deer Cave in Malaysia's Gunung Mulu
National Park (with a height of 122 m, a width of 174 m, and a length of
4.1 km) to occupy the position of the largest natural cave in the world.
gender.
In addition, some sections of Son Doong cave are as large
as 140 m x 140 m, including stalactite columns up to 14 m high. A
splendid photo taken by photographer Carsten Peter in May 2010 recorded
that the cave section is about 91.44 m wide, and the cave dome is nearly
243.84 m high - able to accommodate a 40-storey building.
In the
cave, researchers also found a 2.5 km long underground river and
stalactite columns up to 70 m high. The cave has coral populations and
fossilized animal remains.
The cave has two "skylights", which
are two places where the ceiling collapses, allowing sunlight to shine
in, creating conditions for plants to grow like a tropical forest in the
cave, one of which is called "Adam's garden".
The discovery tour for tourists was organized in early August 2013, costing 3000 USD per guest. The first delegation includes 6 people from the United States, Russia, Australia and Norway. Oxalis Adventure Company is a unit licensed by the Quang Binh provincial government to exploit limited tourism to Son Doong Cave. Each year it is only allowed to organize a maximum of 1,000 tourists, the itinerary includes 4 days and 3 days. Night camping inside Hang En and Hang Son Doong plus 2 nights in hotel before and after the journey. The exploitation period is from January to the end of August every year.
Project of Sun Group at Son Doong cave
A large-scale project of
Sun Group: building a cable car line over 10 km long from Phong Nha cave
to Son Doong cave, transporting 1,000 passengers/hour; Besides, hotel
complexes, golf courses... have caused great controversy about their
sustainability and principles of heritage preservation, leading to media
and researchers' reaction on this issue.
Among them are:
Petition: Stop the Construction: Save the Son Doong Cave!
Declaration
to protect Son Doong natural heritage by IJAVN
This cave was also
mentioned by President Donald Trump when talking about environmental
protection during his visit to Vietnam in 2016. Previously, Tom
Malinowski, US Assistant Secretary of State in charge of democracy,
human rights and labor issues , ambassadors of Argentina, Australia,
Czech Republic, Italy, Sweden, United Kingdom, along with Mr. Pham Sanh
Chau, Secretary General of the UNESCO National Committee in Vietnam and
Miss Duong Truong Thien Ly had a field trip. in this cave. Tom
Malinowski shared: "Son Doong is not only beautiful, it is also very
easily destroyed. Nature took millions of years to sculpt it with every
drop of water, every grain of sand. But humans can do it immediately.
This cave will be damaged if we exploit it incorrectly..."
In
early 2017, UNESCO received a report from Vietnam, in which the
Vietnamese side reported some information related to the conservation
and development of this heritage complex, and affirmed: "No license has
been issued for the project yet." cable car project into Son Doong cave,
while waiting for the Environmental Impact Assessment". Vietnam's report
affirms: the cable car construction project will only proceed if
approved by the World Heritage Committee.
According to Mr. Le Thanh Tinh, director of the management board of Phong Nha - Ke Bang National Park (Quang Binh), on January 26, 2018, FLC Group conducted a survey to build a cable car to Hang En at the end of 2016, until the end of 2016. In early 2017, this survey team reported the plan to build a cable car to En cave with Quang Binh province. Accordingly, this cable car route will be about 5.1 km long from km 37 of the Ho Chi Minh Road east branch to En Cave. From En cave to Son Doong cave is about 3.5 km.