Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1913-12-18
MORE ABOUT ICE CAVES.
Summer Increase of Ice in Them
Never Satisfactorily Shown.

Ice-cave literature is rapidly assum-
ing formidable dimensions, but some
of the fundamental facts seem not yet
to be agreed upon. Every one appears
to acknowledge that ice caves-cav-
ems containing ice in summer-exist;
but is this ice simply left over from
the previous winter or does 1t actual
ly keep on freezing during the sum-
mer? If the latter, is the cause stored
cold from the previous winter or some
kind of action by which cold is gem
Grated even in hot weather? Apparent
ly all these views are held. and the
facts necessary to decide among them
have not yet been properly set forth
and duly substantiated. Mr.. Marlin o.
Andrews recently asserted that he had
clearly shown the accumulation of ice
in summer, which he believed due to
the winter chilling of the adjacent
rocks, underground. In Science Mr..
Andrews is called to account by Ar
thur NJ. Miller, of Kentucky State uni
versity, who holds that summer in
crease of the ice in these caves has
never been satisfactorily shown. Says
Mr.. Miller:
In the first place, it (the Andrews
article) is calculated to convey the
impression that such phenomena as
he describes are exceedingly rare,
whereas they are fairly common in
middle Enthusiastically in lime
stone districts. In the second place,
the explanation given of such phe-
nomena is faulty.
THE writer of the aforementioned
article appears to have come to his
subject rather poorly equipped as re-
CARDS geological knowledge.
Was that shaft sunk on undisturbed
strata or on talus accumulation? If
on the latter, we appear to have here
a case of 'talus ice accumulation, OF
which there are many instances. There
is at least one other of these in Penn
sylvania if / remember correctly.
IF a seasonal reversal of under
ground air currents is to be invoked
as an explanation, his diagrams in
troduced to illustrate this had better
be invested. Every freezing cave
that has been represented in vertical
section shows the more remote recess
es of the cave lower than the mouth
and the more nearly vertical the cir
culation of the air is in consequence
of this the better the conditions for
ice accumulation.
This may be illustrated by the
conditions which prevail in 'freez-
cave near Gap Creek, Wayne Co., KY,
visited in August, 1898, by the author
of this criticism. The cave is in the
nature of a vertical sink, the opening
of which is situated on the top OF
knob. called mountain in that Sec
ton. The top is about 1880 feet above
| sea-level (220 feet above the drainage
! at the base). Descent into this cave
was made by means of rough ladders
Various channels ramify from the
main body of the sink, mainly down.
ward The mountain which consists
of Mammoth Cave limestone\ capped
by a thin coping of Kaskaskia sand
stone, appears to be honeycombed with
subterranean passages
Into these passages the cold air
tends to descend in winter and from
them to rise in summer, during
changes in relative density conditions
of the internal and external atmos-
phere. 1t appeared also to the writer
land this is the only contribution he
wishes to offer to the explanation OF
ice caves) that the descent of the
water through the underground pas
sages during the winter when this
region has it's abundant rains would
aid in the intake of cold air at the
| mouth of the sink somewhat after the
manner Of Sprengle pump, and
hence would contribute to the thor
ough refrigeration of the mountain or
knob. This agency would operate with
little force in summer. when the stage
of cave waters is low
1--WE did not find that the tnhabit-
ants in the neighborhood of this Gap
Creek ice cave attributed any of the
accumulation of ice in it to the sum-
mer months, and while it is not i'm
possible, in accordance with the the
DRY usually advocated for the explain
alton of such accumulation, that 1t
might continue after freezing temper