elfish wrote:Having witnessed some of the events, I think it is a bad idea to leave a body in a cave for several reasons:
1. Leaving the body doesn't allow the family closure. In the case of the Colorado death, at least one family member said she'd never be resolved until the body was removed. Dealing with a unexpected death is hard enough, but having the body in a wild cave, marginally protected from vandals and vermin makes it even more difficult to resolve the loss.
2. Closing a cave is difficult even when there is no body. People always want to get into closed caves. Most gated caves get breached from time to time. As time passes and the tragedy is forgotten, there will be more and attempts to break in. Unless you fill the whole cave to the ceiling with concrete, it will eventually succeed.
3. Having a body in the cave will make it even more attractive to thrill seekers. If I remember right, Floyd Collin's body was kept in Crystal Cave for years and the body was frequently stolen and vandalized. Helen Hunt Jackson used be buried in the foothills outside Colorado Springs, but they eventually moved her to a cemetery because her body was periodically stolen. Similar problems have occurred with Buffalo Bill Cody and President Lincoln.
4. I think it sets a bad precedent. Most caves are dangerous enough that it is not uncommon for people to die in them. If you start leaving bodies and closing caves, we will have many closed caves serving as mausoleums for deceased cavers.
Some people are making a comparison to the Utah mine where miners had been killed and they chose to leave the bodies because of the danger to rescuers. However, mines are inheritly unstable and dangerous whereas caves are not. Considering that this cave has been visited by thousands of people, there is nothing to suggest it is inheritly dangerous. It does appear that one or two passages are dangerous, but you could solve that problem by blocking or widening those specific passages. It should be fairly easy to widen the passage using modern mining techniques. At the same time widening the passage would allow easy and safe body removal.
Wanting to close the cave and leave the body, is understandable as a tribute to the person, but it is just asking for long-term problems.
Elfish all of your reasons are sound indeed and I support them.
With Nutty Putty the situation is unique. In that sealing the cave wouldn't be too monumental of a task. The entrance is a 5 foot vertical hole with a belly crawl to get into the main passage. This crawl is only a mere 2-4 feet long before it (kinda opens up to a ceiling height of 1 foot and gradually gets larger until one can stand up)... there is a gate (photos of the construction can be found here: http://ralph.rigidtech.com/view_album.p ... ng-Project ) and it wouldn't take much to put several bucket loads of sand resting on a piece of plywood on the outside of the crawl opening as a plug for the sand to in turn act as a plug for the cement and it can be filled up to the surface level of the entrance with a single cement truck load.
(disclaimer: the following is not intended to be insensitive or uncaring of the deceased or his family/friends or for those who attempted to rescue him, nor is it intended to be cold uncaring chatter. If it's felt that my timing is way off on the subject matter then I humbly apologize in advance to all who may be sensitive to the subject.)
But still the body is in roughly 6-700 feet into the cave, the cave itself is hydrothermal in origin, possibly formerly a geyser at one time. The cave is very warm, if I recall (and will probably be corrected) the cave's ambient temperature was/is a tepid 74 degrees and at nearly 100% humidity, hence the muddy places that were evident when the cave was originally discovered. During the winter the cave literally blows out steam on the coldest of days, tons of (warm) air flow comes out of the entrance during certain times of the year.
A large percentage of the cave is relatively dry and very dusty. One would imagine that the body would eventually could suffer only a slight decay and mummification with the rest. There are no large or small biota that inhabit the cave, if there ever was they've long since abandoned the cave due to the huge volume of human visitors. Right now the largest creatures would be cave crickets and large black beetles. They would certainly perform the tasks that nature designed them for.
A discussion lead to the idea of sealing up just the passage where the body is. It too can be done and in such a manner that any attempts to "dig it out" would lead to massive frustration or repeated trips. Either way it is not known if the passage beyond the body has any links to other passages in the cave and the odor of decomposition would be noticeable throughout. Discussion lead to sealing up that portion of the passage and waiting upwards to a year before allowing entry back into the cave. A memorial disk can be created as a seal on the concrete plug.
The only other option is to prohibit entry to the cave via the main gate (which has been breached several times) and an additional surface gate, until such a time that the body has decomposed to the point that extraction of the remains are not as difficult. This can still be done with an appropriate amount of reverence and respect and allow better interment of the body for the family members to have closure. A plug can still be created in the passage to prevent curiosity seekers from making the same attempt.
But again the land owners are the final decision makers in this, we can protest all we want here OR we can write a petition or send letters to the SITLA organization letting them know the reasons why their decision isn't a good idea and all of that. Whatever needs or should or could be done needs to be done VERY QUICKLY. The Utah caving community is still reeling from this tragedy, many still bear an (unnecessary) burden of guilt, some may respond in concert but respectfully speaking don't expect too much help at this point. They're willing to follow whatever the powers that be decides.