Pellucidar found in China.

[Aberrant Templar]

Explorers just found a cave system in China that is so massive it has it's own internal weather system, including clouds.

[Sharoth]

Cool!

[John Kretzer]

Meh...I will be impress when they find the cave system with it's own sun...and dinosaurs.

;)

[BigNorseWolf]

holy BLEEEEP at the size of that stalactite. How long has that BEEN there?

So, any sign of the monks with the secrets to immortality?

[thejeff]

There is some crazy shit in China as far as caves go. And elsewhere in Asia. The largest cave chamber is Sarawak in Malaysia. I don't think this compares, impressive as it is.

There's probably a lot more. There's a lot that's unexplored. The locals know them, but often aren't equipped for real expeditions and have more important things to do anyway. And Westerners are really only starting to get access to a lot of areas.

[meatrace]

So THAT'S where Earth connects with the Underdark.

[Tirisfal]

Watch out for Deep-Crows!!

[Adamantine Dragon]

meatrace wrote:

So THAT'S where Earth connects with the Underdark.

My players in my campaign are currently in my world's version of the "underdark" and looking at the photos of this cavern made me think it is quite similar to the cavern they are in now.

[SnowJade]

Adamantine Dragon wrote:

meatrace wrote:

So THAT'S where Earth connects with the Underdark.

My players in my campaign are currently in my world's version of the "underdark" and looking at the photos of this cavern made me think it is quite similar to the cavern they are in now.

Well, the section on backstory development in Ultimate Campaign advises us to steal shamelessly, so there's your template. (Looks up and whistles innocently.) What, would we do that? Us? Nawww...

[Klaus van der Kroft]

Fantastic!

[Hama]

Beautiful, just beautiful.

[Adamantine Dragon]

One of my players kidded me about my cavern saying it was way too big to be realistic. I'll bring this discovery up next time we meet. :)

[Fake Healer]

beautiful pics but damn....why the f*%$ can't anyone do video anymore. That crap looks like America's Funniest Home Videos when they go with circa 1988 clips. I've seen better video on cellphones. "Hey I'm gonna explore a newly discovered wonder of the world....better pack my sh!ttiest video camera". It's like they stole a Bigfoot Researcher's equipment. No excuse. Probably spent tens of thousands of dollars getting the expedition together and couldn't bring a decent video camera. Idiots.

[Adamantine Dragon]

Fake Healer wrote:

beautiful pics but damn....why the f*%$ can't anyone do video anymore. That crap looks like America's Funniest Home Videos when they go with circa 1988 clips. I've seen better video on cellphones. "Hey I'm gonna explore a newly discovered wonder of the world....better pack my sh!ttiest video camera". It's like they stole a Bigfoot Researcher's equipment. No excuse. Probably spent tens of thousands of dollars getting the expedition together and couldn't bring a decent video camera. Idiots.

Maybe the lighting was bad and the conditions affected things like camera stability and lens cleanliness?

[Fake Healer]

Adamantine Dragon wrote:

Fake Healer wrote:

beautiful pics but damn....why the f*%$ can't anyone do video anymore. That crap looks like America's Funniest Home Videos when they go with circa 1988 clips. I've seen better video on cellphones. "Hey I'm gonna explore a newly discovered wonder of the world....better pack my sh!ttiest video camera". It's like they stole a Bigfoot Researcher's equipment. No excuse. Probably spent tens of thousands of dollars getting the expedition together and couldn't bring a decent video camera. Idiots.

Maybe the lighting was bad and the conditions affected things like camera stability and lens cleanliness?

I could see that to a small degree but that video actually looks grainy and like something my old mini-cartridge video camera from 1988 took. It is so bad that conditions can't be the issue.

Maybe they used a lower resolution version of the video for the article but I would assume that they wanted to "wow" people and help promote themselves for future funding on those types of expeditions.
It boils down to either crappy camera or dumb decision to post lower-grade video than they had....either way the video fails.
The pictures are gorgeous though and I would love to see more....in a video.....that you can actually see some details in.....

[thejeff]

Fake Healer wrote:

beautiful pics but damn....why the f*%$ can't anyone do video anymore. That crap looks like America's Funniest Home Videos when they go with circa 1988 clips. I've seen better video on cellphones. "Hey I'm gonna explore a newly discovered wonder of the world....better pack my sh!ttiest video camera". It's like they stole a Bigfoot Researcher's equipment. No excuse. Probably spent tens of thousands of dollars getting the expedition together and couldn't bring a decent video camera. Idiots.

Conditions for cave photography are usually pretty damn lousy.

First, this cave is way the hell out in the middle of nowhere and the point of the expedition was exploration, not making a documentary. I also doubt they had what you're thinking of as "funding". Most of these trips are basically self-funded.
That's probably done on somebody's personal video camera that they were willing to bring on a trip to the back end of China and drag through a cave. Not all of which is likely as huge and open as these photos.

[ShadowcatX]

Beautiful.

[yellowdingo]

Great Googlymogly! I'm gone a day and everything happens...somehow this is all Kobold Cleaver's Fault.

[Chris Lambertz]

Removed a post. Please revisit the messageboard rules.

[Alzrius]

It's worth noting that the link in the original post is to the Daily Mail, which is a tabloid. I'd wait for independent verification from a trustworthy source before believing this (and by "independent," I mean "not getting the story from the Daily Mail").

[Crimson Jester]

How about this then?

[Feros]

Actually, I saw a TV show on Discovery a while back with the Chinese team that did the first exploring of the sink holes that lead to these caverns. They are massive and extend for miles. They were carved by that underground river. They had to use boats at one point!

EDIT: At least, I thought it was Discovery. Now I can't locate it. But it was amazing footage.

[Alzrius]

Crimson Jester wrote:

How about this then?

More reputable, but it's quick to link to the Daily Mail website, so I'm still suspicious.

[lucky7]

PFS Adventure designers look away!!!

Home game GMs, keep on watching.

[Hama]

Fake healer, photography is very different then video filming. Especially with low lighting conditions that are found in caves. You have to open the iris as far as you can (0.7 i assume) and set for loooooooooooong exposition to get enough light for the photo to look as good as those photos look. Video cameras cannot have long expositions for every frame.

[Feros]

Ah, found it! What I saw was the Xiaozhai Tiankeng, a massive sinkhole that leads to the Difeng cave. It's in the same region as this newly discovered cave system.

[thejeff]

Hama wrote:

Fake healer, photography is very different then video filming. Especially with low lighting conditions that are found in caves. You have to open the iris as far as you can (0.7 i assume) and set for loooooooooooong exposition to get enough light for the photo to look as good as those photos look. Video cameras cannot have long expositions for every frame.

You also can't use flashes for video. Even multiple slaved flashes, which are what's commonly used. Lighting up big rooms, even for a fraction of a second is really hard.

Especially when you have to lug all the gear in with you. The lighting you'd need for real video is just not practical unless there's serious money behind it.

[Aberrant Templar]

It looks pretty legit. One of the explorers (mentioned in the UK article) was a guy named Robbie Shone from Manchester, UK.

Here is his website.

Here is an article about an ice cave they explored

Erin Lynch, a speleologist from America featured in one of the photographs, has been published by the British Cave Researcher's Association as recently as 2012

If it were a political story in the Daily Mail I'd be more skeptical, but it makes sense that the Mail would run a story about a local, famous cave explorer and the people involved look to be pretty well established.

[thejeff]

Definitely legit. I think I've met Erin, briefly. She's been going on Chinese caving trips for years.

And this is big and impressive, a great find, but it's not out of line for caves in the area.