Cave Explorers Discover Underground Forest in China

by Estefania Garcia-Fox, age 12

In a giant sinkhole in Central China, a team of scientists has discovered a mysterious underground forest. This sinkhole turned out to be 630 feet deep. A team of speleologists, people who study and explore caves, rappelled into the sinkhole in 2022 and discovered three cave entrances and a forest of ancient trees that grew to be more than 131 feet tall, seeking the sunlight that came through the sinkhole entrance.

Zhang Yuanhaui, senior engineer at the Institute of Karst Geology, measured the sinkhole interior. The bottom is 1004 feet long and 492 feet wide. In Mandarin Chinese, the word for forested sinkholes such as this one is “tiankeng,” or “heavenly pit.”

“The bottom of the sinkhole did indeed seem like another world!” Yuanhaui said.

The terrain where these sinkholes appear is known as 'karst topography.' The rocks in these landscapes dissolve and turn into caves, sinkholes, springs, and sinking streams. Karst topography can also be found in the United States, including parts of Wisconsin. Sinkholes form when open spaces in the rock collapse, pulling whatever is on the surface into the depths of the earth.

Scientists have discovered more sinkholes in northwest China. Many have underground water that can be easily accessed and could be a resource for the plants that grow there. More research and exploration are anticipated in the future for these natural phenomena. Given how big the sinkhole is, scientists are questioning what species might live there and whether or not there might be undiscovered species in this “underground forest.”

[Source: Live Science]