Castle cave

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Castle cave

BW

Location: Schwelm
Geographic
location: 		51 ° 17 '28.1 "  N , 7 ° 18' 37.1"  E Coordinates: 51 ° 17 '28.1 "  N , 7 ° 18' 37.1"  E
Castle cave (North Rhine-Westphalia)
Castle cave
Discovery: 2014
Overall length: 19 m

The castle cave is a cave in the Schwelm urban area. It is around 19 m long and, according to experts, is of outstanding geological importance in North Rhine-Westphalia.

Location, extent and description

The cave is on the Cologne – Dortmund railway line at the level of the Martfeld house , the entrance is a few meters north of the railway line in the steep embankment. It is 19 m long and has dome-like rooms. It houses a greater variety of stored minerals as well as a natural carbon dioxide lake, in which the CO 2 gas collects due to its higher density on the ground. This phenomenon is only known in the whole of North Rhine-Westphalia from the “ haze grotto ” in Bad Pyrmont . Abundant deposits of copper , marcasite , brown iron stone , manganese , sulfur , gypsum , pyrite and others have been seen. Altitude researchers report: “ The play of colors is incredible. The whole walls glitter with crystals ”. The hydrothermally created cave is located in the 30 m thick Schwelm mass limestone and is around 65 million years old.

The rich mineralization in the cave also gives an insight into the mining of pyrite and marcasite in the Schwelm sulfur gravel pit, which was carried out between the 16th century and 1922, and which mainly operated north of Haus Martfeld down to a depth of 20 m.

history

At the beginning of 2014, a sinkhole occurred near the Martfeld building on the Cologne – Dortmund railway line . A study by the non-profit working group Kluterthöhle e. V. from Ennepetal was commissioned. Because of its outstanding geological importance and because of its location near the Martfeld House, it was given the name "Castle Cave".

On December 3, 2014 there was a press conference in Haus Martfeld, at which the castle cave and the results of the research were presented.

natural reserve

After the discovery, the property was explored in close cooperation between the Lower Landscape Authority of the Ennepe-Ruhr district , the Kluterthöhle working group, Deutsche Bahn AG and Voigt GmbH. Finally, the worth of protection of the cave was determined and its entrance was secured against unauthorized access with a steel gate.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f VFH Schwelm: Current Issues - A sensational find. (No longer available online.) In: vfh-schwelm.de. Archived from the original on February 14, 2016 ; accessed on February 14, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / vfh-schwelm.de
  2. ↑ a b c d Bernd Richter: The castle cave in Schwelm is a sensational find for researchers. In: derwesten.de. WAZ, December 6, 2014, accessed February 14, 2016 .
  3. ↑ Activity report of the Kluterthöhle e. V. for 2014
  4. ↑ Volker Wrede, Stefan Voigt: The Schwelm sulfur gravel pit . Ed .: Geopark Ruhrgebiet eV (=  GeoPark Ruhrgebiet News . Volume 1 ). Essen 2014, p. 9-10 ( online [PDF; accessed on February 16, 2016]).

literature

  • Activity report of the working group Kluterthöhle e. V. for 2014 . In: Messages from the Association of German Cave and Karst Researchers e. V. No. 1/2016 , 2016, ISSN  0505-2211 , p. 18-19 ( online [PDF]).
  • Figge, Klaus, Der Trockenfall des Schwelm Gesundbrunnen, in: Contributions to the local history of the city of Schwelm and its surroundings, vol. 66, Schwelm 2017, p. 44

Web links