The half-century anniversary marks the connection that established Mammoth Cave as the longest cave in the world.
It was the summer of 1972, and Tom Brucker was in a tight spot two generations in the making. His father Roger had created a nonprofit dedicated to the research of caves alongside colleagues who were exploring the Floyd Collins Crystal Cave in the 1950s — one of the main gateways to the Flint Ridge Cave System.
Roger and Tom Brucker returned in a subsequent expedition with others, and Tom was the right dimensions to wriggle through, though it took him half an hour to do so. “My father couldn’t fit through the initial squeeze, so I went through,” Tom says. He then made it down the waterfall and through a winding passage, eventually coming to a river and following it for 500 meters before turning back. Still, that progress was the first step in extending the longest known cave in the world.
On September 9, 1972, explorer John Wilcox made it through the underground river when he saw that the water level had lowered. He made it through to Echo River, where he could see the Mammoth Cave's main tourist trail. That initial discovery by Crowther and Brucker was now confirmed — the Flint Ridge Cave System, which was already the longest cave system in the world, connected to Mammoth, earning Mammoth Cave the title.
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