File:Travertine speleothem (Drapery Room, Mammoth Cave, Kentucky, USA) 2 (38060826095).jpg

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Western Kentucky's Mammoth Cave is the longest cave system on Earth, with 412 miles known and mapped as of fall 2017. The name does not refer to the early discovery of fossil mastodon or mammoth bones here. Rather, the name refers to the immense size of many rooms and passages.

Speleothem (= "cave formations") refers to all secondary mineral deposits in caves. Most speleothem is composed of calcium carbonate (CaCO3 - usually in the form of calcite, but sometimes aragonite). Calcareous speleothem is referred to using the rock name "travertine", a crystalline-textured, chemical sedimentary rock formed by precipitation from water.

Dripstone and flowstone are the most common forms of travertine speleothem. Dripstone forms by calcium carbonate precipitation from dripping water. Flowstone forms by calcium carbonate precipitation from thin sheets of flowing water. The most common forms of dripstone are stalactites (attached to ceilings), stalagmites (growing from the floor), columns (= fused stalactite-stalagmite pairs), and draperies (= curtain-like sheets formed as water drops descend along an inclined surface). Flowstone often has the appearance of frozen waterfalls.

The wrinkled travertine curtains shown here are draperies in the Drapery Room, which is located below and behind a famous flowstone mass called Frozen Niagara.

Locality: Drapery Room, Mammoth Cave Ridge, Mammoth Cave National Park, western Kentucky, USA
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Source Travertine speleothem (Drapery Room, Mammoth Cave, Kentucky, USA) 2
Author James St. John

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This image was originally posted to Flickr by James St. John at https://flickr.com/photos/47445767@N05/38060826095 (archive). It was reviewed on 13 October 2019 by FlickreviewR 2 and was confirmed to be licensed under the terms of the cc-by-2.0.

13 October 2019

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current17:50, 13 October 2019Thumbnail for version as of 17:50, 13 October 20193,000 × 4,000 (5.7 MB)Ser Amantio di Nicolao (talk | contribs)Transferred from Flickr via #flickr2commons

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