Chuck Sutherland

Stages of a cleanup Identify an illegal dump site or graffiti ridden location Secure landowner permission Build your team Build partnerships Set a date Gather volunteers Resolve legal and logistic issues Contact the media Obtain supplies Execute the cleanup Conduct a post-cleanup analysis Identify an illegal dump site or graffiti ridden location It may be that you already know a place that needs to be cleaned. If you don't talk with local officials and folks who spend time outside. Someone can point you to a place in need. Knowing where to clean is only part of the process though. You need to know whose property you would be working on. If you're in Tennessee, you can use the Tax Assessor webpage to explore who owns what. Alternately your friendly neighborhood GIS professional can help you get at this information. Secure landowner permission You'll want to reach out to the landowner early on in planning to make sure they are fine with you proceeding. ...

You're curious about caving? It's easy to understand why! Maybe you've seen photographs of caves and you're curious to see these places with your own eyes. Maybe you heard about a friend's excellent adventure through a local cave system and how challenging and rewarding it was for them. Maybe you're looking for the next extreme sport to master or maybe you're interested in learning about history, or a science that's practiced in caves. Whatever your reason, there's a great group of folks who are here to help you on the next leg of your adventure. "Don't ask where caves are. Ask where cavers are." The National Speleological Society (NSS) is the organization I belong to that is about caves and caving. There are local chapters called grottos. I am a member of a few of these across Tennessee, but the first grotto I belonged to, and the one where I focus most of my energy is the Upper Cumberland Grotto . We are based out ...

February 6th, 2020 the Upper Cumberland received a lot of rain. So much so, that it was worth a few minutes to whip up a map to help visualize how much. White and Cumberland Counties got the lion's share with 4.30 and 4.21 inches of rain on average across each county, respectively. A more detailed breakdown of the rain is below, along with some dramatic images and videos taken mostly at Rock Island State Park in Warren and White Counties. Using lidar to estimate normal and flood stage conditions witnessed yesterday, I suspect the water was nearly 30' above its normal stage. Normal stage is approximately 651' FASL, and the cliff edges being nearly inundated are at 681' FASL. All Flickr Photo and Videos: https://www.flickr.com/photos/chucksutherland/albums/72157713005510572

Sometime around middle to late November of 2019, I started getting tagged in posts on Reddit and Facebook where a map purported to show a correlation between missing person cases and caves. The two maps in question were of terrible quality in both content and image quality (so very much JPG compression). Somehow these maps managed to capture the public's attention for several weeks. In fact, more than two months later I am still being asked questions about the map. What follows is a critical analysis of the maps from both a cartographer's perspective, as well as a caver's. Origin Where did each image come from that comprised the map? The top image is titled " North America Cluster Map " and is produced by the Canam Missing Project / Missing 411. I cannot comment on the methods used to produce the map since they aren't stated. For this reason I am immediately suspect that this is conveying real information. I'll touch on why the form of this ma...

We cavers get pretty emotional about rescues. The kind of emotional that finds a group of 40 people from at least three different states happily atop a windy and frigid mountain in White County at night in the dead of winter. We are busy with tasks. Rope must be rigged. Paths must be cleared. We must be trained on how to use a haul system. Inside the cave people are shaving rocks to widen the passage. Cavers are placing bolts to assist with moving the patient. A medic has rappelled and climbed to him and administers medication to ease the pain. Hand warmers are placed on him. He is cold from having been underground, and unable to move for so long. He hurts and is weary, but he holds a deep strength that all here know and admire. Here is a place where normal people become heroes. Normal people learn the complex art of cave and cliff rescue and apply that to help their fellow humans. Normal people volunteer their time to their local rescue group. We wait for the order “Slow ...

Secret Cave lies on the Albert and Ethel Ogden Nature Preserve. It is owned by the National Speleological Society, and managed by a team of members including myself.

Much of Capshaw Cave looks like the above image; subway tunnel passages following meanders of a cold underground river. The floor of the cave is generally gravel, sometimes clean washed and scalloped limestone, sometimes tires and trash. The urban nature of the cave has left it largely devoid of the kind of life one would expect to find in a wet cave of this size. You will find no cave crayfish, no southern cave fish, and no bat species that call Capshaw Cave home. Today I am assisting TTU geology professor Evan Hart with data collection in the cave. Banks of sediment left behind from floods tell stories to those who listen. Evan's tools include a shovel, plastic siding, toilet paper, and tape. With the "U" shaped plastic siding he removes cross sections of sediment. Looking at the cut he dug with the shovel it's clear there is a story. Finely laminated alternating beds of sand and silt seem to show periods of higher energy and lower energy. The bigger story wil...