Shan Plateau

This was the fifth in a series of British Shan Plateau caving expeditions in the Southern Shan State in Myanmar (Burma), focussing on the area around Ywangan. A new feature of this expedition was that the members were allowed to stay in local villages outside Ywangan, closer to the caves to be explored, and also giving closer contact with the community. The first part of the expedition was based in Linwe village, from which they explored caves round around a large closed depression in the area known as Dragon Lake. Here they mapped five new cave systems, and established connections with other neighbouring systems. The second part was based at Kyauk Ngauk village, hoping to extend the previously explore Kyauk Khaung system into a neighbouring cave, but the technical nature of the caving did not allow this. However a new final pitch did make this the deepest mapped cave in Myanmar. In total the expedition mapped 5km of caves at 8 sites, recorded a further 16 sites of speleological interest, and increased the understanding of the hydrogeology of the area.