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Mmegi On the surface it betrays the eye; the Kalahari Desert is alive with vegetation and undulations, where life in the wild continues as usual. Down below though, the desert is hiding something precious - ancient caves that lie buried under a thick blanket of windblown sand dunes over thousands of years. A geophysical study at the same place that boast of Gcwhihaba caves, confirms that dozens of caves lie buried deep under the Kalahari Desert and work has started to uncover the mystery. The job to unearth the mysteries beneath commenced in 2005 when the National Museum and Art Gallery started sending a team of experts to be based in the desert, specifically for this purpose. The Botswana Defence Force (BDF) has set up a camp there, providing manpower, which digs the spacious area locating the lost caves. {mosgoogle left 7887083644} The team works with museum geologists. Babosi Mosarwa, the geologist heading the team of excavators, says the geophysical study has proven that "there are lots of caves" hidden by the sand. He says evidence shows that some of the caves are as shallow as 40m deep, while others may be deeper. Trying to identify and map out the lost caves is a laborious job that started with a pilot drilling whose purpose was to confirm the map or anomalies shown earlier. Mosarwa says the drilling continued until 2007 in nine areas with three of them proving positive. Through a type of digging called tunnelling, Mosarwa says his team removes the sand, to enable them to access the targeted anomalies. He says in January last year, after much tunnelling they inserted a camera that proved the existence of a cave inside. The air taken out of the hole also showed it had carbon dioxide, which indicates the presence of a cave. A different team from the Department of Water Affairs started drilling some 21.5m to open the hidden cave in March last year. It may be a slow laborious process, but the National Museum and Art Gallery director Phorano hopes that when the job is finally completed, more caves, probably with stalagmites and stalactites similar to the Gcwhihaba caves, will have been unearthed. The neighbouring Gcwhihaba caves or Droskey's caves, discovered in 1932 measuring 500m long, have the stalagmites and stalactites, as well as hundreds of bats inside. Porcupine and a leopard are also known residents of the caves, which are safe for humans. There is also a spacious hall inside the caves, which has been named the Droskey's hall in honour of the man who brought the caves to the attention of the world. It later emerged that Drostkey was actually shown the caves by the Bushmen, who lived in the neighbourhood.
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