Virtual Cave Tour

Welcome to the Virtual Tour of Lehman Caves

Are you ready to head underground into Lehman Caves? Below are three links to videos that will start your virtual tour through this amazing subterranean world. These three videos should be viewed in order for the best experience. Just click on the image of the video you wish to start, and it will direct you to our YouTube page, where you can begin your adventure through this fantastic cave.

This virtual tour was created by using LiDAR (three dimensional laser imaging) and photogrammetry (high resolution pictures of the cave). With the data from these two sources and some incredible computer software, Lehman Caves has now come to life on our screens for us to experience anywhere.

 

 

Blase LaSala and Eric Weaver set up the LiDAR scanner to do 3d scanning of the cave tour route.

NPS/G. Baker

The virtual cave tour was made largely due to a LiDAR scanning project conducted in Lehman Caves in February 2020. During a two-week period, a LiDAR scanner and a high resolution color camera were moved along the cave tour route in approximately eight-foot increments. Each instrument took about 30 to 90 seconds to scan/photograph an area.

Some fun facts from the project:

• The LiDAR pointcloud of the tour route is comprised of over 5 billion points.
• Over 50,000 photos were taken to add color data to the model.
• Collected 3 terabytes worth of raw data.
• Resolution for this dataset is high enough to see formations as thin as a pencil.

 

Go to the Park's cave/karst webpage.