This season’s campaign in the Grotta Scaloria concentrated on the recording of the large Quagliati chamber using a laser scanner, a detailed three-dimensional survey that is fundamental for the advance of this research with regard to a correct reading and interpretation of several tectonic phenomena, which occurred over the course of time inside the cave.

In fact, the considerations that emerged from the study leading to the publication of the 1970s excavations made it necessary to clarify the dynamics of the collapses and therefore reconstruct the tectonic and mechanical sequences that led to the blocking of the original large entrance to this sizable chamber.

Such a detailed survey should also make it possible to check whether the flat area at the foot of the landslide fan blocking the entrance constitutes an artificial terrace, which made it easier to use the space at the point in where the roof is highest and reaches c. 2 m.
This technology facilitates the rapid and complete recording of three-dimensional objects at different scales and resolutions, even in areas that are difficult to reach such as those inside the cavern. The extremely precise measurements offer a level of information that cannot be achieved using traditional instruments.

The realistic three-dimensional graphics that can be created using this type of recording make it possible to study the morphology of the blocks and formulate better-grounded proposals about the dynamics of the collapses occurring from prehistory to the early medieval period.

This campaign required the participation of a team with the appropriate equipment together with a topographer-speleologist and the archaeologists who have been involved in the research in the Grotta Scaloria for many years. Therefore, it was decided to use this year’s funding to carry out the laser survey, prior to any other intervention. The lighting system set up for the survey constituted a great, and to date unique, opportunity to see the entire grotto well-lit and to consider various aspects of its topography and possibilities for future interventions.
It was also possible to map the clandestine excavations prior to the cleaning of the sections exposed by the latter in order to take micro-morphological samples. This will provide information over a vast area without opening new excavations and recover important data. Indeed, some of the sections from the illegal digging present traces of the charcoal rich soils documented in other areas of the grotto.

New interesting ideas for analyses seem to emerge from the geo-electric survey undertaken in 2014.

The resistivity survey, undertaken both inside and outside the grotto, covered a much larger area than the entire Scaloria-Occhipinto Complex, with the aim of identifying the location and depth of the larger cavities over an area equal to c. 25 hectares. At the time, the team from Genova University and Tubingen University made a detailed geo-electric survey using a dense grid of 15 parallel transects, which made it possible to obtain a 3D model of the underground structures and therefore further clarify the characteristics of the karstic complex adjacent to the Grotta Scaloria. The electrodes were placed 2 m apart along the transects.

The results produced by two bores also undertaken in 2014, which provided information about the stratigraphy and presence of underground cavities, were used to calibrate and validate the analyses. Work has begun on the data interpretation, which so far indicates that the site’s morphology is far more complex than previously known.