In the early 1990s, a Vietnamese man named Ho Khanh stumbled upon a massive cavern in the jungle. He didnt know it at the time, but hed made a groundbreaking discovery. Today, Hang Son Doong is recognized as the largest cave in the world.Despite his astonishment at the size of the caverns opening, Ho Khanh forgot where it was located for nearly 20 years. Then, around 2006, he ran into British cavers who were exploring the region. He told them about what he had once seen, and for the next two years, they searched for the cave together.Ryan Deboodt/Oxalis Adventure/FacebookHo Khanh came across the entrance to Hang Son Doong while searching for agarwood.Finally, in 2009, they found it again, and the cavers realized the true extent of Hang Son Doong. The cave stretched for more than five miles, and the main passage was so big that it could hold an entire New York City block complete with 40-story skyscrapers.Today, Hang Son Doong is a popular tourist attraction, though access is highly restricted. However, those who do have the opportunity to enter the cave leave in awe of one of the worlds most magnificent natural wonders.Click here to view slideshowBelow, read more about the world's largest cave. And above, look through 20 incredible photos of its otherworldly beauty.The Accidental Discovery Of Hang Son DoongAround 1991, a man named Ho Khanh was searching the jungles of central Vietnam for valuable agarwood to sell to support his family. He had ventured far from home when the weather suddenly turned, and he sought shelter beneath a large rock."I sat down with my back to a huge boulder," Ho Khanh told Vietnamese media in 2009. "Then something strange happened. I heard the sound of a strong wind and running water coming from behind me."Oxalis Adventure/FacebookHo Khanh sits outside the entrance to Hang Son Doong.Ho Khanh searched for the source of the noise and discovered a gaping cavern opening with a river rushing through it. "I was very surprised," he recalled. "I thought I knew many caves in this region, but this one was so different and seemed to be untouched by man. It was pitch black, but judging by the feeling of the air, I thought I was walking into a huge space. The strong wind blowing felt like something from the underworld."Ho Khanh had no way to explore the cave at the time, so he headed home and promptly forgot where it was. Over the next 15 years, he tried to find it on occasion, but he had no luck. Then, around 2006, he was approached by a group of British cavers.They had heard rumors of his discovery and wanted help locating the cavern. Ho Khanh renewed his search efforts, and while trekking through the jungle two years later, he heard a familiar sound. "I stopped by a big boulder," he said. "There was the same strong wind, the sound of water running I knew I'd found the cave at long last. I can't describe my feelings at the time, I was so overjoyed."He led the cavers to the site in 2009, and when they finally entered, they realized it had been well worth the wait.The Wonders Of The World's Largest CaveThe first major expedition into Hang Son Doong was carried out by members of the British Cave Research Association (BCRA). Their 2009 survey found that the cave was at least 5.5 miles long, but that wasn't its most impressive feature.Jason Speth/Oxalis Adventure/FacebookThe opening into the main passage of Hang Son Doong.The main passage of the cavern is the largest in the world. At 660 feet high and 490 feet wide, it's big enough for a Boeing 747 to fly through without its wings touching either wall. Explorers came across stalagmites that were 260 feet tall, and they dubbed a solid calcite flowstone deposit that towered 300 feet above their heads the "Great Wall of Vietnam." They also saw cave pearls spheres of calcium carbonate that form in the pools of limestone caverns that were the size of baseballs.Peter MacNab was one of the first men to enter Hang Son Doong. As he told CBS News in 2026, "Every corner you went 'round was completely new, completely exciting. And it just kept getting better and better as you went into the cave. It was absolutely spectacular."Ty Horton/Oxalis Adventure/FacebookVisitors to Hang Son Doong spend two nights in the massive cavern.In two areas, the roof has collapsed into the cavern, creating massive skylights open to the world above. Vegetation has made its way through these holes along with monkeys, birds, and insects creating a breathtaking miniature jungle inside the cave that's been compared to the landscape from the movie Avatar.Indeed, those who enter Hang Son Doong don't soon forget the awe-inspiring experience.Inside Hang Son Doong's Growing Tourism IndustryThe first tour group was permitted to enter the world's largest cave in 2013, paying $3,000 each for the opportunity. Since then, between 800 and 1,000 visitors have ventured to the site each year. Tourism is highly restricted, both for safety reasons and to preserve the cavern's fragile ecosystem.Vietnam's government once considered installing cable cars in the cave to promote additional tourism, but locals pushed back so fiercely that those plans were quickly abandoned, and conservation efforts were put in place.Oxalis Adventure/FacebookIn monsoon season, the river that flows through Hang Son Doong is dangerous, but visitors can boat on it during calmer times.Tours are prohibited between September and December due to rising water levels during peak monsoon season. The river that flows through Hang Son Doong can reach dangerous levels, blocking access to much of the cave and threatening to sweep away anyone inside. And while visitors are welcome from January through August, permits are required to join one of the 100 expeditions into the cave's depths each year.Ho Khanh, the man who first discovered Hang Son Doong, now helps lead these expeditions. He's known as the "king of the caves," and he's turned his passion for his country's environment into a career. His wife, Le Thi Nghia, told Vietnamese media in 2009 that she used to resent Ho Khanh's desire to explore his surroundings. "Sometimes I get angry because he just wants to go to the jungle and look at caves," she stated. "After all this, I'm proud of him."After exploring Hang Son Doong, the world's largest cave, learn about 21 more of the most beautiful caves in the world Then, look through these photos of Vietnam when it was a French colony.The post Hang Son Doong, The Cave In Vietnam Thats So Massive A Boeing 747 Could Fly Through It appeared first on All That's Interesting.

When Marilyn Monroe first stepped onto the Hollywood scene, she claimed that she never knew her mother, Gladys Pearl Monroe.The starlet told the public that she was an orphan who spent her childhood bouncing between different foster homes, but that tragic tale was only partially true. In 1952, a gossip columnist discovered that Marilyn Monroes mother was actually alive and working at a nursing home in a town outside of Los Angeles.Silver Screen Collection/Hulton Archive/Getty ImagesGladys Pearl Baker was a single mother struggling with a low-paying job and mental illness when she gave birth to the future Marilyn Monroe.Gladys Pearl Monroe, who also went by Gladys Pearl Baker, had paranoid schizophrenia, and her relationship with Monroe was strained. Despite this, however, the mother and daughter had enough of a connection that the starlet felt obligated to leave her a handsome inheritance following her sudden death in 1962.So why did Marilyn Monroe lie about her relationship with her mother?Why Gladys Pearl Baker Felt She Had To Give Up Her ChildMarilyn Monroe was arguably one of the most glamorous stars in Hollywood, but before she became a celebrity, she was just a girl named Norma Jeane Mortenson from the suburbs of Los Angeles. Born in California in 1926, Monroe was the third child to Gladys Pearl Baker who worked as a film cutter at a Hollywood editing studio. Bakers other two children, Bernice and Robert, were taken by her abusive ex-husband John Newton Baker, who she married when she was 15 and he was 24. Baker had won sole custody of their two children during their divorce in 1923, but he kidnapped them and brought them to his native home in Kentucky. Baker briefly married a man named Martin Edward Mortenson, but they separated some months later. It is not known whether he fathered Marilyn Monroe. In fact, the identity of Monroes father is still unknown to this day, and it didnt make it any easier that her mother lived with undiagnosed paranoid schizophrenia and was barely able ends meet at her low-paying job. Silver Screen Collection/Hulton Archive/Getty ImagesMonroe is actually Gladys Pearl Bakers maiden name.Due to Bakers struggles, Monroe was placed with a foster family.According to author J. Randy Taraborrelli in The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe, Baker visited her daughter as much as she could. She once came close to kidnapping Monroe by stuffing her in a duffle bag and locking her foster mom Ida Bolender inside the home. But Bolender broke free and thwarted the plans of Marilyn Monroes mother.The truth was that Gladys had a problem watching Ida raise her child, said Mary Thomas-Strong, who knew Monroes first foster family. She was a professional mother, in a sense. She wanted to have her way with Norma Jeane, and it was hard for Gladys to be on the sidelines.In 1934, Baker suffered a nervous breakdown during which she allegedly brandished a knife while yelling that someone was trying to kill her. She was institutionalized at the state hospital in Norwalk, California, and Monroe was placed under the guardianship of her mothers friend, Grace McKee, who also worked in the film industry. It was allegedly McKees influence that later sowed Marilyn Monroes aspirations to become a movie star. But with a husband and three children of her own, McKees hands were full. She convinced a judge to grant Monroe a half orphan status, which enabled McKee to place the minor with foster care families under her guardianship and receive a government stipend for Monroes wellbeing. Aunt Grace would say things to me like no one else would ever talk to me, Marilyn Monroe said of her legal guardian. I felt as whole as a loaf of bread nobodys eaten.Silver Screen Collection/Hulton Archive/Getty ImagesNewlywed Norma Jeane (far right) has a meal with her family, which includes her mother Gladys Pearl Monroe (front).Marilyn Monroe moved between roughly 10 different foster homes and one orphanage between 1935 and 1942. She was also sexually abused as a child during this time. One of her abusers was McKees husband.After McKee and her family moved to West Virginia, 16-year-old Monroe stayed behind and married her neighbor, 21-year-old James Dougherty, but the marriage fell apart due to Monroes Hollywood ambitions.Just as she regained her freedom following the divorce, Marilyn Monroes mother was released from San Joses Agnews State Hospital. The dysfunctional mother-daughter duo moved in briefly with a family friend while Monroe continued to make a name for herself in Hollywood as a budding model. Unfortunately, her mothers psychotic episodes only worsened.How The Studios Fought To Hide Marilyn Monroes Mother From The PublicMichael Ochs Archives/Getty ImagesAfter she became Marilyn Monroe by name, studio handlers also worked to create a new identity for the burgeoning star.In September 1946, Gladys Pearl Baker declared that she would be moving to Oregon to live with her Aunt Dora. But Baker never made it. Instead, she married a man named John Stewart Eley, who secretly had another wife and family in Idaho.According to Taraborrelli, Monroe tried to warn her mother about her husbands second family, but Baker suspected that, in reality, her daughter was purposefully trying to hurt her in revenge for the difficult childhood shed given her.Thats how much [Norma Jeane] hates me, Baker allegedly told Grace McKee after the news was passed on from Monroe. Shell do anything to ruin my life because she still believes I ruined hers.By this time, the aspiring actress had changed her name to Marilyn Monroe and signed a promising contract with 20th Century Fox. She starred in a collection of films in the early 1950s, but her big break came with the 1953 comedy Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Monroes career quickly skyrocketed thereafter with more hit films like The Seven Year Itch and Some Like It Hot.And as Monroes popularity rose, the studios PR team worked to hide her messy past. They instructed the actress to concoct a false story about her parents in which her parents had died and she had been orphaned. Monroe went along with it and rarely spoke of her mother with anyone outside of her extended family. FacebookGladys Pearl Baker was admitted to Rockhaven Sanitarium in 1953, shortly after the expos on her was published.But that lie came back to bite the star in 1952 when a gossip columnist received a tip that Marilyn Monroes mother was still alive and working at a nursing home in Eagle Rock, a town outside of Los Angeles. Despite their troubled relationship, her mother had proudly told people at the nursing home that the famous actress was her daughter. The poor woman was telling people she was Marilyn Monroes mother, and no one believed her, Taraborrelli said in a 2015 interview.Baker suffered another psychotic breakdown shortly after the true story of Monroes past broke the news, and she was once again institutionalized in the Rockhaven Sanitarium in La Crescenta. From there, she often wrote her daughter pleading for her to get her out. Did Marilyn Monroe And Gladys Pearl Monroe Ever Reunite?Vintage Actors/TwitterMarilyn Monroe with her half-sister Bernice Baker (left) and her mother (center). While the sisters got along well, they both had a rocky relationship with their mother.Marilyn Monroe had reportedly visited the Rockhaven Sanitarium before admitting her mother there, but the event proved to be too much for her. According to McKee, Monroe was so upset by the visit that she had to take sleeping pills that night.And despite her traumatic childhood, Monroe maintained a connection with her mother even as she became one of the most recognizable faces on the planet. She also sent her a monthly allowance. While it seems that Marilyn Monroe remained somewhat in touch with her mother, their relationship was nonetheless strained up until Monroes tragic death in August 1962. The uncertain circumstances around her demise birthed many conspiracy theories that the star had committed suicide. Indeed, it was initially ruled a probable suicide.If true, it wouldnt have been the first time that the bombshell tried to take her own life. Marilyn Monroe endured a brief stay at a psychiatric ward herself when she was admitted into New York Hospitals Payne-Whitney ward after attempting suicide in 1960. Monroe wrote of the traumatic stay:There was no empathy at Payne-Whitney it had a very bad effect they asked me after putting me in a cell (I mean cement blocks and all) for very disturbed depressed patients (except I felt I was in some kind of prison for a crime I hadnt committed). The inhumanity there I found archaic.Before her death, Monroe was suspected of living with the same mental health issues as her mother. Those closest to her saw parallels between the stars erratic behavior and her mothers illness, which has brought many to speculate that she may have inherited her mothers condition, though she never received an official diagnosis. A year after her daughters death, Baker escaped Rockhaven by climbing out of a small closet window and lowering herself onto the ground with a rope she fashioned from two uniforms. A day later, she was found inside a church about 15 miles away from the institution. She told police she ran away to practice her Christian Science teaching before they deemed her non-threatening and returned her to Rockhaven. Gladys Pearl Baker died of heart failure in 1984. It seems that Marilyn Monroes estranged relationship with her mother was yet another heartbreaking facet of the actresss tumultuous life, but the late starlet did attempt to reconcile with her. Upon her death, Monroe left Baker an inheritance of $5,000 a year that was to be drawn from a $100,000 trust fund.Though unstable, it seemed as though their relationship couldnt be broken.Now that youve learned about Marilyn Monroes stormy relationship with her mother Gladys Pearl Baker, read some of the Hollywood icons most memorable quotes. Then, peruse these candid photos of Marilyn Monroe.The post The Tragic Story Of Gladys Pearl Baker, The Troubled Mother Of Marilyn Monroe appeared first on All That's Interesting.

Titanium as a raw material is a resource that you can find as soon as you leave your Lifepod in Subnautica 2. While there are some uses for Titanium as it is, you'll need to be able to turn it into Titanium Ingots if you want to craft more advanced items, such as the Repair Tool, Sonic Resonator, and Bioreactor.

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