Wulong Karst

Wulong Karst lies in Wulong District, Chongqing Municipality, in southwestern China, a landscape of limestone dissolved into natural bridges, sinkholes and gorges and recognized as part of the South China Karst UNESCO World Heritage Site. Its Three Natural Bridges area protects a 22 square kilometer zone containing the Tianlong, Qinglong and Heilong limestone bridges along with multiple tiankengs, giant collapse sinkholes, and gorges. Nearby, the Qingkou Tiankeng Scenic Area holds five sinkholes across a 7,134 hectare core zone and 46,781 hectare buffer zone, some 53,915 hectares of protected area in total, and is considered the only known tiankeng cluster in the world hypothesized to have formed by surface water erosion rather than underground collapse alone. The area's Furong Cave, about 20 kilometers from the district center, runs 2,846 meters long through the limestone, its numerous vertical shafts lined with abundant stalactites. This entity documents Wulong Karst specifically as a geological formation, a limestone karst landscape of natural bridges and giant sinkholes shaped by surface water erosion.