Puddle Dig Team: Freya Bearn, Sam Hill, Stuart Jelliss, Mike Kushy and James Vickery.
Four of us arrived at the entrance at about 18.30 and headed down to Puddle Dig. We carried in 5 bags. 1 of which was sand taken on to TPC by MWa, the other 4 had 3 sand and 1 cement. These were left in Boulder Rift Chamber for use in the TPC dig. Initially James and I were clipping buckets of loose rocks from the dam onto a rope which Mike and Sam then hauled up. However when Stuart Jelliss arrived I was sent down to the dig face. At the bottom of a slope lay an uninviting crawl into a pool of mud and loose bits of rock, which terminated where a large boulder sloped down into a puddle of sloppy mud.
After a while of clearing the larger chunks of rock from the foot of the slope, which I handed up in buckets to Stuart, I ventured towards the far end of the crawl to the foot of the boulder which sloped down from the ceiling. I began to clear the mud by hand, expecting to hit solid rock beneath it, but was instead met by a gritty sand-like substance. Beneath me was a large slab of rock which prevented me from going too far forwards, but I managed to loosen much of the grit with a crowbar which I continued to shovel out. To my excitement, when I pushed the crowbar into the grit, it kept pushing forwards without hitting an endpoint. Furthermore, having cleared enough mud out of the way, I could put my hand underneath the boulder and felt that it arched upwards. It seemed as though beyond the grit and mud was a large gap leading downwards, which could be made accessible by widening the gap between the boulder which sloped down and the rock on the ground. By the time we had stopped, enough had been removed that I could no longer reach through with my arms.
Mike and Sam came down to look. Looking behind us on the way out, we could see cracks in the ceiling beneath which I had been digging. Mike and Sam debated putting in scaffold bars, but it was agreed that the ceiling would have to come down to make it safe. This would also give a bit more room for manoeuvre, as currently there is not space to sit up. Out by 21.00. Freya.
Tea Party Chamber Dig Team: Mikey Waterworth and Mike Wise.
Dropped into the entrance just after 1730 with a drill and grinder in a tackle bag, two batteries in a small box and 3 x 25 litre containers 2 of which were cut as buckets and 1 as a drag tray. After some discussion at the TPC dig, including Mikey disappearing some distance into the floor, operations commenced. All references are made from the viewpoint of someone standing immediately above/in front of the dig.
4 mixes of cement were made and used to fix rocks in place in the large gap below the two large boulders at upper left.
A second horizontal bar was fixed across the front between the two uprights and wedged at each end against rock - see first photo below.
Mud, small rock and some quite large rocks were removed from the floor of the dig in the centre and right hand side. The small stuff was placed above the dig on the left to form a flattish platform and otherwise used to fill voids in the main boulder slope
Large rocks including those from the dig were placed against the new upper horizontal bar as part of our plan to build this up stage by stage to level out the main boulder slope - see video.
The cement mixes used up all the available water, all the cement except for 3/4 of one large daren drum and all the sand except for 1 bag.
We agreed that placement of two bars, one either side between the the two uprights and the two lower bars running to the hanging bedding wall (see photo 2) would be needed to further stabilise things. Also the mud and stone wall adjacent to the bedding wall on the right needs stabilising which could be done by adding more bars with pieces of GRP grid behind and stone wedged in any remaining gaps.
Before leaving we had a bit of a tidy up putting all scaffolding bits up with the red tackle bag and gathering what sand we could find into one location. We left some of the cut 25L positioned as drip collectors but in these weather conditions they are not going to collect very much.
Mikey took the drill/grinder bag up but the battery box and 3 empty daren drums were ferried one at a time by rope up the light connection. The daren drums were chained up through the more tricky parts of the exit although one did escape our care on two occasions.
In the Boulder Rift connection we found 4 tackle bags stashed. Apparently they were 1 of cement and 3 of sand.
We reached the surface hot and bothered but satisfied at 2115.
Mike Wise
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| Dig location. Photo MWa. |
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| Closer view. Photo MWa. |
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