Michael Kousiounis and John Gisborne. Met 10am and took in drill, water and 2 daren drums with premixed cement and sand in. JG went for a look at the sharp end, then MK went in and broke up the nuisance rock from Wednesday evening. JG in the meantime started making a mix and sent the first load down to MK to carry on the wall building. A second mix was made and this was used supporting the opposite wall. Buckets filled up ready. Lots of calcite amongst the spoil at the bottom and the floor seems to be drying out well. All daren drums brought out and left with sacks in container, ready to get filled up with sand and taken back in. 2 1/2 hours. Mike.
Saturday, 7 June 2025
Thursday, 5 June 2025
Wednesday 4th June 2025
Hollie London, Trevor Hughes, Mike Wise, Ed Ford, Chris Holt and John Cooper on a mission to level the bottom of Cement Dig. HL, EF and CH each spent approximately 30 minutes digging and filling buckets. The top rope attachment loop was found to have a very long tail; when this was adjusted the rope reached all the way from JC at the dumping spot to TH at the top of the shaft making hauling easy peasy especially with MW, EF and CH assisting the buckets to negotiate the corners. A new 8m rope was attached to the top rope krab and left to follow the bucket, making it easy to retrieve the bucket from JC after emptying.
EF had a 1 on 1 battle with a tooth shaped rock in the floor which was rocking to and fro but did not want to be extracted. The full time score was EF 0 - Rock 1. In extra time CH and MW took a look at it but the final score was Diggers 0 - Rock 3, with a grand total of 42 buckets removed, all of which were dumped by JC with the rest of the team rotating to different extents.
At the end MW went down to review the status at the bottom and was really pleased to find a flat floor with no downhill wriggling needed to see the 'corner' and a clearance of maybe 15" below the undercut. The floor has some rocks embedded in the mud but a bit of minor furtling indicated these could be dug out.
No-one got cold as the draught wasn't as strong as it was on the last visit, but TH and MW got persistently dripped on while positioned just above the top of the shaft.
JC took CH out via the old cave, HL carried my bag of tools in and out - thanks HL!
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| Before digging photo |
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| After digging photo - the rock mentioned above can be seen in the floor just above the krab |
2 hrs and 15 minutes
Before and after photos by HL
Mike Wise
Saturday, 31 May 2025
Saturday 31st May 2025
Mike Kushy and Mike Wise. Took in 2 8ft scaff bars and 2 x daren drums of sand/dust to Cement Dig. MW cut the bars whilst MK drilled for pins. MK also made a small mix and started buliding up a wall from solid ledge at the bottom. MW then made a further load of mix to keep building. No building materials left so will have to fill Daren drums to carry in next session. Lovely draughts coming from all holes leading 'down cave'. 4 hours. MK.
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| The dig face (looking east), I'm stood on the big solid ledge. Photo by MK. |
Thursday, 29 May 2025
Wednesday 28th May 2025
John Cooper,Jake Baynes, Mike Kushy, Hollie London and Mike Wise
Johns log entry:
I went in via the Puddle Dig route and had a look at the bottom of Cement Dig before the others arrived. At least a couple of meters deeper than the last time I was there. Hauling was done in two stages using two ropes. Started with MW at the bottom filling small buckets (5L) which HL hauled up and passed across to JB. He removed the bucket from that haul rope and attached it to the upper one which I pulled up and emptied. Initially we were hauling and dumping via the original East slope but when MK arrived the top haul moved across to the West slope where emptying by MK was easier, even though a longer haul. After a while I swapped with MK so resumed emptying the buckets. Much later, about the time the spoil being removed changed from bang debris to original deposit (sticky and muddy), MW and HL swapped. 60 loads of spoil removed from bottom. Definitely needs 5 people to work effectively.
Mike Wise log entry.
The first 30 buckets were easy containing mostly bang debris. The following 30 were harder to fill and empty comprising in the main sticky mud and access to grab this stuff was down slope and under the under cut, so was harder to get at. In the end HL was able to get in under the bedding roof and see around a sharp left corner into about 1m of narrow ongoing passage. Spoil removal at the corner noticeably improved the draught but there is loose material coming down from above the undercut somewhere.
On Saturday 31st some stabilisation work is planned by MW and MK unless 3 more bodies are available in which case some more clearing will be done.
We also need to improve the method for hauling up from the bottom - it is unnecessarily difficult.
No photos this week, but prospects are looking more positive than they have for quite a while
2.5 hours
Mike Wise.
Friday, 16 May 2025
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