White Pit - Wednesday 12th December

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mark Denning
2.5hrs
Hauled all the bags up to Talus and Mark emptied them. Estelle went and dug and cleared out 3 bags worth, but getting harder to dig as space a bit limited. James did one bag and then Mark did a further 3, but we all agreed it needs banging to make it bigger which hopefully will be done next Wednesday. Air remained clear all evening down there and it appears to be draughting inwards.

White Pit 5/12/12

Estelle Sandford, Mark Denning, Mike Moxon

1.5hrs

Digging the end and moved all the bags we dug and had stored previously up to the top ready for a haul next time. Mike dug first and then Estelle had a dig and then Mark. Fairly easy digging in stal floor which has a mud infill underneath and any rocks seem to be coming out ok. Debatable as to whether the bit we are sat in could do with a little chemical persuasion to enlarge, but the way on so far is easy digging so we could leave as is. There is a boulder in the roof above which is well stalled in but looks a bit precarious. Way on has an obvious sign of a void, how big we might well find out next time… Hoping for something a bit more than the usual little pocket we seem to find! 

White Pit 27/9/12

Estelle Sandford, Mark Denning & Mike Moxon
2hrs
Arrived and bang had removed some of the rock but also only cracked some of the walls. Took a couple of pics then removed the already full bags up to Talus before Mike went in and had a dig. The air was really quite bad down the bottom although much of the bang fumes were gone. Mike did about 1/2hr or so before he came out and Mark went in and did about 1/2hr or so. Straight on blocked by calcite now, floor is still soft and diggable, left hand might go under. There seems to be some sort of draught, but there really is limited oxygen in it! Retreated to pub with headaches! We really need to remove all our digging debris from there and also empty the place of the hessian bags, that were a good idea at the time, but might not be helping the air problem as they do rot and get mouldy.

White Pit 11/9/12

Estelle Sandford, James Begley
Popped in for 20mins to retrieve Stu Lindsay’s bang wire. Noticeable smell of bang as you go down the slope into second chamber and whole of Talus IV smelt bad. I went as far as the hauling corner just above steep bit and managed to free the wire and we pulled it up from there. Reckon that needs another good couple of weeks before a revisit to the actual dig site.

White Pit 6/9/12

(missing 2 trips from here from Mark between this and 4/7)
Estelle Sandford, Stu Lindsay

Mark & Henry had already drilled holes last Monday, so 8x 12mm, 450mm long holes ready. Holes suitably stuffed and then set it off from the bottom of entrance shaft, with a satisfying thud in the distance. Will need to retrieve Stu’s bang wire soon, but dig needs leaving for about a month before checking.
Trip time 2hrs

White Pit 4/7/12

Estelle Sandford, Stu Gardiner, Mark Denning and Mike Moxon
2.5hrs
Emptied and cleared all the bags that were en route or awaiting emptying and bagged up the old rotting ones for taking out of the cave later. I dug first, quite awkward digging now as having to dig around ankles with limited space around. Mike had a go next and then Mark and Stu – still plenty coming out, still have some sort of draught as the air remained clearer the entire time although really needs another bang.

White Pit 13/6/12

Estelle Sandford, Mark Denning, Mike Moxon & Henry Dawson
1.5hrs
Stu G turned up at Belfry with idea on breaking rock with air chisel, tested it and it used an entire 7L cylinder in 2 minutes! He hadn’t brought any kit, so didn’t come over. Henry on surface wall building still. Estelle, Mark and Mike to dig, moved bags up to Talus, then moved ones from shelf in dig to Talus leaving Mike filling bags. He filled 12 and we ran out of time. There is a draught, but no air as such, it is still quite hard to breath at times down there. Dig now has an archway going on at the end, floor still needs digging out. Reckon another session should let us know if we need to bang it again.

White Pit - 6/6/12 - back to the dig!

Estelle Sandford & Mark Denning
1.5hrs digging the end.
Mike failed to turn up on time, it was peeing with rain so we decided to give up the idea of cementing in favour for a dig at the end to clear the bang we laid back in Jan. Filled about a dozen bags until we ran out and then moved most of them up ready to haul and Mark carried on digging spoil out. The bang has done a good job and lots of fractured rock/stal, but reckon we’ll need another once we’ve cleared this. Sort of think we can hear space beyond, also at one point there did seem to be a draught, although the air was generally poor! We need to get this air tested for CO2 levels at some point soon… Looked at side opposite to the shoring on way in, we need to look at finding a way of making that safer as it looks like it has the potential to all come in and collapse rather than just slump and because of our new route in, we are caving more to the left now than before. We also need to have a damn good clearout in there as the place is minging with mouldy bags and other rotting vegetation we’ve left behind…

White Pit 23/5/12

Estelle Sandford, Mark Denning, Mike Moxon
2.5hrs
More wallbuilding and cementing. Mostly filled in the incoming side of Klingons, just working on the other side now. Both the left and right hand walls look like they have the potential to slump in without some sort of protection in place. They aren’t as bad as the main bit we’ve blocked off with metalwork and railway sleepers though. Reckon one more cementing session and we can go back to our dig.

White Pit 18/5/12

Estelle Sandford, Mark Denning, Henry Dawson
2.5hrs
Took over more sand and cement and made a mix then Henry arrived so we lowered the railway sleepers into place and put them on the metalwork. Then started wallbuilding on top of them and did quite a lot of cement before retiring to the Hunters.

White Pit 18/4/12

Estelle Sandford, Mark Denning, Stu Gardiner, later joined by Mike Moxon & Henry Dawson
3hrs
Took down drill, etc. and generator to bolt some of the bars in place with anchor bolts, also removed a bit more rock to make sure we were back at secure rock. All three of the short lengths bolted into place, now need to bring down some cut down railway sleepers and cement lots or rock in. Mike & Henry brought some cement and Henry started a project to build a shed construction on the surface to house the air pump and generator while we are digging. They made a start on that.

White Pit 14/3/12

Estelle Sandford, Stu Gardiner, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Sarah Payne
1.5hrs

Me and James at bottom loading bags/boulder net and rest at top hauling with winch and emptying said bags and net. All empty now so have moved the winch and a frame to under the trees. Removed a good pile of rocks, all make lovely rockery rocks!

White Pit 7/3/12

Estelle Sandford, Stu Gardiner, Mark Denning, Mike Moxon, Ivan Sandford
2hrs

Ivan had repaired the capstan winch (shit in the carburettor!) and back running fine. I had made a new boulder net for smaller stuff and we got to hauling lots out. Ran out of petrol part way but Ivan saved the day with some fuel he had as we’d forgotten and we reckoned at end of session we have about 1/2hr or so left of clearance. Got very cold on the surface hauling stuff out.

White Pit 3/3/12 hauling day

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Stu Gardiner, Mark Denning, Trevor Hughes, Mike Moxon (fresh back from 6 weeks in New Zealand!). (Jo Hardy (& Amelia) and Hels Warren turned up with cakes and sausage sarnies lunchtime)

Turned up at Belfry and loaded up the capstan winch and scaff bars for A frame and all the other bits and bobs we thought we might need and headed over to the dig. Stu missed the obvious chain over gate post when trying to get into the field, but thankfully I noticed that one! We initially tried to ‘sled’ the winch over but decided to wheel it across as field not that muddy. Set everything up and Trev soon arrived with boulder net and some strops. We set to work with me, James and Stu at the bottom and Mark and Trev at the top who were joined by Mike an hour or so later with his jetlag! We removed roughly a third of the pile of boulders before lunch and I also went down to the dig to see if I could get a suitable skip, but we seem to have only damaged ones. The dig was clear of fumes, although very mouldy and there is plenty to clear at the end now from the last bang we couldn’t get to a couple of months back! Came out at 1ish when Jo turned up for lunch and beers and then Hels turned up with cupcakes. We went back underground/surface haul soon after, but the winch only lasted about 30mins or so before it started stalling on us and we couldn’t keep it running, so forced to give up and go and drink coffee at the Belfry. Hoping Ivan can fix before Wednesday so we can continue clearance and also get on with the shoring work. When I looked from the other side of the collapse, there’s a boulder that looks a bit dodgy, but it may be possible to force it to stay in place with shoring/cement.
09:30-15:00

Templeton 22/2/12

Mark Denning & Estelle Sandford went over to Templeton to collect some steel for White Pit and have a look at their dig and dig with them. Stu Gardiner came over and took some metalwork, but didn’t go underground as he didn’t have kit.
They have some serious engineering there, including a dumper truck and cctv and lots of winches and pumps! They also had a breakthrough on Monday into a new pitch which is 35ft long and 8-10ft wide and still going. Mark went down to look at that and I went down to their main dig which had just finished being pumped out. Dug about 10 or so buckets and then came up all the fixed ladders to the surface. Very muddy at the bottom.
2hrs

White Pit 15/2/12

Estelle Sandford, Stu Gardiner, Mark Denning, James Begley
2.5hrs

Using the trusty chisel and ‘feather’ method – lots of holes drilled and used them like plug and feathers to break up the boulders, many fractured easily with just sledge hammer. We have cleared all the boulders now from the top of coffee pot and that is now open, and can get through to Talus, although still looking dodgy – I went through to have a bit of a look and don’t think it’s likely to come in on it’s own again, but we need to shore it properly having started the job! Waist of Thyme is now blocked with the spoil requiring going to the surface. We are planning to sort a weekend job of hauling and clearing with borrowing an A-frame and winch to do the job. Also needing to go over to Templeton to acquire some metalwork as they have all the digging pile of steel donated by Trevor Hughes.

White Pit 8/2/12

Estelle Sandford, Stu Gardiner, Stu Lindsay, Trevor Hughes and Tim Large
2.5hrs
Others came down to assess the damage and give us ideas on way forward with shoring. We removed about 2 tonne of rock from the collapse up to the entrance to Waist of Thyme and nearly blocking the way on there. 20 bags of spoil as well and all this needs to go surface once we’ve sorted out a winch/A-frame. Way on is sort of open, but needs a lot or rebar and shoring up and cementing in order to stop further slumps.

White Pit 1/2/12 - crash... bang... whallop...!

Estelle Sandford, Stu Gardiner, Mark Denning
1hr
Took a longer bar and hammer down, poked the armchair sized boulder and the wedge and didn’t come down immediately, but putting a rope around the little one and prodding the big one brought the lot down – an immense amount crashed down making Stu literally leap up out of the pot and we all exited pretty fast as it felt like the cave was caving in! Went to surface and looked around, it hasn’t collapsed the surface! Went back down and took a closer look, can still hear rocks falling and the way on to Talus is thoroughly blocked now. We need to consider whether to try and access from above or try and clear and cement this in to regain access in coming months.

White Pit 25/1/12

Estelle Sandford, Stu Gardiner, Mark Denning
1.5hrs
Went to look at dig at end of talus and still really bad with bang fumes 1.5 weeks later. It had been noticed when they went down on the banging trip that there had been a slip at the dodgy place by top of coffee pot/Talus junction so we took a crow bar and some rope and realigned some boulders – with a little prod and pull, we had serious boulder jenga and loads came down. Coffee Pot is almost blocked now and the way on to Talus is still just about passable, but there is a hanging death armchair sized boulder ‘floating’ above so we won’t be going under there in a hurry. Decided to leave it to self dig if it wanted to and come back for another look later.

White Pit 4/1/12

Estelle, Henry D & Mike M

2.5hrs

Henry went in first clearing the remains of the rubble created by Mark last time with the chisel drill and continued digging downwards through mud while Mike & Estelle hauled about a dozen bags up from the dig and shelf. Then Estelle went in and after doing a little digging in the floor, was attacked from above by a tennis ball sized rock, so decided the roof needed gardening. This has been tidied now and a fair bit of rock brought down. The digging in the floor isn’t easy as it’s quite tight and you need to double up and have your head by your feet! Mike went in after and carried on gardening and clearing spoil. As it stands ideally need the chisel drill for next time as the passage we are following down is getting quite deep and really awkward to dig now and needs widening and hammer and chisel has little impact. It may be worth considering Dr Nobel’s linctus as well, although air was really rubbish all night tonight, quite thick all the way through in the dig area and above it. All bar the last few bags were cleared to Talus and dumped.

Lock has been changed as old one died.

White Pit 14/12/11

Estelle, Mark, Stu, Mike, Henry

3hrs

Last dig for Mark before baby due to take over his life! Using the generator/drill as much as possible to create as much debris as possible and do as much damage as possible to give work for the next session! All took in turns to have a dig, quite a lot of looser mud and stal encrusted around it, but still needs widening. Following a water worn wall and can see s bit of what looks like black space beyond, but not sure what we’ve got. All bar last few bags cleared up to Talus. Also poking around in RH wall in middle of Talus by spoil pile removing big boulders to pass the time and keep warm! Air not overly good, but kept better by only the digger being in the dig and the rest generally staying up in Talus out of the way.