Present: Dan Hibbits, Jim Lister, Bob Toogood
I had a telephone call from Dan, asking if I would like to accompany him, to the recently pumped sump in the “Wet, Wet, West,” with the intention of enlarging the passage in the sump to allow access to passage beyond?
We meet up at Stony Middleton, and walked up to a house, who’s owner had given us permission to use the shaft in their garden, that entered the sough, which in turn enters the mine and natural cave it intersects.
We made our way up the sough into the mine and climbed up a series of old iron ladders up a shaft that led to more passage and a choke, which was passed to the pumped out sump, the Eldon had drained with a “BOG Pump” a few days before. The sump was still dry and it did not take long to drill shot holes, in the rock restriction and then to remove it with snappers.
The restriction was still tight but passable which Dan quickly proved, in hind sight it may have been better to have made it big enough for a caver with a mini cylinder, but as Dan rightly said, “Lets see if it goes first” beyond the dry sump was a small chamber with a pleasant stooping sized, stream passage, meandering off, this was followed for fifteen minutes (?) to a cross rift, which was blind at both ends. Ahead was a raised gravel bank, holding back another sump (Sump 2). We thought it may just be a duck so I entered feet first on my back feeling for an air space with my feet. I felt none and was up to my nose so came partially out and asked Dan for his belt to hold onto so I could get further in. Kicking about inside the submerged section I could feel that the passage stayed approx. 1m square in dimension. I came out for a breath and Dan pointed out that a rather lot of water was now running from the gravel bank. We looked at each other and both started racing back to the sump (lets call it sump 1) Before it filled up!
To conclude; it definitely needs a return trip... We never returned due to access agreements limiting the number off trips during that time. The second sump could be drained easily by digging the gravel bank away but Sump 1 would need more people waiting to pump it out to ensure escape! There were small pieces of shredded fertiliser bag in Sump 2. I am sure were surveyed it on the way in but Dan had the data on his PDA and I never saw anything come of it. Lastly, A big thank you to Dan for inviting me!
I would love to know, has it gone?
Report By Jim Lister