17/4/18

from Mike Moxon - him, Stu, Dave & Jon present.

Level had dropped again to about an inch on the shelf where we left the empty bags, so I dug all 5 lots of them out & stacked wet mud on right of passage to come out later. Stu, Dave & Jon worked on supporting the rails.

3/4/18 water levels back up, but railway work commences

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Jonathan Riley, Stu Lindsay, David Walker, Duncan Simey

2hrs

having made the decision last week that we need to give the railway a go and remove the aerial runway, that was the plan for this evening. Armed with tools and capping kit, the railway was lowered in from the top. The dig was looked at for water levels and it's back up above the step down again, probably back to nearly the highest we've seen it as it had done nothing but rain for the last few days - suspect we're a good month away from getting back into digging the end, but there is quite a bit of clearing and tidying up we can be getting on with in the meantime.

Aerial runway removed, Stu set to work dealing with the stubborn hump of rock in the middle, around 8-10 caps later and it was relatively flat. The railway was laid out and we'll look to get some bags under it to make it more stable as we fill some. Need more brewery bags. Headed to pub after. Also removed some frogs/toads and newts from the big hole and also the one with the stemples in.

27/3/18 water levels dropping a little...

Estelle Sandford,  Jonathan Riley, David Walker.

2hrs

went to have a look at the state of the water levels and see what maintenance we need to do also. There has been some collapse at the hedge end of the shaft and also under the opposite end, including one end of the washing line being ripped out, including it's rock that it was bolted to. We took a look in the dig and it was about 10m from the end and possible to see the end wall. There was a dead baby rabbit in the water, which we removed. There is a lot of mud washed/slumped in from where it's been flooded and the steps are pretty much gone, so we do need to do quite a bit of clearing. Looked in the other dig and that has also slumped quite a bit, found another baby rabbit dead in the water there. Removed that too and also there was one near the entrance to the main dig dead. Removed 10 toads and 2 newts with an additional newt from the stempled hole. With the washing line down, we collected the bags up and those that were clean are bagged up ready for use. Those still dirty put back on the other ladder and remaining section of line. Where the collapse by the hedge end is, we dug the ladder out and also the two skips that had been buried by it. One is trash and the other may be of use. Also did some wall building with the additional rock that had come down. Decision made that next week we'll remove the aerial runway and replace it with the railway Stu made ages back.