23/4/19

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Jonathan Riley, Dave Walker 2hrs pumped tonight, not risen much since last week and not enough to invade the dig which Dave had lowered a bit last week into boulders in the floor. While pumping was progressing, Estelle started digging - carried on a bit down, but there are quite a few large boulders in the floor at the moment. We do need to clear more out from the floor, but it's still progressing well by digging the wall of mud/clay/rock in front of us, so will see how the water levels go on the puddle. After Estelle did her 17 buckets, Dave went in next and then Jon for 17 each, then the pub called! Have left the pump in situ, but removed the pipe from it so the sediment doesn't settle in the pipe. Found a dead baby bunny under the buckets at the start. Also noted that there seems to be some erosion of the mud/rock hedge side, we need to keep an eye on this as it may decide to come down...

16/4/19

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Jonathan Riley, Dave Walker, Stu Lindsay (although Stu didn't dig, just brought cable over) 2hrs Stu brought back the pump from clean and looking at cabling and we also inserted the armoured cable in from the mains socket at the top to as far as it would go - part way down 'steps' - via the top dig route. He is going to sort the middle cable ready for industrial connector, so couldn't pump this week. James set to digging, followed by Jon and then Dave. Usual 17 skips each and then we retired to the pub. Dave was digging down in a floor a bit - risky if the water rises much...!

9/4/19

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Stu Lindsay, Jonathan Riley, Dave Walker, Pat Hillier, Olivia Gentile

2.5hrs

Estelle went in first to photograph and dig – the boulders had been satisfactorily reduced to manageable sizes and a lot of gravel! Dave, Pat, Mike and Liv all went in and had a session and James helped Liv at the end of her session. A massive 87 skips removed this week, think it’s a record! End looking easy digging still at the end and probably best part of a metre progress made.

8/4/19

Estelle Sandford, Stu Lindsay

2.5hrs

After ending last week with a couple of large boulders impeding digging a bit, Stu and Estelle went over to give them a bit of chemical persuasion – satisfactory thud as we left! Drilled and dealt with the two boulders and also a roof pendant. Also while we were there, we pumped the puddle dry as last week it was getting a bit bigger again. Seems to be seepage rather than anything to do with weather conditions though.

Stu took the pump away to clean and also change the connector for industrial type one to go with the heavy duty cable we have to be fitted.

2/4/19

Estelle Sandford, James Begley, Mike Moxon, Dave Walker, Jonathan Riley, Pat Hillier, Harry Page

2.5hrs

Dave started off digging, there are 2 prominent boulders in the middle so having to dig around them. The water levels had risen a bit in the puddle making it quite mucky near the dig face. 10 buckets each going on tonight, so once Dave had done his, Estelle took over. The roof on the left appears to be getting lower by the 2 boulders the deeper we go, suspect we need to seriously look at digging down. After Estelle, Mike, then Harry then Pat all had a turn. Estelle took photos at the end and the right side roof is also lowering. The top boulder does move a little when smacked with a hammer and a bit did fall off, but both look like they need chemical persuasion. We also need to look at building some sort of bund so we can retain the puddle and start looking to dig down without it coming to join us. All looks interesting at the end as the passage is widening, but lots of big boulders.