28/5/24 water levels up!

Estelle Sandford, Stu Lindsay, Jon Riley, Fran Campbell

1hr

Estelle and Jon went to the end to look at the water levels and unsurprisingly really, with the recent heavy rains, the water levels had risen by around 0.5m since we looked a couple of weeks ago. More rain is forecast so we think it is unlikely to be diggable by next week and as such not planning to arrange anything. 

We had a clear up and also removed the blue pipe from the dig (relocated to by the other holes for now) and also the electric cable as we don't envisage using either again. Several bags of rubbish and dead skips removed and all the serviceable buckets now back where they should be. 

14/5/24 First visit after winter floods

Estelle Sandford, Jonathan Riley underground, Mike Moxon, Fran Campbell, James Begley and Stu Lindsay didn’t go underground. 

15mins

Estelle & Jon kitted up and headed down. There was polystyrene and plastic containers/tubs at the top of the steps indicating the water levels were higher than we’d originally thought from photos but think the peak was from Storm Henk in January from Kevin’s photos! Reasonable amount of cleanup work required on surface and in the spoil area as bags, buckets, etc. are everywhere! Headed down and while it’s a bit slimey from being under water for so long, there are little signs of any movement of mud or rocks from roof, etc. At the end, the conveyor belt was clear and above water, but the end of the dig is about 1-1.5m underwater still. Not quite diggable, but probably only a week or two if we get reasonably dry weather. Headed off to the Waldegrave after where Stu joined us. Discussed that it is worth a team going over next week to do some cleanup work and check levels with a hope we will be back in digging within the next couple of weeks. 

Edited to add the highest point of flooding from 24/2/24 from Kevin.