14/7/26

Report from Jon

Ed turned up early again and set about breaking up the remaining boulders at the dig face. He was just finishing his efforts when the rest of the team arrived. Jon and Harley dug with Ed's support. Mike and James hauled. 

The dig face now looks a lot tidier. The boulders are largely out of the way.  All loose spoil has been removed.

Ed has levelled off the right hand side looking towards the face. With some effort we may be able to construct a means of hauling.

The air remains fresh despite extended efforts in the last couple of sessions. 

couple of Ed's photos of the levelling work for new haulway

Looking towards the dig, hole in the floor conveyorbelt to left

Looking from dig back up passage, hole in the floor to the right. 

7/7/26

Ed turned up early to reduce some boulders with the drill and plug and feathering before the rest of us arrived. Once Ed had finished the last of his batteries with one last boulder, Estelle & Harley started digging. Harley on the right, Estelle on the left. Checked the boulder James had reported last week on left and it doesn't particularly feel like it will imminently go, so cleared the spoil created from rocks being dropped last week before mostly digging downwards to clear out the large step we'd created following the hole in the top and draught. Easy digging as always and found a piece of what looked like fossilised bone in amongst the quite 'gravelly' spoil. Fairly certain the 'gravelly' grey spoil is crushed coral or similar, although it does look like unset concrete! After all 38 buckets filled and Ed finished moving more rocks around to work on levelling the proposed new haul in the bottom chamber. Ideally a 'railway' like at the top as it will be hard to stop it tipping off the hole in the floor side with conveyor belt as it stands. All buckets taken to surface and emptied and then headed to the Hunters.

(photo by Estelle of Harley in the end dig)

30/6/26

Report from Mike & James

The rain did stop when we arrived at cutler's (unfortunately not in time for Estelle walking there, so she got rather wet!). We were greeted by this juvenile green woodpecker on the lawn before flying up into palm. James and Harley were digging, Mike in support (I filled one bucket from spoil on top of conveyor belt over drainage hole) and Fran doing the end haul, as she had limited light. Remaining 37 buckets filled and more rocks removed (could do with breaking some up now) before moving them back to entrance (realising reinforcement was now unlikely!) - Fran dumped 1/3rd of them down side passage and rest emptied behind ladder, before a slightly later than usual retirement to Hunters'.

James - At the end of the digging session I removed a couple of quite sizeable rocks from the top of the left hand side of the dig. These are now on the floor and probably in the way. The “roof” on the left hand side is probably another rock of dubious stability. The air at the end was fresh.