What is all that plastic? Is it old silage bags just dumped?

In my youth we set off an air bomb repeater firework at the bottom of Alum. Wow oh wow was it loud. We thought it was going to bring the place down and end the world, but it never did. Alum has amazing acoustics. On a different note, more recently, when we removed the old water tank from...

Borneo is huge and divided into three countries. Brunai, Indonesia and two states of Malaysia, Sarawak and Sabah. Caves in all but Brunai. However, there is little freedom to just go caving. Much depends on where you are based. But a lot of the caves are difficult to access and require local...

Yes, try the Skylotec Spark (or Sirius) as an alternative to the Rig. Retail at about £180 only a little more than a Rig. The Harken Clutch is a great device for industry but hardly anyone uses them as they retail at £700. I'm not sure you'd find them great for caving anyway. I'm a Stop user...

Andy, interest rates have no where near matched inflation for a large part of the last ten years or so. BCRA will have lost the purchase power of a large part of its nett asset. The Bank of England inflation calculator shows that if you had 150K in asset ten years ago, you'd now need 200k to...

Andy, Chris. Thanks for the heads up. Since you asked Andy, I stood down from BCA at the end of 2020. Personally I support the concept of a British Caving Library. However, in a thread that asked about visiting the BCL, I just thought I would point out the criticism it had received over BCA...

Good to know. I do support the concept of a British Caving Library (if that didn't come across). As you know the cost has been criticised though. (by others). How much does BCA contribute each year to keep the place running and how much does BCRA contribute for the same period. They'll be a...

Moderator comment - Folks, kind of drifted off topic a bit onto a CRoW argument. Can we please go back to the OP about the need for a BCA more generally. If you want more chat about CRoW please start a new topic or resurrect one of the many, many CRoW topics which have gone before. Thank you

I recall when I was involved with BCA that a member questioned the expense BCA went to in support of the library. I believe it is a fact, that it is officially the BCRA caving library, but which the BCA members pay for. In my time it ran to about £12,000 a year, it may be more now. The...

My preferences, for me are..... Main attachment is the Petzl Omni Triact triple lock. Compared to the Maillons of yesteryear they are brilliant and I am no big petzl supporter these days. Descender connector. I always use a steel screwgate. Not sure why. Steel wears better. I take the...

This is a thread on memes. Isn't that obvious. Please start another thread yourself to talk about other issues that concern you. Thank you

Please take the hint about topic. Thank you.

I'll jump back in if I may and expand on the points I was making a few days ago. It is difficult to write good articles on UK caving activities with any frequency as just not that much happens across the regions. It is possible if you are an entertaining writer to publish interesting stuff on...

You'll never fill a bi monthly magazine like Descent with UK based content. There just isn't enough of it. On top of that some groups seem to prefer to keep their UK activities a closely guarded secret so that limits content even more. I love reading about foreign caving exploits myself and I...

Ditto, I had some which were damaged and contacted Suunto. Nothing worth doing to repair them I'm afraid. Put them on the scrap heap along with all those Disto Xs which can't be repaired either ;)