In all these dodgy movies our hero always cracks open a flare to explore his/her newly discovered underground predicament - has anyone here actually *tried* filming with flares???  :

The MNRC tried to photograph with magnesium on their centenary Swildons trip, hope we don't have to wait another 100 years for them to perfect the technique

Thay are way too smokey - fill a chamber in a fewminutes.....

Andyf

Rockets and Roman Candles are no good either, giving off choking, impenetrable smoke. :yucky:

A lad called Simon Monk let some off in between the first couple of pitches in Tathams Wife Hole (Yorkshire) around 1985 on a Leicester Poly Caving Club trip.  :spank:
At least 10 years latter some LPCC members met a group underground in the Burren (Ireland) and the usual pleasantries were exchanged. As soon as LPCC was mentioned, the group became agitated and demanded to know if any of the LPCC members was Simon Monk.
It turns out that they had a group further down Tathams Wife on the day of the fireworks and it had become club folklore that they should massively damage any caver they found with the name Simon Monk!

I don't think that they will get their wish though - he moved to Australia in the early/mid 90's and, I'm told, married his Phillipino maid a little while later.

I've let off some roman canlde types in the West chamber in Oxlow. lit it quite well. they didn't seem to give off enough smoke to upset the first photo we would have taken. it was the rest of the fireworks that smoked out Manchester Uni who happened to be coming down maskill

AndyF said:

Thay are way too smokey - fill a chamber in a fewminutes.....

Andyf

Click to expand...

It would have been good if that had happened to the MNRC, but the results were exactly the opposite - no smoke and no light. A shame really as thay had lugged a large format glass plate camera all the way to the old grotto in order to try and re create the early photographs of Harry Savoury, but had to be content with a few snaps with the new digi and electronic flashes

The Descent has a fair amount of Flares being used in it; however, since it was filmed in a well ventilated aircraft hangar with diverting fans to blow the smoke outdoors it should ring a few alarm bells in the mind of anyone tempted to behave similarly underground.

Lighting fires underground regularly results in fatalities from asphyxiation IIRC.

Anyone caught using a flare in a cave containing bats runs the risk of being crucified by English Nature (first offence, standard punishment  ).

naaah the alarm bells ring when the bank of smoke starts chasing you through the mine you're filming in...  oops I've maybe said too much  :halo: