Highest aven bolt-climb

Emsy

Member
Does anyone know or have any thoughts on what the highest aven bolt-climb might be? Not just the UK but anywhere in the world.
Thanks
 

seddon

New member
Titan is a good starting point, in Britain at least.

Definitions? Single aven, or is multiple scaling allowed? Lampo may figure pretty high on that score...
 

Emsy

Member
I was thinking of single avens specifically. Other bolt-climbs would also be interesting to know about.
How high was Lampo? (is that Lamprechtsofen?)
 

mak

Member
Why ? - do you think Your (and Mad Phil's) recent exploits abroad may have set a new record? or has eastwater gone deeper than expected?
 

Pitlamp

Well-known member
You might like to consider asking someone like Mark Wright (via his rope access training agency in Sheffield, which gets advertised in Descent). Mark is pretty knowledgeable about such things (as he's done loads of big aven climbing himself both in the UK and elsewhere).
 

Rob

Well-known member
danthecavingman said:
I believe the Astradome was one of Marks biggest routes, in Matienzo - just over 100m to the top.

Dan.
However, unless i'm thinking of the wrong place, i believe that this wasn't totally "bolt-climbed" as they used a certain degree of maypolling across the shaft to get up it!  :eek:

Does this still count?  :confused:
 

footleg

New member
According to the online description of this cave the aven was bolted to within 4m of the top before a scaling pole was employed to pass a sandstone bed the following year (search for astradome to find the reference about half way down the page) http://www.geography.lancs.ac.uk/Matienzo/descrip/0107.htm

Photo of the astradome linked to from that same page:
0107-fa-37.jpg
 

mak

Member
I thought Titan was climbed from the bottom? that was at least 130m to the passage (141 if they made it all the way to the top)
 

Glenn

Member
whitelackington said:
Some years ago a bloke died in Spain combining maypoling with bolting.

I'm perplexed as to how someone who has contributed over 3,000 posts to a caving forum appears to know so little of the recent history of his sport.

Anyway, some years ago in the Dales Mick Nunwick and co bolted up a big aven (around 100m?) to create Box Head Pot...

Cheers,

Glenn
 

Beardy

Member
Glenn said:
Anyway, some years ago in the Dales Mick Nunwick and co bolted up a big aven (around 100m?) to create Box Head Pot...

anyway that's small fry compared to very recent activity in the Hirlatz (Dachstien, Austria),a recent trip climbed another 113m up this aven making it 213m (plus about 5m unsurveyed)

- phew I think that the sharp end might be an exciting place to be.....

regards
Beardy 
 

seddon

New member
I always find that dim lights are beneficial when bolting! After 10m it's all the same drop (except the approach!)
 

cavermark

New member
mak said:
I thought Titan was climbed from the bottom? that was at least 130m to the passage (141 if they made it all the way to the top)

Moose climbed all the way to the top, including the narrow rift in the top of the main roof dome, so a height greater than the freehang rope drop can be claimed..
 

footleg

New member
cavermark said:
mak said:
I thought Titan was climbed from the bottom? that was at least 130m to the passage (141 if they made it all the way to the top)

Moose climbed all the way to the top, including the narrow rift in the top of the main roof dome, so a height greater than the freehang rope drop can be claimed..

That raises an interesting point. When considering bolt climbs, should we measure the distance along the bolt route, or only the vertical height gained? With cave surveys the usual practise is to quote the total length of survey legs for cave length, but only the total elevation range for depth. So in places like Mendip where the limestone has been well crumpled, cave depths tend to be quite shallow but there can be a lot of elevation covered up and down along a route.
 
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