Wet in t'Dales

Fulk

Well-known member
It were wet in t'Dales today, but we were so pissed off with lockdown we decided to go for a walk anyway.

Here's a snap of the dry valley in Lower Easegill:
 

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Fulk

Well-known member
Unorthodox technique was needed to get across t'beck:
 

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Brains

Well-known member
Had a trip into Valley Entrance on Monday, fairly damp in the roof tunnel and the pitch was well sprayed. Knee deep at the bottom, with the master cave waist deep and going like the clappers. Tried bridging and fighting our way up but gave up before the junction. Fluming back to the pitch was quick cold fun! Climbing out I noticed sump foam only a metre from the top of the pitch... Guess it got very wet!
Has anyone seen it in this state or worse? Was the rising making a plume?
Kingsdale beck was flowing and plenty of standing pools in the fields. On the drive in from the M6 / J34 the river Lune was filling the flood plain as bad as I have ever seen it for decades
 

Fulk

Well-known member
I once met someone who claimed to have, on one occasion, swum into the Master Cave from the Roof Tunnel (and back, very quickly).
 

Pitlamp

Well-known member
Brains said:
Had a trip into Valley Entrance on Monday, fairly damp in the roof tunnel and the pitch was well sprayed. Knee deep at the bottom, with the master cave waist deep and going like the clappers. Tried bridging and fighting our way up but gave up before the junction. Fluming back to the pitch was quick cold fun! Climbing out I noticed sump foam only a metre from the top of the pitch... Guess it got very wet!
Has anyone seen it in this state or worse? Was the rising making a plume?
Kingsdale beck was flowing and plenty of standing pools in the fields. On the drive in from the M6 / J34 the river Lune was filling the flood plain as bad as I have ever seen it for decades

It was like that on the night of the rescue in the system when, sadly, Dave Anderson lost his life in Rowten Pot. My memory of the water level was about 60 cm below the lip of the pitch down from the Roof Tunnel at one stage. It wouldn't surprise me if it managed to encroach into the Roof Tunnel itself in really extreme conditions (such as during Storms Desmond and Eva, late in 2015).

The 1.8 km of passage out to the resurgence is all open enough; I think the backing up in the KMC is simply due to friction between the water and the walls in the long sump.
 

Fulk

Well-known member
Here in Cumbria (just south of Kendal) there has been a lot of rain over the last few days; I understand that Derwentwater and Bassenthwaite Lake are, at the time of writing (Thursday night ~10?50) joined together as one lake; and somewhere they've had 300 mm of the stuff in a day or so. So I guessed that there would have been pretty bad weather to the east, as well.
Yet when I looked at Dales weather this morning I saw that there had been a mere 9 mm of rain at Malham Tarn.
So ? can anybody tell me what the weather has been like in the Dales in the last 2 or 3 days? If you see this, Pitlamp, how much rain have you recored?
 

JoshW

Well-known member
Nipped into yordas last night and the chamber was all one big lake and the slot through to the little climbing loop at the bottom of the chamber was fully under foamy water, so clearly had some reasonable rain.

Also popped into valley entrance and the inlets were flowing well, but the master cave streamway didn?t seem massively high (higher than I?d have wanted to be in and flowing at a reasonable rate though).
 

Pitlamp

Well-known member
The Ingleton area hasn't had anywhere near as much rain as Cumbria. It's what I'd refer to as "normal autumn wet" - but still not good caving weather. (See CDG website VisBot for rainfall details.) Take care underground this coming weekend; the fells are soaked and in a condition where even a moderate weather event can bring streams up very fast..
 

Ian P

Administrator
Staff member
I have been caving with Scouts this week.

Tuesday: Churns. Water Up a bit but good fun.
Wednesday: Runscar and Thistle. Water up, the water in the ?narrows? of Runscar 3 were sporting. Exit to Thistle had just started to pool.
Thursday: Runscar and Thistle. Water levels just up a bit from normal, a bit ?tame?.
Friday: ????  Probably R & T

Walking to the caves has been grim at times!!
 

mikem

Well-known member
See Pegasus' photos on FB...

The Aire is up but not ridiculously & flood warnings have been dropped around there, butit remain in place for upper wharfe.
 

tony from suffolk

Well-known member
Fulk said:
Thanks for the replies; clearly Cumbria has been 'dumped on' big time.
I stayed at our holiday home in Keswick on Wednesday night. It peed down all day & all night, & I only just managed to get my car out from its flooded parking space yesterday morning. It was a very close-run thing! Luckily I always get up at 5 o'clock. Back home in Suffolk now.
 

Pitlamp

Well-known member
Monday morning 1st November: it was the Ingleton area's turn to get a proper deluge overnight; rivers are higher this morning than they've been for a long time.
 

mikem

Well-known member
But dropping already. The nearest rain gauge (Keswick) on weatheronline only shows 2mm in last 12 hours.
 

Pitlamp

Well-known member
mikem said:
But dropping already. The nearest rain gauge (Keswick) on weatheronline only shows 2mm in last 12 hours.

The nearest rain gauge (to Ingleton) is perhaps mine - I tipped out 45 mm at 06:00 this morning. It's still raining . . .
 

Ian Ball

Well-known member
For interest the Hydro plant at Settle has recorded the highest generation in the month of October since it opened.
 

Cantclimbtom

Well-known member
Ian Ball said:
For interest the Hydro plant at Settle has recorded the highest generation in the month of October since it opened.
Looks like they have a bit of water https://www.camsecure.co.uk/settle_weir_webcam.html

Edit, takes time to connect to the cam, be patient with it
 
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