mmilner said:
The Old Ruminator said:
Lovely MM. Not the UK ? Looks very very fragile to me.
Hi Nick. Belgium. SC Avalon have got it sussed. The caver is within the tapes, trust me!
Indeed "mmilner" is right. As a member of Sc Avalon I know this place very well. This is the cave "Grotte du Bois de Waerimont" Eprave - Belgium. The part that is discovered by our club is protected by 2 steel doors.
Picture of the 1st entry door :
http://scavalon.blogspot.be/search/label/Bois%20de%20Waerimont
We guide 6 times per year groups of maximum 6 cavers in the cave. The trip (4-6 hours) is almost completely taped to protect stals/ walls / floors/ bones / ...
There is even a zone were you need do undress and go through in your fleece undersuit. All dirty stuff is transported in bags including the helmets. So everybody needs an extra light. (see slide 13 in the presentation)
P De Bie made this presentation about conservation. It has been mentioned already several times here on the forum. Anayway here is the link to the presentation :
http://www.scavalon.be/downloads/Cave%20Protection%20English.pdf
Slide 18 and 19 are the same spot as in the picture shown previosely. The picture will tell the story
Slide 24 gives an example of pictograms to protect go / no-go zones in the cave.
Currenlty we use fencing wires with the woven alu wires in it. These are proven to work even better then the fine nylon ropes we used before, The nylon ropes were sometimes eaten by animals. The fencing tape is not
And we also switched the small plastic pins instead of alu pins for security reasons. A plastic pin will bent when somebody falls on it an alu pin not and can cause injuries to the caver
@Old Ruminator : Go for the fencing wire it is proven that it work very well.
In the following photo album you can find some photos of how the taping can be installed.
https://plus.google.com/photos/+PaulDeBie/albums/5979106419169816081?banner=pwa
The taping in this cave was placed 2 days after this part was discovered. Taping should be done asap after the discovery. In this case 2 members did the discovery on a Friday and on Sunday we went back with 6 persons to do the taping / survey and further exploration.
A small clip of a clean-up action in an other Belgian cave. This action involved members of several clubs joining to clean-up the cave
https://sites.google.com/site/speleovig/Environnement/operation-mr-propre-a-ste-anne
Recently there was a new discovery of a very very beautifull cave in Belgium. The explorers protected the cave in the same way and more. They even documented the cave in such a way that a virtual trip can be made in the cave.
https://sites.google.com/site/grottenoubleu/ (the virtual tour is a must see)
Hopefully this post will encourage other cavers to go an protect the beautiful underground.
BR
Dagobert L'Ecluse (Sc Avalon - Belgium)
www.scavalon.be
scavalon.blogspot.be