Clatterway Dangerously Unstable

[calamityrob]

Clatterway has become dangerously unstable, one or more rocks in the roof that have to be squeezed past, in flat out crawls, are now loose, wobble and are likely to fall. It is strongly advised NOT to attempt Clatterway until DCA / PDHMS have inspected and hopefully made repairs.

 

[owd git]

Clatterway has become dangerously unstable, one or more rocks in the roof that have to be squeezed past, in flat out crawls, are now loose, wobble and are likely to fall. It is strongly advised NOT to attempt Clatterway until DCA / PDHMS have inspected and hopefully made repairs.

Any clearer info on the whereabouts of instability ? so many places where flat out is the only waythrough in Clatterway. thanks. O.G.

 

[calamityrob]

Any clearer info on the whereabouts of instability ? so many places where flat out is the only waythrough in Clatterway. thanks. O.G.

After the free climb (or call it the second pitch) with the handline - there are few side shoots but after about 3 minutes crawling the way on branches left and right. Right is up and over and I think is one of the two garden exists but the left is down - the rock is body length into that left branch.

 

[Pitlamp]

Could you tell us when this instability was noticed?

 

[calamityrob]

Could you tell us when this instability was noticed?

Tuesday (6th Feb) by me as a I crawled under it , it followed me so I beat a hasty retreat since I had 5 capable but all the same relatively noobs with regards to mine exploration

 

[braveduck]

Tuesday (6th Feb) by me as a I crawled under it , it followed me so I beat a hasty retreat since I had 5 capable but all the same relatively noobs with regards to mine exploration

So That was after the Buxton Earthquake .

 

[Pitlamp]

Well done Braveduck; you beat me to it!

This may relate to the other earthquake-related topic on here:https://ukcaving.com/board/index.php?threads/how-far-are-the-effects-of-earthquakes-felt.31508/

 

[paul]

So That was after the Buxton Earthquake .

Yes - but we don't know if it was already loose before the Buxton earthquake/tremor...

I don't live far from Buxton and felt nothing unlike a few yeas ago when we were woken up in the early hours by the noise of the metal handles on the wardrobe rattling during a previous one in the Peak (can't remember the exact year or location just now). I agree - that also doesn't really prove anything either.

 

[pwhole]

My flat in Sheffield got seriously rattled during the big Louth earthquake several years ago - I think that was 5.1 or something and is about 70 miles away. My parents live several miles closer to the epicentre on the northeast side of Rotherham at Wickersley almost on the Magnesian limestone boundary and they didn't feel much at all, but they're situated on many higher (and younger) layers of bedrock to me, which may have something to do with it, as all the beds in this area dip toward the east.

If the shock is coming up from below radially, hading beddings, and especially softer beds like shale and coal (of which there are plenty here), may transmit the forces diagonally and with differing intensities - but I'm only guessing really.

Many years ago I was in San Francisco at a friend's house on Potrero Hill, which is a high rocky peak. She had a phone call from her friend down in the city three miles away asking if she 'felt it' - there'd just been a tremor downtown and everyone was panicking. We didn't feel a thing.

 

[Lampwick]

Nothing to do with blasting in Ball Eye quarry then? Clatterway Levels are only 150m away from the edge of the quarry and there's a drilling rig up the top end.

Very rough plot of Clatterway Levels, top entrance passages not shown.

 

[Pitlamp]

Yes - but we don't know if it was already loose before the Buxton earthquake/tremor...

I don't live far from Buxton and felt nothing unlike a few yeas ago when we were woken up in the early hours by the noise of the metal handles on the wardrobe rattling during a previous one in the Peak (can't remember the exact year or location just now). I agree - that also doesn't really prove anything either.

That's fair comment Paul. All I would say is let's not forget the cumulative effect of eathquakes over a long period of time. It may have been loose for a long while (partly) due to previous events.

I doubt the mag 2.5 quake alone would have been responsible but it may be a part of the bigger picture.
Circumstantial evidence of course - but perhaps one small example of a wider pattern.

 

[braveduck]

That's fair comment Paul. All I would say is let's not forget the cumulative effect of eathquakes over a long period of time. It may have been loose for a long while (partly) due to previous events.

I doubt the mag 2.5 quake alone would have been responsible but it may be a part of the bigger picture.
Circumstantial evidence of course - but perhaps one small example of a wider pattern.

That Buxton Earthquake was very shallow and rated at 4 velocity which is certainly above the British averages for such things !

 

[LarryFatcat]

PCC are going to attempt to fix this before next weekend. We've the full rebolting, we did there, to check too so need to go anyway.

 

[LarryFatcat]

All sorted and safe now, rocks dropped, broken up and shifted.
Complete rebolting of both pitches last year, all bolts look good.
Report with pics being prepped for pwhole.

 

[calamityrob]

Thanks so much Larry and team, we can all now return the squalor of Clatterway in reasonable safety

 

[AR]

This probably sounds completely heretical, especially coming from me, but I've always thought that if you were to take all the best bits out of the Via Gellia mines to create one super-mine, Clatterway is what you'd make out of the leftover bits...

 

[Pipster]

Great work!