Rowter Hole Update
- Thread starter Mark R
- Start date
Mark R
Well-known member
Mike and I had a trip last night. We took quite a lot more scaffolding and the jack legs down with us, and after removing a temporary pole I inserted just before leaving last time, thrutched up into the void. It was tighter than i remembered it to be and i soon realised that quite a bit of material had shifted. I started to look around for places to get scaffolding in, starting with the mud slope above our entry point. The hanging boulders in the roof however were taunting me and the more rstricted way out was playing on my mind so I made a very firm decision that I didn't like being there and quickly threw all the gear back down the hole and headed back down myself. The hole was really tight to get back down and not at all enjoyable. At that point I felt like this might not be possible to get through and began to assess the viability of carrying on at all. Mike went to have a look and suggested we start just steadily working back up again, one boulder at a time. it took absolutely ages to get the first piece of scaffolding in place, there was just no obvious way to go about it but we got to work and before long were installing more pins and scaffolding above our heads and pulling the odd boulder down as we went. By Cowboy time we had a pretty reasonable array of scaffolding in place at the mouth of the void that provided at least some very good psychological support, but relistically some decent physical support too. We finished off by putting in several 'temporary' poles which woudl at least ensure some degree of open space remains if there was a large collapse in our absence. We had taken 6 or so 600mm boards down with us and managed to get some of them inserted into the upward dig to support the mud walls which have been in danger of unravelling for some time.
We left the dig in high spirits, having created a much better working environment. The void of hanging nightmares still needs tackling but we will hopefully soon be in a position to do that with a reliable escape route in place.
We left the dig in high spirits, having created a much better working environment. The void of hanging nightmares still needs tackling but we will hopefully soon be in a position to do that with a reliable escape route in place.
alastairgott
Well-known member
10 to 10… 101010 🤠🤠
MarkS
Moderator
Enthusiasm for the upstream dig prospects prompted a 9 am meet at Rowter farm, foregoing the Peveril breakfast only available after 9:30. Having said that, enthusiasm was only sufficient for two of us to be there!
Walk 1 to the entrance with 4 poles each was relatively pleasant, but then the rain started, resulting in a moderate drenching on our second walk over with the rest of our kit, followed by further drenching as we lowered two large bundles of kit on the end of our rigging rope. We could then enter the relative warmth and dry of the entrance shaft, although given the rain in recent days it was nowhere near as dry as usual.
After carting the kit to the start of The Origin we were pleased to have so many poles to keep us dry up the cascades. I’d not been on any of the evening trips so things had moved on a bit from last time I was there. I made my way up the awkward climb to be greeted by scaffold barring my way into the scary void above, placed at the end of the last trip to prevent too much collapse. Thankfully it hadn’t been needed and I tentatively removed the bars blocking my entry and emerged into the space above.
The first job was to quickly create a sort of scaffolding Christmas-tree monstrosity with the aim of temporarily protecting myself from anything that might come down when I started drilling in the walls. Once this was done I set to stabilising the massive boulder hanging menacingly above the downstream end of the space to give us somewhere safe to start from. With two solid walls this was thankfully pretty straightforward. Next up was to try and scaffold the delicate looking roof directly above the entry climb, again made fairly straightforward with the solid walls. We’d now stabilised most of the roof and established that the voids beyond the massive boulder were nothing more than spaces in a choke, but at least it gave us ~5 cubic metres of precious stacking space.
Time for lunch and a brew. Mark had kindly brought along some pouch meals, so after being energised by a curry/chilli and a coffee at the base of the climb we both went back up to work out our next steps. The climb up at this point was a fairly constricted dog-leg that meant not only was it a pain to get up and down, but we were also unable to lob mud down it to be washed away by the stream below. It needed sorting for us to have any hope of progressing further. Our plan was to migrate the top half of the climb so it sat vertically above the bottom half. Sounds easy but was anything but…
Eventually we reached a point where we could carefully deconstruct the original scaffold, hoping with each scaffold clip that our judgement of its lack of structural necessity was correct. Thankfully there were no major dramas, and after some hefty boulder-shifting and some capping of even heftier boulders, the climb became a little more sensible (relative to what it was, rather than any usual definition of sensible).
The last activity of the day was an initial look at the “way on”. Facing upstream at the top of the climb the draught was howling out (enough to keep us wearing balaclavas all day). The obvious route to take seems to be a fairly loose-packed area of the choke under a bit of a shelf on the left wall. We could see along 5 m or so, with enticing gaps beyond and the sound of water. Mark took on the tricky job of starting the scaffolding for this, now without the luxury of 2 solid walls, or even a solid floor. It’ll be entertaining for sure!
We made our way out around 7 pm feeling suitable tired after our efforts. Food and beer tasted all the better for our exertions, and we both suffered with significant aches the next day.
Prospects remain good. Fingers crossed our new-found stacking space is sufficient for the next bit of progress…
Walk 1 to the entrance with 4 poles each was relatively pleasant, but then the rain started, resulting in a moderate drenching on our second walk over with the rest of our kit, followed by further drenching as we lowered two large bundles of kit on the end of our rigging rope. We could then enter the relative warmth and dry of the entrance shaft, although given the rain in recent days it was nowhere near as dry as usual.
After carting the kit to the start of The Origin we were pleased to have so many poles to keep us dry up the cascades. I’d not been on any of the evening trips so things had moved on a bit from last time I was there. I made my way up the awkward climb to be greeted by scaffold barring my way into the scary void above, placed at the end of the last trip to prevent too much collapse. Thankfully it hadn’t been needed and I tentatively removed the bars blocking my entry and emerged into the space above.
The first job was to quickly create a sort of scaffolding Christmas-tree monstrosity with the aim of temporarily protecting myself from anything that might come down when I started drilling in the walls. Once this was done I set to stabilising the massive boulder hanging menacingly above the downstream end of the space to give us somewhere safe to start from. With two solid walls this was thankfully pretty straightforward. Next up was to try and scaffold the delicate looking roof directly above the entry climb, again made fairly straightforward with the solid walls. We’d now stabilised most of the roof and established that the voids beyond the massive boulder were nothing more than spaces in a choke, but at least it gave us ~5 cubic metres of precious stacking space.
Time for lunch and a brew. Mark had kindly brought along some pouch meals, so after being energised by a curry/chilli and a coffee at the base of the climb we both went back up to work out our next steps. The climb up at this point was a fairly constricted dog-leg that meant not only was it a pain to get up and down, but we were also unable to lob mud down it to be washed away by the stream below. It needed sorting for us to have any hope of progressing further. Our plan was to migrate the top half of the climb so it sat vertically above the bottom half. Sounds easy but was anything but…
Eventually we reached a point where we could carefully deconstruct the original scaffold, hoping with each scaffold clip that our judgement of its lack of structural necessity was correct. Thankfully there were no major dramas, and after some hefty boulder-shifting and some capping of even heftier boulders, the climb became a little more sensible (relative to what it was, rather than any usual definition of sensible).
The last activity of the day was an initial look at the “way on”. Facing upstream at the top of the climb the draught was howling out (enough to keep us wearing balaclavas all day). The obvious route to take seems to be a fairly loose-packed area of the choke under a bit of a shelf on the left wall. We could see along 5 m or so, with enticing gaps beyond and the sound of water. Mark took on the tricky job of starting the scaffolding for this, now without the luxury of 2 solid walls, or even a solid floor. It’ll be entertaining for sure!
We made our way out around 7 pm feeling suitable tired after our efforts. Food and beer tasted all the better for our exertions, and we both suffered with significant aches the next day.
Prospects remain good. Fingers crossed our new-found stacking space is sufficient for the next bit of progress…
Mark R
Well-known member
On Saturday 2nd December Ben E and I set off from home to meet Mark S at the farm. When we stopped off in Bamford for a bit of fuel it was -7.5 degrees, but a balmy -6 or so at Rowter. As Ben and I had been awoken earlier than necessary by my two children, we were there in plenty of time and managed to do a couple of trips to the entrance, moving 14 scaffold poles and the entrance rope over. It really was a stunning day with crisp blue skies and a thick hoar frost on the ground which crunched underfoot. The perfect day to spend inside a muddy boulder choke.
We got all the scaffolding to the dig with relative ease, having three people makes it just so much easier. It was interesting to hear Ben’s reaction to seeing the dig for the first time. I think it was something along the lines of “oh my god……what have you done!”
The aim of the day was to start tunnelling horizontally into the choke upstream and do whatever we could to have a bit of a tidy up of various spoil piles throughout the rest of the dig to create some space. At some point during the morning we also had a closer look at the small window at the rear of the void of hanging nightmares (which we started calling the loft as the day went on). The little window above a lodged slab of rock was where we had been throwing spoil on the previous trip but on closer inspection, the window led to a small leftward trending void in the choke which didn’t go anywhere but which did provide us with quite a bit more stacking space... if we could access it. So with three tasks to concentrate on, the three of us got to work.
Time flies when you’re having fun and by lunch time we had all of the temporary scaffolding we installed on the last trip removed and a really good start made on the horizontal tunnel. The main difficulty with that is the absence of a solid floor, so we are working out methods of progress as we go but things went fairly smoothly, with only a few small collapses. The secondary void at the rear of the loft had two poles installed before lunch but was left with quite a lot of work to do to get it anything like acceptable to remove the wedged slab in order to gain access. Lunch was the usual gritty coffee and cheese sandwich and we returned to the dig face refuelled. Mark S went up into the loft and continued with the second void scaffolding, undertaking some very acrobatic scaffold installation in a very difficult space but eventually gained access into the extended stacking room. The forward tunnel into the choke progressed slow but steady and Ben managed to clear a lot of space lower down in the dig.
We left the dig having removed some very large boulders (one of which was obliterated into pieces by the most perfect bit of capping most of us had ever seen!). The way on follows the left wall, which meanders in and out slightly but the choke is very loosely packed against this wall, allowing us to see through the boulders for a few metres. It is really hard to get a sense of what may lie ahead but by contorting into strange positions and shining a powerful torch through the choke it’s possible to believe we can see a further 6-8m through the boulders into something resembling a bit of ‘space’ against the continuing left wall. I went in and had a good prod around with the pokey stick to clear a bit of space to look through and in doing so, wobbled a large boulder that knocked into a second big rock hanging out of the roof and caused a fairly significant mass shift. The next trip will need some more very careful scaffolding to allow further progress whilst maintaining the open spaces we’re currently seeing. The choke is precarious ahead and more poking will likely result in a collapse that would close off the open spaces. So basically, we need to carry on with what we’re doing- very, very carefully.
We got all the scaffolding to the dig with relative ease, having three people makes it just so much easier. It was interesting to hear Ben’s reaction to seeing the dig for the first time. I think it was something along the lines of “oh my god……what have you done!”
The aim of the day was to start tunnelling horizontally into the choke upstream and do whatever we could to have a bit of a tidy up of various spoil piles throughout the rest of the dig to create some space. At some point during the morning we also had a closer look at the small window at the rear of the void of hanging nightmares (which we started calling the loft as the day went on). The little window above a lodged slab of rock was where we had been throwing spoil on the previous trip but on closer inspection, the window led to a small leftward trending void in the choke which didn’t go anywhere but which did provide us with quite a bit more stacking space... if we could access it. So with three tasks to concentrate on, the three of us got to work.
Time flies when you’re having fun and by lunch time we had all of the temporary scaffolding we installed on the last trip removed and a really good start made on the horizontal tunnel. The main difficulty with that is the absence of a solid floor, so we are working out methods of progress as we go but things went fairly smoothly, with only a few small collapses. The secondary void at the rear of the loft had two poles installed before lunch but was left with quite a lot of work to do to get it anything like acceptable to remove the wedged slab in order to gain access. Lunch was the usual gritty coffee and cheese sandwich and we returned to the dig face refuelled. Mark S went up into the loft and continued with the second void scaffolding, undertaking some very acrobatic scaffold installation in a very difficult space but eventually gained access into the extended stacking room. The forward tunnel into the choke progressed slow but steady and Ben managed to clear a lot of space lower down in the dig.
We left the dig having removed some very large boulders (one of which was obliterated into pieces by the most perfect bit of capping most of us had ever seen!). The way on follows the left wall, which meanders in and out slightly but the choke is very loosely packed against this wall, allowing us to see through the boulders for a few metres. It is really hard to get a sense of what may lie ahead but by contorting into strange positions and shining a powerful torch through the choke it’s possible to believe we can see a further 6-8m through the boulders into something resembling a bit of ‘space’ against the continuing left wall. I went in and had a good prod around with the pokey stick to clear a bit of space to look through and in doing so, wobbled a large boulder that knocked into a second big rock hanging out of the roof and caused a fairly significant mass shift. The next trip will need some more very careful scaffolding to allow further progress whilst maintaining the open spaces we’re currently seeing. The choke is precarious ahead and more poking will likely result in a collapse that would close off the open spaces. So basically, we need to carry on with what we’re doing- very, very carefully.
MarkS
Moderator
In the choke or in you?
Mrs Trellis
Well-known member
Sorry to be a bit slow but are you heading towards Peak or just getting deeper/higher in the natural?
Mrs Trellis
Well-known member
I thought that was the case. Thanks for confirming.
Fatman
Member
Daft question but is there anything on the Peak side that might connect?
MarkS
Moderator
The small tube off on the right wall (heading upstream) after the first Whirlpool Rising sump pool looks to be the most likely place, but if they do connect there it is presumably not the route the water takes. Split Infinitive takes a fair bit of water, but there was little more than trickles coming in by Whirlpool Rising when I went for a look. It was fairly draughty though, which was encouraging. More of a look there is certainly on our to-do list.
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pwhole
Well-known member
As I remember, that small tube off Whirlpool Passage leads to a crawl to the base of a very tight natural aven - I could only manage to sit up in it, but couldn't get my legs around the corner. I seem to remember a tale of Shaun P once getting stuck at the top.
I'm particularly interested if you can connect into the Shackhole Scrin workings or cave passages, as that vein connects directly to Longcliffe Mine, and the water coming into that shaft 15m down could be coming along the sole of the SHS workings - or its vein cavities. We did a (Tinopal) dye trace with John Gunn and two of his students a few years ago in the engine shaft on SHS, at the top of the Longcliffe slope, but it was negative on the detector in there, but I think it did come out at Whirlpool Rising. Photos 11 onwards are of the collapse 30m further west, right on the edge of Winnats Pass:
https://pwhole.com/photo_galleries/private/ShackholeScrin/
I'm particularly interested if you can connect into the Shackhole Scrin workings or cave passages, as that vein connects directly to Longcliffe Mine, and the water coming into that shaft 15m down could be coming along the sole of the SHS workings - or its vein cavities. We did a (Tinopal) dye trace with John Gunn and two of his students a few years ago in the engine shaft on SHS, at the top of the Longcliffe slope, but it was negative on the detector in there, but I think it did come out at Whirlpool Rising. Photos 11 onwards are of the collapse 30m further west, right on the edge of Winnats Pass:
https://pwhole.com/photo_galleries/private/ShackholeScrin/
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Mark R
Well-known member
A summary from a Rowter dye trace from John G that I'm sure has been posted before but which is worth re- posting.
As part of their undergraduate dissertations two University of Birmingham Earth Science undertook water tracing experiments in the Castleton karst under the supervision of Professor John Gunn (JG). As neither is a caver** the initial plan was to repeat tracing experiments from sites that they could access with JG sampling in Speedwell Cavern. Then Mark said he would be more than happy to inject dye in Rowter so that became one target. There has always been some uncertainty over previous tracing from Blue John (did it or did it not go via Speedwell) so that was the second target. Following clearance from the EA Rhodamine WT was injected into the stream in the Variegated Cavern at the end of the Blue John show cave at 12:00 on 2nd June. The dye was first detected at Russet Well (RW) at 23:00 on 4th June. No dye was detected in Speedwell or at Slop Moll (SM). Dye was still emerging in measurable concentrations at 12:00 on 18th June. The test confirms there is an independent conduit linking Blue John Cavern and Treak Cliff Cavern to RW. Mark injected the fluorescein into the Rowter stream at 19:20 on 2nd June. No dye was present on water samples and fluocapteurs (charcoal bags) in Whirlpool Passage, Bathing Pool Passage, Cliff Cavern or the Speedwell Near Canal. Purely by chance JG changed the Main Rising (MR) fluocapteur and collected a water sample at 11:00 on 9th June. No dye was present [NB I ASKED THEM TO REPEAT THIS ANALYSIS TODAY & AM AWAITING RESULTS]. However, fluorescein was present in a water sample collected automatically from Russet Well at 05:00, and in a water sample collected downstream at Goosehill Bridge at 05:10. Unfortunately batteries on the Slop Moll water sampler had failed but fluorescein was clearly present in a sample collected manually at 12:34. Fluorescein was also clearly present on the RW and SM fluocapteurs. The startling conclusion is that a conduit independent from (& presumably below) Speedwell provided a more rapid route from Rowter to RW & SM! Than the route to Speedwell. Unfortunately a conference in Bosnia intervened and JG was unable to visit Speedwell until 18th June. The MR fluocapteur was strongly positive clearly showing that some of the Rowter dye had followed that route. However, the concentration of dye in a water sample collected at 13:10 was only just above background whereas water samples collected from RW and SM at 11:00 had much higher concentrations, supporting the idea of an alternative route from Rowter to the two springs.
As part of their undergraduate dissertations two University of Birmingham Earth Science undertook water tracing experiments in the Castleton karst under the supervision of Professor John Gunn (JG). As neither is a caver** the initial plan was to repeat tracing experiments from sites that they could access with JG sampling in Speedwell Cavern. Then Mark said he would be more than happy to inject dye in Rowter so that became one target. There has always been some uncertainty over previous tracing from Blue John (did it or did it not go via Speedwell) so that was the second target. Following clearance from the EA Rhodamine WT was injected into the stream in the Variegated Cavern at the end of the Blue John show cave at 12:00 on 2nd June. The dye was first detected at Russet Well (RW) at 23:00 on 4th June. No dye was detected in Speedwell or at Slop Moll (SM). Dye was still emerging in measurable concentrations at 12:00 on 18th June. The test confirms there is an independent conduit linking Blue John Cavern and Treak Cliff Cavern to RW. Mark injected the fluorescein into the Rowter stream at 19:20 on 2nd June. No dye was present on water samples and fluocapteurs (charcoal bags) in Whirlpool Passage, Bathing Pool Passage, Cliff Cavern or the Speedwell Near Canal. Purely by chance JG changed the Main Rising (MR) fluocapteur and collected a water sample at 11:00 on 9th June. No dye was present [NB I ASKED THEM TO REPEAT THIS ANALYSIS TODAY & AM AWAITING RESULTS]. However, fluorescein was present in a water sample collected automatically from Russet Well at 05:00, and in a water sample collected downstream at Goosehill Bridge at 05:10. Unfortunately batteries on the Slop Moll water sampler had failed but fluorescein was clearly present in a sample collected manually at 12:34. Fluorescein was also clearly present on the RW and SM fluocapteurs. The startling conclusion is that a conduit independent from (& presumably below) Speedwell provided a more rapid route from Rowter to RW & SM! Than the route to Speedwell. Unfortunately a conference in Bosnia intervened and JG was unable to visit Speedwell until 18th June. The MR fluocapteur was strongly positive clearly showing that some of the Rowter dye had followed that route. However, the concentration of dye in a water sample collected at 13:10 was only just above background whereas water samples collected from RW and SM at 11:00 had much higher concentrations, supporting the idea of an alternative route from Rowter to the two springs.
Mark R
Well-known member
Which I think means that the dye injected into SHS probably didn't find its way into the stream we're currently pushing up in Rowter. Although I have a vague recollection that the dye in RH did eventually turn up at Main Rising and WPR.. in that order after it appeared at Russet Well?! I'll see if I can find the full report.
MarkS
Moderator
Worth noting for anyone less familiar with the cave that the stream mentioned at Split Infinitive that disappears in the vicinity of Whirlpool Passage is totally separate from the Rowter stream tested in the above dye trace. In fact, I'm not sure we were aware of its existence at the time!
