What is the UK's Biggest Chamber ?

[Pitlamp]

To answer you definitively I'd have to do quite a lot of work rationalising a huge amount of survey material and I  have more urgent plates spinning right now. Even with the most precise distances (and much of it was actually measured underwater with a non stretch Fibron tape) it's still not a definitive answer. The trouble is it depends on whether you quote the absolute shortest route or whether you quote the distance of the actual route taken through the underwater complex (bearing in mind very heavily kitted divers will swim through the largest passages from choice - and the largest passages are, in many cases, longer). This is why attempting to come up with such statistical lists which others may then quote as gospel is not always the best of ideas.

 

[SamT]

...
Biggest horizontal entrance = Porth -Yr - Ogof
...

I think it's actually Peak Cavern, with probably the only UK record that will never be beaten.

Peak vs Smoo ???

 

[kdxn]

The Frozen Deep is a great discovery but announcing it as the biggest chamber in the UK is a bit premature.

Let's see the detailed survey results. Hopefully with lots of Disto shots so that we can get good quality area and volume numbers to compare with other UK stuff. Maybe I or someone else can get in there later this year and do a 3D laser scan.

As to what constitutes a passage or chamber, you could start with the BCRA or UIS glossary of those terms. They are subjective. There has been some international discussion about creating a more mathematically rigorous way of defining cave features but it gets very complicated. For example is Miaos Chamber the world's second largest chamber by area or is it a big passage ? Does GG chamber stop at the shaft top or shaft bottom and does the entrance shaft mean that GG can no longer be classed as a chamber ?

Out of interest, I am aware of the following UK caves with detailed 3D laser scans.
There are plenty more especially mines.

Yordas Chamber
GG Chamber
Mud Hall
OFD2 Entrance series and The Big Chamber Near The Entrance
Reads Chamber
Titan (Upper half only)
Smoo Cave
Nottingham Caves

 

 

[bograt]

Its announced as MENDIPS biggest, these lads have no pretentions.

 

[kdxn]

Within this thread, "What is the UK's Biggest Chamber ?", Muddy Funkster has listed TFD as the largest chamber.

Too often, the media get a hold of something like this and blow it out of all proportion which does a dis-service to caving.

 

[Bob Smith]

Its announced as MENDIPS biggest, these lads have no pretentions.

but of course if it is bigger than GB, it must be the biggest in the UK, as we all know GB was previously the biggest.

C'mon LesW back me up here.

 

[Les W]

Its announced as MENDIPS biggest, these lads have no pretentions.

but of course if it is bigger than GB, it must be the biggest in the UK, as we all know GB was previously the biggest.

C'mon LesW back me up here.

Well, that was my claim and as nobody has yet disproved it... 
Isn't that how science works? 

 

[graham]

Well, that was my claim and as nobody has yet disproved it... 
Isn't that how science works? 

He who asserts must prove.

I don't think we need to invoke either Carl Sagan: Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence

or Christopher Hitchens: That which is presented without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

 

[cavermark]

Within this thread, "What is the UK's Biggest Chamber ?", Muddy Funkster has listed TFD as the largest chamber.

Too often, the media get a hold of something like this and blow it out of all proportion which does a dis-service to caving.

Or National Geographic....

 

[cavermark]

3050 m comes to mind...

Recent accurate survey work suggests this is not quite correct.
[/quote]

..so that's recent accurate survey work that hasn't been processed to provide a definitive answer, then?"
(tease)

 

[Pitlamp]

Yep - but I'm too busy to deal with it at the mo as I have a couple of quite big writing commitments on; sorry.

 

[mikem]

Did you ever work out the answer?

It wasn't planned, but I did just visit TFD & GG within the same 24 hours, still couldn't tell you which one was bigger!

Mike

 

[The Old Ruminator]

Like most things it depends how you do the calculation.

TFD has the greatest floor area at just under 3,000 square metres. GG has the greatest volume. TFD would appear bigger as you can see all of it by walking around. GG has a lot of volume high up that you cannot walk around.

You know what we would say here on Mendip.

At least ours wasn't discovered by a Frenchman and we have a vast amount more formations.

My son in TFD. Image by Olympus Live Composite mode as there were only the two of us.

 

[mikem]

Sorry, it was pitlamp's survey I was wondering about..

Mike

 

[David Rose]

At least you don't need a contract with the Longleat Estate to enter GG.

 

[mikem]

Just a permit from the ingleborough estate instead...

Mike

 

[Badlad]

Just a permit from the ingleborough estate instead...

Mike

Not for long. Full beta test trials on the new on-line cave booking system start next week 

 

[PeteHall]

Just a permit from the ingleborough estate instead...

Miket

I remember once writing to the estate office for a permit, only to receive my own letter back with, "yes ok" scrawled across it.

 

[Ed]

Just a permit from the ingleborough estate instead...

Mike

Not for all routes as its access land --- Main chamber is still within the extent of day light. So Dihedral doesn't technically need a permit,

 

[TheBitterEnd]

Just a permit from the ingleborough estate instead...

Mike

It hasn't been Ingleborough Estate for a few years and Geoff is the fastest CNCC permit issuer in the Universe, all you have to do is think of maybe wanting a permit and one turns up seconds later. And,as  Badlad says the online booking system is already being tested by a few clubs.