Worst case senario ?
- Thread starter Stupot
- Start date
L
Lincolnshire poacher
Guest
Not a caving "oh crap" moment but was scary..........
Found myself at RAF Fairford watching the B52's taking off etc to bomb a small middle eastern country. In front of me was a B52 being loaded with bombs. One of the guys loading the bombs did something wrong and one fell off the fork lift truck thing they were using.............i saw the thing fall and thought "oh bugger" as myself and several others tried to break the 100m sprint record!!.
Found myself at RAF Fairford watching the B52's taking off etc to bomb a small middle eastern country. In front of me was a B52 being loaded with bombs. One of the guys loading the bombs did something wrong and one fell off the fork lift truck thing they were using.............i saw the thing fall and thought "oh bugger" as myself and several others tried to break the 100m sprint record!!.
F
Frog
Guest
Been lost at sea couple of times whilst diving, once at the Farne Islands and once in South Africa.
Not a nice feeling when you surface and theres no boat.
Even worse when it starts to rain and you get wet!
Oh had a CO2 hit on my rebreather. Not nice but I dealt with it ok. Took me 20 mins back on the boat to feel anything like normal again.
Not a nice feeling when you surface and theres no boat.
Even worse when it starts to rain and you get wet!
Oh had a CO2 hit on my rebreather. Not nice but I dealt with it ok. Took me 20 mins back on the boat to feel anything like normal again.
E
emgee
Guest
AndyF said:
Surely the big metal helmet and the heavy suit are to keep you dry. Can't you just follow the hose back to the boat? Or has diving gear got less user friendly in the last half century or two.
L
Limestone_Cowboy
Guest
One time in Lancaster hole I got back to the entrance shaft and attached my jammers. As I pushed them up the rope more and more slack kept coming down. This started to concern me that if I pulled much more down there wouldn't be any left and I would have to go all the way up to wretched rabbit to get out. Luckily the rope then went tight and after a good pull and bounce on it at ground level it seemed secure enough. I then prusiked up the pitch, except that at a little over halfway up ( about 15m up in the air ) as I stood up in my foot loop the rope suddenly went slack and I started to fall back down the shaft. :shock:
Understandably I let out a huge girlie scream and just at that point the rope tightened and my fall stopped. Instantly I performed the most amazing feat of sticking myself to the shaft wall in a star shaped position using no holds what so ever. Due to my position the only way to get out of this was to re weight the rope and hope for the best.
Luckily I got back on the rope and all was good. I got up the pitch and the anchors all seemed fine and so did the rigging. Unable to explain what had gone wrong the rest of our group then had to ascend the rope as well after having just witnessed my epic :!:
Understandably I let out a huge girlie scream and just at that point the rope tightened and my fall stopped. Instantly I performed the most amazing feat of sticking myself to the shaft wall in a star shaped position using no holds what so ever. Due to my position the only way to get out of this was to re weight the rope and hope for the best.
Luckily I got back on the rope and all was good. I got up the pitch and the anchors all seemed fine and so did the rigging. Unable to explain what had gone wrong the rest of our group then had to ascend the rope as well after having just witnessed my epic :!:
Peter Burgess
New member
Sounds like some lame brain in another group had started to pull your rope up, and then realised they shouldn't .
D
Dep
Guest
It is possible to mis-tie a bowline-on-the-bight (Y-hang knot) in such a way that one loop can slip through into the other when the wieght goes on it.
It cannot slip any further than the point at which the central knot hits on of the belays so not too critical (but obviously not ideal) but it can drop you a few feet and can be quite scary.
When this happened I was standing at the bottom watching somone else get onto the rope to ascend. The odd thing is that we had both just descended on it with out it moving - very odd.
It cannot slip any further than the point at which the central knot hits on of the belays so not too critical (but obviously not ideal) but it can drop you a few feet and can be quite scary.
When this happened I was standing at the bottom watching somone else get onto the rope to ascend. The odd thing is that we had both just descended on it with out it moving - very odd.
L
Limestone_Cowboy
Guest
When I got to the pitch head the knots looked perfectly normal which leads me to believe that the rope had been pulled up and then thrown back like Pete said. It must have caught on a ledge somewhere and worked it's way free whilst I was prusiking.
D
Dep
Guest
If the knot was ok then this seems to apply here too then!
At least with a knot failure you know you're only going to slip a bit, but with what you describe that is very scary indeed as there could have been any amount of slack rope waiting to spoil your day.
I like this forum, lots of little details that you might not otherwise have thought of. Next time I return to a rope like that this will be in the back of my mind and I will give it a quick flick.
Thanks.
E
epik
Guest
Stupot said:What is the worst thing that could happen to you / a group underground, something that if it did happen you think to yourself "that's it game over"
Stu.
I think if a bunch of girls in lycra tops ran past swinging ice axes and screaming "its coming" i'd probably think yep thats it!
On a serious note i guess bad air has a habit of making you want to lie down and die for a few hours and the sign on longwood august about flash flooding does make you wonder what if......... be worse if you could hear the pumps stop!
Les W
Active member
epik said:
I'm not sure that the pumps stopping is an issue.
I think it more likely that the sign is there to placate / absolve the water company over a percieved risk, rather than the existance of a real risk.
I have been caving on Mendip for 25 years (yep count em
) including many trips in longwood, and have never seen myself, or heard from any caver of this happening. :shock:That said, there are a couple of low bits in the streamway where a sudden rise in water could render the streamway a bit "sporting" although IMHO not life threatening.
E
epik
Guest
AndyF said:
Well quite often it seems! hasn't there been two documentary films made about it recently? :wink:
E
epik
Guest
Les W said:
Wasn't necessarily saying it was but makes you think about the likely hood of survival in certain passages in certain caves if flash flooding occured! I know there are caves on mendip that certainly used to flood on regular basis (though many don't now due to water board or change of river direction). Thats the only thing that would scare me being that im a crap swimmer and there is only so long you can hold your breathe!
paul
Moderator
There's always Otter Hole (Forest of Dean) with its tidal sump. The original explorers weren't aware of this until they were in the low passages on the way out - on one of the days that year with the highest tides...
Watching the re-enactment on Sid's video can give a real case of the willies! :shock: :shock:
Watching the re-enactment on Sid's video can give a real case of the willies! :shock: :shock:
gus horsley
New member
paul said:
I think the worst problem with Otter Hole is the rank smell of the tidal mud and its potential for making you feel ill. I've been in several times and I think on nearly every occasion somebody's had to turn back with bad guts.
M
mountainboy
Guest
finding loads of big flesh eating monstors down a cave that you never been down mmmmmmm like a recent hollywood movie
cap n chris
Well-known member
badger said:
Phill Short; IIRC he got slightly "stuck" and managed to get free by jettisoning his helmt/light and surfacing in the dark at sump 12.
Unfortunately he was solo.
Fortunately he managed to dive back and get his light.
Unfortunately he couldn't find his mask.
Fortunately he managed to dive all the way back to the surface without it.
Later that day he informed a hushed audience of his exploits at the Mendip Cavers Weekend. Much later apparently he had a couple of halfs of shandy to relax and chill out a bit.
