Intake Dale Mine
Discussions following on from the Bradwell Catchment Symposium and after reading reports from the 80's of natural rift and chambers, EPC members have re-descended Intake Dale Mine and embarked on exploring it further.
Blogs:
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- Written by: Rob Eavis
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Intake Dale Mine - 19/12/2019 - Rob & Jon
An early start allowed for a relaxed pre-beer. Compared to the mammoth carrying session last week I made easy (and very delicate) progress to the dig. Meanwhile Jon went for a gander in a boulder chamber above the Blackjack Choke. We had clear voice connection through the choke although it was hard to know exactly where from. That might one day provide another option to attack the choke from, especially as digging down in boulder choke is generally the easiest and safest option, but for now we must continue as planned.
Jon did a sterling job of cutting some scaf bars whilst I did a pretty poor job of getting a “vertical” pole in. Obviously forgot my spirit level, again! I then spent some time digging the face to make more room for more scaf. At first this involved pulling spoil back for Jon to sort but soon it was easier to just push it forwards and left, down into the big hole. The sound of some of the rocks falling was very encouraging, if not a little foreboding. The draft is noticeably increasing too now. The last rock was probably too large to safely drop down the hole so I pulled it all the way back then headed in to see if I could get through. Very carefully I quietly moved beyond the scaf, being very aware of the horrendous looking choke now all around me. A small funnel lay beyond with a hole in the middle leading down out of sight. I lean out to get a better vantage and see a pitch down heading off West into a tall rift. Solid wall on each side, the first seen in the whole dig, we’ve made it through the choke! It looks to be at least 12m deep and too wide to safely freeclimb down.
Any jovial feelings are quickly thrown away as I contemplate the challenges that we must overcome to abseil down this pitch and explore what’s below. The relative safety of the existing scaffolded section stops ~2m before the pitch and the hanging death is totally surrounding. Any structural integrity gained from solid walls will have to wait at first, so the rough plan for now is just to fill it with any remaining scaf and see if we can fit through the Kerplunk that’s left!
Squirming beyond the "safety" of the scaffold
We do a bit of tidying of the scaffold frame and head off to the Anchor to contemplate further. Lots of options, none very appealing. I’m hoping time will heal both the dig and my worries….
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- Written by: Jon Pemberton
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Just Rob, Jeff and myself tonight with a mission to transport six rather large scaffolding bars down to the Black Jack Choke. We took 2 pieces of scaff down each all ranging between 5-6ft. which made moving through the Mine hazardous, slow and stupid. I went down first mainly to get out of the bitter chill upon surface and made a fine job of not really knocking anything down. I waited at the de-kit point for Rob who was next and was showered with multiple scree falls and the occasional large rock.
We ferried the scaff through in pairs and then I headed back to help Jeff with his bar. Once all at the dig Rob put on his big boy bravado and managed to remove the shattered bits of rock from the choke which were left over from last week. After inserting some more scaffolding we all took a good look in to a rather nice looking void which had appeared straight in front. It's hard to tell from this point but it looks like we may be looking at a solid back wall but don't quote me on it!
We headed out and was turned away from The Anchor so we made a B-line for The Red'n for some AWESOME pork scratchings. Deffo worth it and the choke looks promising too. More shorter bars required for next week so we'll be holding a "Scaffolding Cutting Within A Confined Space Workshop" or S.C.W.C.S.W for short. Anyone interested please feel free to hit us up on any of our Social Media outlets or contact Rob Eavis directly. Location; Black Jack Choke, IDM, Bradwell. Time; 19:30 ish.
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- Written by: Rob Eavis
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Jeff & Rob
A quick trip pre-monthly meet to check out what happened after the last attack and to redo if necessary. Prebeers and chips got us prepared and we headed straight down to the Black Jack choke.
Thankfully it looks like nothing has moved in the choke and the rock that we had drilled had indeed slit nicely into two. Unfortunately the bigger half was still under pressure and it was unsafe to do anything there. So we drilled it again and used some different technology this time to see what effect that would have. Big 16mm holes and stemming take a while, which feels like forever when at the pointed end of this choke!
We retreated back to a safe distance and let her go. A good pop but again no big collapse. Rubbish! I went back for a careful look, against Jeff's best advice. Great news that the air was totally clear (within 3 minutes) so the draught is obviously working well. The offending rock was completely obliterated into about 10 different chunks. However they were all still in place! The whole place was creaking and spitting rocks so i retreated to a safe distance. I prodded it with the longest scaf bar we had (only 1.5m) but nothing was budging. It must be holding up the whole hillside!
We will return with a much longer bar, although i hope it will have all collapsed by then...
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- Written by: Jon Pemberton
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Just Rob and I for tonight's adventure as Luke was of having a baby and Geoff couldn't be arsed... Late start as we didn't have much to do so went underground around 7:20pm. We wasted no time and ticked off jobs on our to do list.
First job head down to the entrance to Brexit Rift and pick up the remaining scaffolding from down there. There was only a couple of lengths but pretty decent in size decorated with a few useful scaff clips. I had a quick look at what Rob and Geoff had done last week then Rob and I started our trip ferrying the pieces up through the ginged shaft Luckily Rob let me carry up the shorter length bless him.
Next job was to wang as much scaffolding in to the choke as possible to ensure that if the whole thing was to move 'hopefully' our engineered route through the choke would still remain. After lots of fuck-whittery and in-adequate scaff cutting room we had finally ticked this off the list.
Final job was to remove the boulder blocking our route through to the spacious void we can see and hear beyond. Rob drilled a hole and once packed up we edged our way back to the main shaft. Slight hesitation to ensure we had everything we waited but the loud crack and rumble never happened, only a soft fart - DAMN!
This trip could've and would've been perfect but unfortunately it was ruined by the last 15mins. We headed out somewhat peeved and headed to the Red'n for the first pint of Belgium Blue of the season. Shall have to see what happens after a weeks worth of solitude down there.
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- Written by: Rob Eavis
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Jeff & Rob
The floods last week showed the steam emerging from below some boulders below a natural crossrift, so we decided this week to have a poke at the back to see if we could open a route into the upstream continuation. After a quick look about we each picked a side and started digging down. After a hour both of our routes looked pretty rubbish with lots of sediment between the boulders and no sign of anything opening up.
Disheartened and bored I convinced myself that this was a bad site anyway because any upstream continuation would likely still have to navigate through the large boulder choke to the west, so we might as well just keep attacking that where it draughts and is easyish.
I had a quick look at our dig and nothing had collapsed since last week, which is good. Next trip; more scaf and some bang...