h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Got back from Slovenia last week, and went digging in Wales. As a respite from our riverside shaft dig, we are currently excavating an old mineshaft that may give access to a lost cave with the potential to form a link bewteen two of the main local systems.
I turned up with my caving gear, but somehow most of the others didn't have theirs. They hadn't said much about the dig itself, just the odd mention of a few bags they'd removed the previous week, and buried nearby.
On descending the shaft, I found the reason why no-one else was keen on going down. The shaft bottom (about 5ft by 2ft6) was composed entirely of dead sheep deposited by a local farmer in times past, some in fertiliser bags, some just loose. There was little obvious smell, and nothing noticably moving, but it still wasn't a terribly pleasant job. If anything the bags were the worst - you were never entirely sure what was inside, and imagination isn't really desirable in a situation like that.
In reality, there wasn't much there other than a mess of skulls and bones, and fleeces squeezed into felt-like mats by the weight of the sheep above, but it took a while before I went from just using the entrenching tool to pull bits into the hauling bucket to using my (gloved) hands as well. I reckon I cleared something over metre depth of remains in my time down there, and the next guy down only had to shift a few more sacks before he cleared the sheep layer and got into old household rubbish.
I do wish someone had advised me to take my old PVC oversuit rather than my new fabric one, since PVC is rather easier to clean and sterilise. Still, apparently the previous week's digging had been a bit more unpleasant, with warmer weather and fresher remains to remove, so I suppose I should be grateful.

What *are* the first symptoms of anthrax?

Ohh, what is it about Wales and dead sheep? Derbyshire has a similar sheep-raising industry, but there desn't seem to be half as many ex-sheep stufffed in unlikely places.

Unfortunately, our shaft is right by a farmhouse track, and was rather too convenient for disposing of anything unwanted.

We did about 6 hours of digging today and got down about another metre and a half (the shaft is somewhat wider at the current depth than it was last week. There were still a few sheep bones in the spoil, but the bulk was initially household waste (1 more radio-cassette player, a can of engine oil, various plastic makeup containers, a few kettles, and assorted cans and bottles and broken glass), and at the end of the day, it seemed to be largely soil of some kind, mixed with what seem likely to be stones that once formed a wall around the top. We also removed another couple of live frogs, and one toad.

We *seem* to have reached a depth where the sides are largely bedrock, rather than more-or-less lose ginging. We think that the shaft is an old ladder-way for the nearby larger shaft, and hope that it may soon shift sideways as such things tend to do, ideally meaning that the next vertical section may be clear of surface debris.

It's still going down.
We're something like 12m down now (enough to look scarily deep when peering down from the shaft-top), and have long passed the garbage - now it's either rocks or clay that has to be hauled out.
As the shaft is widening out, we have to shift a little more stuff for a given bit of depth, and the spoil tip is getting rather large - we started off dumping in a nearby hollow, but the hollow looks set to become a hump in the next few weeks.
Fortunately, foresight was employed when the shaft top was sorted out with girders and metal-grid sheet, and a couple of sections of angle-iron were laid to act as rails. We now have a wheeled platform running on the rails that can be slid over the shaft top when a bucket (or boulder) is hauled up, enabling it to be undone from the haul rope without any danger of dropping back down the shaft.
We have also fitted a windlass to the scaffolding frame at the shaft-head, which makes hauling much easier than it was just using rope,pulley and hands, and for extra comfort, a wood-burning stove made from an old gas container to keep the surface party more comfortable.
The shaft seems to be spreading out along the vein at the bottom, but it's not clear if we've hit a mine level or some kind of stope filled with spoil. The next few weeks should help clarify things.

I can't imagine. On the other hand, it would be a waste if you never have kids. 'tis a rare man who isn't too squeamish to handle what uckiness comes out of a little baby.

We're now down to fifty-something feet deep (~17m), and the damn thing is still going. It has to stop sometime, but isn't obviously doing it yet, nor is it really clear exactly wnat kind of shaft we're clearing (it doesn't look much like a ladderway), nor why it was filled in with so much stuff when the general surface landscape isn't short of spoil heaps - why bother moving spoil from any other shaft to fill up this one, rather than just dumping it somewhere closer to its source.

On Wednesday night something *seemed* to happen - the guy loading buckets at the shaft bottom noticed the floor moving somewhat, though it later seemed to be a result of us reaching the top of a debris cone with gaps between the debris and the wall allowing some material to slump a little when disturbed.

After a full day digging on Wednesday (arms and back still aching), we're over 60ft deep now, still no sign of stopping going down, nor any levels going off.
There's a supposed level at 33 yards down relative to the main shaft nearby, and our shaft starts from about 15ft lower than the main one. Given we're definitely in the vein, we must hit the level eventually, and particularly if the level was stoped upwards, it may not be too long, but no joy yet.

After an initial bit of boulder-splitting courtesy of the newly repaired drill batteries, three 50-bucket shifts on Wednesday lifted around 3 tons of boulder/rock/clay fill. The evening shift was abandoned a little early when a handle on one of the (twin-handled) buckets broke as the load was being taken up on it, and we decided to retire to the pub to think about things.
Some handle backup method may be needed on the replacement buckets, or we may shift to using an old aluminium beer barrel for hauling like some other diggers do. Investigations continue.
Went to the more expensive of the two local pubs. Had three different real ales, *all* of which were cloudy. Got headache at ~1.5 pints, and had even stranger dreams than usual.

Is there a *reason* for this, other than some sort of challenging recreational activity? Sorry if I've missed something important previously that might have informed me about this (and please don't beat me up if I have . . .)

Long and narrow bits of deep darkness are just the sorts of things that make me go . . . well, you don't want to know.


az

Many of the best caves in North Wales have actually been found by miners - there's a great deal of cave development at depth, but the surface is often moorland blanketed with peat, with no obvious surface cave features.
Our current dig is between two of the largest caves, which almost certainly connect together at some point.
One of these caves has a 90+m entrance shaft, and then a long (and often wet) journey to the area of likely connection, and the other one has quite a bit of unexplored/unpushed passage in it, but on the other side of a long sump (completely flooded passage).
Where we are digging at present, there are many mineshafts in a small area along the main lead-ore vein. The mineworkings here are known to have broken into a sizeable natural cave passage which is a very good prospect for working on connecting the two large caves, as well as exploring for its own sake, if only we can get into it.
Most of the shafts nearby have been solidly capped, and/or have cratered at the top (a whole load of ground around has slumped into the shaft, leaving a depression and a seriously blocked shaft). The shaft we are now digging *seemed* the best bet to get into the mineworkings without too much work or danger, though we hoped we might only have to dig out a few metres of fill.

Still, we know there is a cave down there, we know there are mineworkings somewhere underneath us, and we're more than half way towards getting into them. It's a bit late to stop now, and it is pretty good exercise.

The things you do for fun *shudder*

The things you do for fun *shudder*

Sorry (must learn correct smileys)