[Texascavers] RE: New tour at NBC
The new tour's talking points include its unusually long soda-straw formations - one of which, at about six feet in length, is the second-longest in North America. What a crock! There are lots of places in North America with soda straws over 6 feet long. Maybe that was supposed to say 16 feet, since on the NBC website http://www.naturalbridgecaverns.com/adventureTours.aspx they claim to have one 14 feet long, and say it is _one_ of the longest in North America, rather than second longest. With bedrock dating back about 140 million years, the cave's interior is a veritable catalogue of Texas' past, said resident geologist Brian Vauter. What you're looking at is probably the world's most extensive library of climatological change, he said. More BS. There are lots of caves that go much deeper than Natural Bridge and cut through more layers of rock with older ages. I can't believe a geologist would make that statement. Mark Minton
RE: [Texascavers] RE: New tour at NBC
Mark, This reminds me of what the General Manager of the Edwards Aquifer Authority told me when I first started work down here. I will never hold you accountable for what you said to the press - only what the press says you said. Geary -Original Message- From: Minton, Mark [mailto:mmin...@nmhu.edu] Sent: Friday, March 14, 2008 10:55 AM To: Texascavers@texascavers.com Subject: [Texascavers] RE: New tour at NBC The new tour's talking points include its unusually long soda-straw formations - one of which, at about six feet in length, is the second-longest in North America. What a crock! There are lots of places in North America with soda straws over 6 feet long. Maybe that was supposed to say 16 feet, since on the NBC website http://www.naturalbridgecaverns.com/adventureTours.aspx they claim to have one 14 feet long, and say it is _one_ of the longest in North America, rather than second longest. With bedrock dating back about 140 million years, the cave's interior is a veritable catalogue of Texas' past, said resident geologist Brian Vauter. What you're looking at is probably the world's most extensive library of climatological change, he said. More BS. There are lots of caves that go much deeper than Natural Bridge and cut through more layers of rock with older ages. I can't believe a geologist would make that statement. Mark Minton
[Texascavers] Re: New tour at NBC
Wow Mark. Thanks so much for the kind words. If I got paid every time I was misquoted by the press, I wouldn't have to work for a commercial cave, much less work at all. You are correct. That is a crock. There are lots of places in North America with soda straws over 6 feet in length. Hell, I've taken pics of the straws in La Puenta ... talk about long soda straws! Unfortunately, what I told the reporter was that the soda straw he was looking at was 6 feet long. He asked if that was the longest, and I told him that it was not. We do have a soda straw which is 14 feet in length. It's located in the Fault Room. And it's among the longest in North America, because to be honest, I haven't made a recent survey of long soda straws in North America. I don't really know if ours is still the second longest. But saying among the longest is honest. So when that reporter asked the length of the longest soda straw and then misquoted me in the paper, well, that's part and parcel of dealing with the press. As far as the climate comment, man, you are correct again. That is the mother lode of BS! But, unfortunately once more, what I did say was that the caverns represented AN extensive library of climatic data. This has been confirmed by Dr. Jay Banner, of UT Austin, (one of those pesky geologists!) whose students have been working in our cave, and many others, for over 11 years. Their work has been instrumental in understanding what we present to our guests. Dr. Banner and I have talked at great lengths about the cave, and his work. Since I do not possess the scientific resources of a university, I am grateful to have a whole team of geologists helping me to further understand the place at which I work. So, thanks again for your comments about me, the cave for which I work, and some misquoted comments of an over-zealous reporter. Brian Vauter Cavern Geologist Natural Bridge Caverns, Inc.
[Texascavers] Re-engineering a typewriter
One of my ideas, is to re-engineer the typewriter Most of your ideas about the typewriter, David, are what the first word-processors looked like. My Army office, in 1982, had a Wang WP system that we thought was the cat's meow. As you say, it had a vertical CRT that displayed one complete page. I think it had a 10-megabyte hard drive. You typed in a page, or pages, but you couldn't back up or make corrections, and you had to add any formatting by typing in the tags (i.e., bolditalicthis text/italic/bold. To edit or correct, you hit the Edit key. That split the screen horizontally across the middle, and brought your text page(s) up from the bottom to the center line. If you were happy with the first line, you would scroll it up, and it went above the centerline. If the next line had a mistake, you typed that (entire) line again correctly; it appeared above the line, and you then hit Delete to remove the first line underneath. Then on to the next line, completely replacing any line that contained an error. Pretty lame by today's standards, but it sure beat using white-out. And a tremendous boon f or sending TWXs (telegraph wire express -- the equivalent of today's fax) which were digitized by being read by an OCR, and thus could not contain any errors or corrections in the magnetic ink used. And it cost several thousand dollars. Boy, do I feel like a geezer today! Alex - Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com
[ot_caving] Truck Parts for caving vehicle
I'm looking for most of the body parts for an 86 to 92 Chevy S-10 Blazer, Including Both doors. (Front Bumper, Radiator Support, Front Left Fender) Anyone knowing of a decent junkyard in the Austin that might yield these parts? -DC
[Texascavers] RE: Florida cave diving fatality
Louise Power said: in what world to people still go caving, especially cave diving, alone? It is not uncommon for cave divers to push sumps solo. They say that when pushing, it is actually safer to be by yourself so that if there is a silt-out or other problem, your partners do not get in the way. Still, they generally have a team of sherpas and/or backup divers along. Ron Simmons died last year on a similar solo push trip with no backup. :-( Mark Minton
Re: [Texascavers] RE: Florida cave diving fatality
Or to paraphrase the cave diver saying, when I dive solo, I can trust everyone on the dive. I may not have the wording quite correct, but you understand the implied meaning. Diana On Mar 14, 2008, at 11:53 AM, Minton, Mark wrote: Louise Power said: in what world to people still go caving, especially cave diving, alone? It is not uncommon for cave divers to push sumps solo. They say that when pushing, it is actually safer to be by yourself so that if there is a silt-out or other problem, your partners do not get in the way. Still, they generally have a team of sherpas and/ or backup divers along. Ron Simmons died last year on a similar solo push trip with no backup. :-( Mark Minton * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Diana R. Tomchick Associate Professor University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center Department of Biochemistry 5323 Harry Hines Blvd. Rm. ND10.214B Dallas, TX 75390-8816, U.S.A. Email: diana.tomch...@utsouthwestern.edu 214-645-6383 (phone) 214-645-6353 (fax) - Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com
[Texascavers] Shetland Attack Pony-True Pulse-Suuntos-D3 shot comparisons
Last weekend Aaron Bird and I got together to shoot 12 survey shots using... 1) Shetland Attack Pony(digital compass/inclo - http://shetlandattackpony.co.uk 2) True Pulse 360 - http://www.lasertech.com/360/ 3) Traditional Suuntos sighting instruments 4) New Disto D3(discount code is cavers) - http://www.laserstreet.com/leica-disto-d3.htm Aaron and I both shot the different shots independently and wrote the results down. Here is a link to those results http://www.cavediggers.com/SurveySidebySideSummary.pdf NOTE: there is also a link to the .xls file that contains the raw data at the top of this pdf file. *OTHER NOTES*: Aaron and I had originally tried this a week earlier but quickly realized the True Pulse and SAP(Shetland Attack Pony) needed calibration. The Shetland was shipped from overseas so most likely got knocked out of calibration on the journey to the U.S. The SAP(Shetland Attack Pony) however wasn't so easy to calibrate i.e. the shot process is very simple but the software had installation issues. I never did get the software to complete the calibration completely, but instead had to send the raw.txt file to Phil at SAP. Phil then generated a calibration file and sent that file for me to load. Hopefully the software issue will be resolved soon because the SAP is an absolutely fantastic device thus far to use and worth every penny of the $600. In fact my goal is to have another unit by year end for backsights. **Phil just emailed and said a new version is up and running so I will test this weekend and post if it is successful in running the entire calibration routine. *SAP(Shetland Attack Pony) usage* -- Simply hold the device at any angle...point the laser to the next stationhold the button down for 1.5 second(this is adjustable via software setting) and read the results. An extra feature is the recording/saving of a leg # on the device. This leg# is written down in the survey book with that shot so that later any blunders in reading the device or in the recording of the measurement can be discovered! The SAP is without a doubt the single greatest survey device I have used and will eliminate many common survey errors. *Suuntos* -- Both Aaron and I discovered how easy it was to read these devices wrong.maybe just once or twice in a series of shots but it was enough for us to recognize the benefits of a device like the SAP or True Pulse. *Disto D3* -- An easy to use...ultra small device that delivers what it is designed to doi.e. distance and inclo! *True Pulse 360* -- Easy device to use but relegated for use above ground on longer shots such as a surface survey. Aaron will publish more on this device. My adviceget an SAP you won't be disppointed then add an extra column in the survey book for Leg# and go survey.the data crew will become so much more efficient that they will have more than enough time to draw cross sections at each station. This in turn frees up the sketcher so that the labor is more balanced and the survey moves forward at an even pace for all involved. Mark Passerby, InCaveDigitalSurvey.com --
[Texascavers] 2 New tour at NBC
At 11:55 AM 3/14/2008, Minton, Mark wrote: What a crock! There are lots of places in North America with soda straws over 6 feet long. More BS. There are lots of caves that go much deeper than Natural Bridge and cut through more layers of rock with older ages. Awwwh, come on, Minton. This is commercial cave hype and we all know it is commercial cave hype. It is meant for consumption by the general population of gullible America, not the scientific community--even if it comes from (or should I say: especially if it comes from) an NBC staff geologist who is also a respected caver and colleague. Next you'll be trying to convince us that it's not Texas' longest cave and that it doesn't connect with Carlsbad. What pluff The effort they make at NBC toward instilling cave conservation in the feeble minds of the general public--paying tourons visiting their cave--far outweighs any minor stretching of the soda straw or compressing of the geologic sequence they may make in attracting those same tourons with a harmless bit of commercial cave hype. We should be expressing our thanks for their educational effort, not lambasting their minor mensuration prevarications which attract the tourons and. coincidentally, expose them to their beneficial cave conservation educational efforts in the first place. Git down, --Ediger - Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com
[Texascavers] Technicality may cut California desert areas from federally protected status
From yesterday's LA Times. One of the areas includes Spooky Cave in Afton Canyon Natural Area. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-landscape13mar13,1,3502258.story
[Texascavers] Florida cave diving etc
At 12:35 PM 3/14/2008, Louise Power wrote: While I'm really sorry for this man and his family, in what world to people still go caving, especially cave diving, alone? Look, everybody has decisions they have to make in their lives and those decisions are based on the surrounding conditions--some not the slightest bit dangerous--and their experiences and their abilities (and known or suspected inabilities). It is why we train cavers (and divers) and why we make (or should make) their training stressful and realistic--so they know (really know!) their abilities and limitations. As trainers we are responsible for both determining those traits and for making them learn and be aware of them. After that, having done our job conscientiously, we relinquish that responsibility--they are on their own. We are no long responsible for setting limitations on other cavers' abilities. One reason for that is that each caver is unique in his or her abilities and limitations and nobody is more qualified to know that than they are. While one particular caver may be adept at free-diving a 40-foot sump over and over again, other cavers may not even be competent to be immersed in neck deep water. It's not our business to decide if solo caving or solo diving is within somebody else's realm of safe pursuits. It is OK to say that based on results it is a dangerous activity and to warn them of it, but it is not OK to say that it is stupid. Many cavers cave divers have done it successfully--often enough to prove that it is not entirely stupid. Living one's life in fear--in fear of the unknown, in fear of exceeding one's abilities, in fear of death, in fear of not knowing where one will spend eternity, in fear of living a life with some planned risk _IS_ just plain stupid. And forcing your limitations through rule or caveat on someone else is even more so. The fear one should have is the fear of ignorance. And ignorance is not overcome by being conservative but by going boldly to explore the frontiers--the frontiers of the Earth, the frontiers of the mind, the frontiers of nature, the frontiers of your equipment, and the frontiers of one's physical abilities. Mostly you get it right. Sometimes you don't. Sometimes cavers get hurt. Sometimes cavers die. That's not unique to caving. Couch potatoes die too. And, like cavers, it's their decision to make. You can stress the dangers of any sport to the participants but in the end it is their place to decide the limits of their own abilities and to do what they feel they have to do. Just step back and let the live--or die. It's OK. --Ediger - Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com
Re: [Texascavers] Florida cave diving etc
Gill, I must disagree with you about letting people risk their lives in caves. I do agree we need to recognize that different folks have different degrees of ability and not put undue restrictions on people more skilled than we are. I know people who are as safe walking a tight rope as I am on a sidewalk. That being said, in most of the places I cave, the caves are privately owned and the owners know each other. I generally believe that adults have the right to maim or kill themselves, especially if they have made an informed choice. However, I don't think that they have the right to get me other cavers locked out of caves because they scared all the landowners in the area by getting trapped, rescued, or dying in a cave.. Caving is often perceived as very hazardous by landowners and I think that it is incumbent upon the caving community to ensure that individuals cave safely in sensitive areas. An accident is what happens when one ignores the immutable laws of physics. - Ambrose Bierce Almost no cave accidents are truly accidents in the sense that they were acts of God; they are the result of errors in judgement. Gill wrote: Many cavers cave divers have done it successfully--often enough to prove that it is not entirely stupid. I must disagree with the above in general (not about solo cave diving in particular). Most safety practices are based on something like a one in a million chance of something serious going wrong. Our experience base is not that large, so we must use nonempirical methods to assess risk. There is a big difference between getting away with an unsafe practice for years and the activity actually being safe. Someone who has successfully played Russian roulette once every weekend for the last 20 years doesn't prove that Russian roulette isn't dangerous. It shows the player has been lucky, but they are still engaged in a high risk activity. Philip L. Moss philipm...@juno.com - Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com
[NMCAVER] Shetland Attack Pony
John, I've been reading with some interest the discussion on the Cave Digger's list about the supposedly great attributes of the Shetland Attack Pony survey instrument. Has one been used in Fort Stanton Cave? Lee ___ NMCAVER mailing list nmca...@caver.net http://caver.net/mailman/listinfo/nmcaver_caver.net
RE: [Texascavers] Florida cave diving fatality :
Thanks for posting this, Jerry. When reading stories like this, or reviewing the Accident Reports printed by the NSS every year, I try to relate the incidents to activities my family and I do or to talks I give to youth and beginning cavers. More than likely, you can point to something that occurred or didn't occur that can explain or, at least, would have helped minimize the risks. In the case below, I believe the key word is ALONE. Unfortunately, as he and Floyd Collins can attest to, they both broke Rule #1 of caving: One should never ever go caving alone. Cave Safely (and with others!), Mark From: jerryat...@aol.com [mailto:jerryat...@aol.com] Sent: Fri 3/14/2008 12:15 AM To: Texascavers@texascavers.com Subject: [Texascavers] Florida cave diving fatality : Swiss man dies while cave-diving By LISE FISHER Sun staff writer A man visiting the United States from Switzerland died Monday while cave-diving in Gilchrist County. The body of Mark Fyvie, 35, was found about 3,800 feet into a cave system at Ginnie Springs, the Gilchrist County Sheriff's Office reported. Fyvie had been alone when he started his dive at about noon Monday into the cave system at an opening called the Devil's Eye. Another diver began searching for Fyvie after he had failed to return by about 9 p.m., according to the Sheriff's Office. An hour and a half later, Fyvie's body was discovered. Fyvie was alone at the park but had made arrangements to go to dinner, said Investigator Patrick Cordasco.
RE: [Texascavers] Florida cave diving fatality :
While I'm really sorry for this man and his family, in what world to people still go caving, especially cave diving, alone? Especially someone who had been certified as a cave diver. On Fyvie's Web site, photos feature his travels and dives. He described diving as a hobby and said he had been diving since 1993 and teaching diving since 2000, according to the site. It's either a case of supreme misplaced confidence or extreme stupidity!Louise
[Texascavers] Oztotl
Hey cavers, I am looking for a vector or high res bitmap image of the oztotl for a project I'm doing. Do any of you have something I could use? Please contact me at grac...@gmail.com Thanks! Grace - Visit our website: http://texascavers.com To unsubscribe, e-mail: texascavers-unsubscr...@texascavers.com For additional commands, e-mail: texascavers-h...@texascavers.com
