Great trip. Congrats to team flaco. On Sat, Jun 4, 2022, 9:14 PM Marvin Miller <cave0mil...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Kelsey Dennis and Mio Kitano joined me today to finish up a little bit of > muddy survey and to push leads in Dinosaur Cave. Dinosaur Cave is a 642 > meter-long cave in Comal County. The survey went about 2 meters down a hole > that had been too tight for the previous survey team. Both Kelsey and Mio > have slight figures ideal for these kinds of leads. The next survey shot > was 3 meters through a muddy trough into a small terminal room with some > drops falling from the ceiling. The drops had been a trickle when I had > first seen this room last year. The room isn't really terminal because > there is a slot in the floor that could be enlarged to get down to the next > little space 2 meters below but then there is another, tighter > constriction. There is no airflow so this is not a high priority lead. > > We struggled out of these muddy confines and headed back towards the > entrance till we stopped at a hole that dropped down in the middle of the > passage. This hole leads to a bit of walking passage in the breakdown that > makes up the floor and fills the lower part of the main passage. 10 meters > along the breakdown passage a small hole in the floor drops down into a > small room, the floor of which slopes further down to the opening of a > small, horizontal tube in bedrock. The tube is straight and clean-washed > and can be seen to extend at least 5 meters. The tube is intimidating (to > me, at least) because it looks barely larger than body-sized. Once you get > into it there is actually a little more space than that, and only one spot > where you are scraping floor and ceiling. At about the 5-meter mark you > encounter a cross-joint which provides some relief, and immediately after > that the floor drops down into a fissure and then the passage widens, opens > up to the right, and drops over a ledge into a small room. Bennett Lee > pushed this passage and discovered this room. A small trickle of water > falls from a too-small tube in one wall. At floor level a duck under the > ceiling leads to a short 5-meter section of passage, at the end of which > was today's objective. At that point the floor trends slightly down and the > ceiling comes down to within 20 cm of the floor, which is clean-washed from > that point. I had tried to cram myself into this lead when Bennett, Greg > Mosier, and I surveyed the preceding passage but it was a no-go. I couldn't > even get far enough to see around the near corner. Kelsey is a skinny girl > and had no problem with it. There is a pool in the floor just after it gets > tight so she had to consider whether she wanted to get wet, but in the end > she committed to it and soon disappeared around the corner. She kept a > running commentary and informed us that just ahead it was going to open up > to walking - or at least stoop-walking height. She was soon there and > continued, sometimes in several cm of water. There was another short > constriction to be passed and then the passage dimensions resumed. She had > to stop, probably about 20 to 25 meters along, due to a boulder that was > filling the passage. She could see the passage continuing past the boulder. > Her assessment was that it could probably be broken up with a sledge or > rolled out of the way. There is good airflow coming out of this passage, > really the only airflow we have seen anywhere in Dinosaur Cave. > > When Kelsey came back out, excited by her discovery, we set to work on the > other passage that exits here, stacked almost right on top of the water > crawl below. The problem with this one was that it was almost filled with a > 2 meter-long, 1 meter-wide slab of breakdown. It wasn't very thick so we > had some hope that we could break it up somehow. We took turns beating on > the near end, and some bits broke off easily, but then it got hard. I > decided it was time to employ the hammer drill and straws. I had barely > drilled 4 cm into the rock when my bit got stuck and would not move. The > only way to rescue it was to beat on the rock some more. I started in on > that and suddenly the rock broke across its width about half-a-meter back. > This large chunk fell to the ground in front of the lower passage, and the > remainder of the slab started to slide down what must have been a slight > slope towards us! Fortunately, it stopped moving after 10 or 15 cm. We then > had a discussion that if a survey team was going to come back and attack > the lower passage, the slab would first need to be eliminated. We continued > pounding on it - with some care to have an escape route - and eventually > were able to lever it and chock it in a more stable situation. What all of > that ended up doing for us was open up space over the top of the slab to > crawl across and see what lay beyond. A quick look showed that the passage > took a sharp right turn and followed the trend of the lower passage. Mio > ventured in and I noticed that I could see a reflection of her light on the > pool in the lower passage. There were holes in the floor. In fact, she > remarked that the floor was not stable and there was a danger of falling > through. Several rocks were dislodged and fell into the lower passage. > About 4 meters in, the passage was blocked by flowstone, but she could see > around it into a larger space. It is almost certainly the same passage that > Kelsey traversed. This is a possible bypass to the lower level > constriction. > > The new discovery is at the lowest point of the cave and the air was not > very good. We will wait until winter to organize further survey trips. We > left the cave happy, muddy, and tired. > > Marvin Miller > _______________________________________________ > Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com > Texascavers@texascavers.com | Archives: > http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ > http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers >
_______________________________________________ Texascavers mailing list | http://texascavers.com Texascavers@texascavers.com | Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/texascavers@texascavers.com/ http://lists.texascavers.com/listinfo/texascavers
