CREWE ELIMBING AND

PorTHoune Els
DEC, 1963. No.3 :

latter. So that

SLETT:

filled super interesting Ne
as" inside quickly, 1@11 keep this introduction short

can 8
ews gleaned from other sources.

ani briefly give you sone interesting
N.0.C. is that Leck Pell is fully booked for weekends "till June 'f,.
and on Pen-y~

ookings left for the Rasegill systen,
half thi e Gingling

zy few b

er

tactics are sonet’

at "conboy

it worth mentioning here, that anyone wanti

hrough' the secretary

Pell or Cave booking should always "go

with any other Club activ

the date require’ does not cla.

make sure th:
ean be worse than gatting © Permit and nobody turning up, there!
a Permit which could
d puts further bookings in jeopardy.

is that the loose boulders at the enterance to

has happe:

ve gone to another Club, This

Other News from C.N.C.C.
ed in Derbyshire Caving Ass. News, has b

Ireby Fell Cavern, rep

in goed order, The lower exit to King Pot is naw blo

he iron ladder at Hensler's Master Cava in G.!

ne is in it's place.

jews from the Derbyshire Caving Ass. is that a fixed ladder is to be

lea in the i y-Pass route in Basegill, and Top Sink is now

led to notice

8 recently couldn't hav

Those of you who have done P.
ng naterial from the ‘Eldon dig' which is now backing up

a ai,
f all that rubbish)

streammay considerably. I should think (by the look
Jiggers have now passed Giants and oan't be far off Peak ¢:

C,Jones.

ty.

Redacted

19th October, 1983.

C.C.P.

Dear ian.

Putting pen to paper (at last) I would like to thank all the members
of C.c.P.C. for their support and help over the past few years. It made
my job as a Chairman that much easier. iy thanks to Ralph, a good Secretary,
an old one but a good one; Paul Holdcroft for taking o. the Stores, Training
ete.; John Shenton fo: continuing to do the Treasurer's job (thankless that
it is); Mick Edje for doing the raffle over the years; Tony Gamble for dragging
me caving when I didn't want to go - special thanks to Tony for letting me
carry his bag full of wet caving gear cut of UPT2K OLE and even letting me
hold his camera on one occasion} my special thanks to Tony Reynolds for
leurning to shut up when I was in the chair (I knew if I gave him enough bananas
he'd learn). Thanks Tony also for dragcing me up LOS? JOINS all those years age

I could go on, us all of you know, but over the years the names and facos
are too numerous. There are many happy memories, many many rough trips, but

I would not have changed it at all. Most of you know I hold the record for PB
all continue to improve that record.

Many many thanks to you all, especially for making me an honorary life member.

Yours sincerely,

AA DBabhe.

Comuents from lievsletter, July, 1983 - Cavers rapped for Six Hours.
I know how old Toy Reynolds is. Price negotiable - for information ring A. Walker.

A LIGHT-HEARTED TALE er NOROBY NWS THE

‘Oh what a day it's been’. I've been spat at, peed on, prodded and poked,
bashed and bumped and had a fairly hairy free-fall descent of a 20ft. pitch
before returning to the van and a blissful rest. I'm glad I'l] not be needed
this afternocn down Manknewer Farm 'cos I've just about had enough of guiding
this clumsy load of crettins about.

The weekend started quite pleasantly. having had a comfy ride from Salistury
with me mates, in a Tatonic Rattle Box and then from the Hunters for the journey
to Wells Hut, I had travelled in an excuse for a Nini with windows that opened
without being open and doors that did not open when opened.

Saturday, me and me mates got a lift in a posh new tranny van to Nine Barrows,
which marked the point where a good weekend turned bad.

I was man-handled out of the van by an inconsiderate, kinkily dressed yob and
jammed in this metal fixing in front of him. Then he did not seem surprised when,
after stuffing my guts full and dropping me in a puddle, I burped 'oos he just
sparked-off the sequence of events that I'll relate to you now.

After the lads had shifted a caravan or two, paid the farmer and locked ur, we
all plodded across the field for the first grovel of the day down the entrance of
Nine Barrows where I spied 2 nice pair vhile washing the muck off her hands in
the small pool. Quite an enjoyable trip to the chamber and, if I might te so
bold, expertly guided by yours tmly.

At the chamber, it was decided to continue dowm to the far dig. The youns
lady in the party led this section, guided ty her current new fangled box of
tricks, We followed down this tight tube where, unfortunately, my nose got

rabbed in the grot, so exit one cave guide, Again, I was man-handled to this
bloke behind, who immediately diagnosed my problem - congestion of the nasal

passage.

Instinctively, by the vindictive glint in this blokes eye, I knew what was
coming as he collected a mouth full of lukewarm spit. I laid back with
thoughts of England or Ingrid and waited as he puckered his lips. Then, I
tensed 2s he - but it never came ‘cos when I looked round, I could see chat
ny man had got the full broadside right in the eyeball. iveryone curled up
and laughed. I had a good. giggle too until that bloke started shooting spit
at me like a sub-machine gan, prodding my hooter, he vas, at the same time.

Suddenly, my airvay was clear, I could let off steam tut the fun, games and
fireworks did not end there as that bloke was locking down on my head - with
his ‘smelly’ still alight. It had to come, I could not atand it anymore, I
exploded with rage when his flame got too close to my head ani then the laugh
was all mine when he leapt back in surprise, banging his head on the ceiling
of the cave.

Anyway, I was reinstated back to my rightful position of cavers guide. We
proceeded out of the dig, back past the chamber but as I was approaching the
short scramble over the boulder ruckle, I started gettizg thirstier and thirtier,
Total dehydration scon followed. I was speedily removed from my stance, put

on the cold, damp cave floor and then subjected to the most degrading treatment
one could imagine, as because there was no water in that part of the cave,

he +.» well... used what natural resources were available and. ..er..
well . . . yer know. . . peed on my head!

I quickly showed a spark of life, although the thought of all that second
hand beer and stuff now inside me gave my stomach a wierd gassed-up feeling.
I led the way out without further incident and was overjoyed when a rest was
called near the entrance to Sludge Pit as HIS lamp was now suffering.

But ectasy was short-lived as the ladder was grabbed. We, me and my man,
entered the hole, leaving HIM to sort out his problem lamp.

Down into the pitch black depths we grovelled, finding the five foot drop to
the larger pessage leading onto the ladder anchor point (a pipe), then down
onto 2 small ledge where the ladder was uncoiled and secured to the pipe.

The ladder was then checked to see that it was hanging correctly and then,
while holding onto the pipe, he looked down to make sure it wasn't caught
before he started to climb down.

Next moment, I was emulating a falling brick as me and the helmet had
simulataneoulsy departed from him to find ourselves hurtling earthwards
together at an alarming pace. luckily the old helmet bore the brunt of the
fall but I could imagine the poor thing moaning softly as he lay beside me
assessing his braised state.

My man was in dead lumber now as he had either to wait at the top of the 20ft.
ch for his mates to come in or to find his own way back out without both
helmet and light.

I could hear him gro: long the passage after he hac scrambled to the top
of the ladder pitch. There followed a few moments of swearing and cursing 2s
he tried to find the final length of passage high on his right-hand side. In
time, the scunds faded into the distance as he slowly nade his way to

entrance.

I lay on that cold floor for somewhile after his decarture before hearing any
new sounds. My nose was bunged up again and had gone quite cold. Thrashing
about noises penetrated my thoughts as the sound of two people returning to
the ladder pitch (with only one light though?) travelled down to us two
miserable souls.

The lighted man descended the pitch, then shouted up to his mate (who, I later
recognised to be my man) to tell him that I had been found. He carried me slowly
down to the small pool to attend to my needs and by the time his mate had
arrived after descending the pitch in total darkness and tripping over

numerous boulders. I was feeling quite light-headed again.

1 had had encugh by this time, as had my man, sc ve both returned te the surface
where the sun was shining brightly, so I was no longer needed.

Everyone made their way tack to the van and I treathed a sigh of relief as the
contents of my guts emptied into a polythene bag.

My grandad never had days like this when he was working for Florence on the
wards. It certeinly is a hard lift for a carbide lamp so be nice to a smelly
friend today.

D.Staft.
FHOTOCRAPHIC COMPETITION 1983.

At the last meeting (November) it was agreed to hold a photographic
competition, to be judged at the annual ‘DO' at the Biddulph Arms in February.
The competition is open to all members and entries can be either prints or

slides. The nusber of entries per member is restricted to five, and these

ould be given to Ralph, together with an entrance fee of 50p,(or 10p per

e

nsry). This coupetition, we hope will become an annual event, but for this

first one prints or slides of any vintage will be accepted,

The prize for the winner will be an enlarged, framed print of the winning
-y, with the winner's name on, We are hoping to be allowed to hang the

t in the meeting room of the "Bleeding Wolf".

BLAST FROM THE PAST, or A WALK DOWN MENMORY LANE SWALLET.

When I had decided to do a ‘Blast from the Past' in this issue of

Ithoucht it would be interesting to take from an old log book

Giant's in the pre-blasted days, however while I was looking I found an old
Newspaper outting which will jog the memneries of the older cavers, and give
us younger, more hairy cavers an insight into what caving was like in the

ate post-war years.

NICLE, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 1959.

Potholers forced up after
| nine hours underground

1X" members of the Crewe anit! there ts an alr space)» only a
SOE RemET Pothole Clk (i. Susume mee ar fms dem iste
jeberon, B. Gridihe, M, Scout, Te fiamoes

: . ott and’ M. Aas

‘Aleruel) descended. Giant's qa Witt, SAMs suet tne? e wad

se Liisa, ou salitaay. “Whel expladaa’ was Heard The stared
The" ling “or"doyded gautgn wan earera wip, oud te waa en

‘the water.
‘A Your or Sveinch alr space finally which doused the flames,

appeared and Mf Potts dived through, was that his|
Gitely followed, by the, ‘other ve igenetaied $00,
Sitter’ shore halt to tae some photo- the the

graph he cavers” pressed. forward, “ftamal
Gown a Sifoot waterfall and along the from everywhere posable, causing an
Great Hitt Passoge fora quarter of 8 explosion “These explosions are quite
Git vac e ayphon was "reached—a common with this type of lamp, yet

‘cavers more than aay

:
i
i
i
4
3
3
EH
rg
iu
cf

Sine eave wt, tiie polat fapldy. "The leader. at, this, pola detded
dereioys into & mate and fe was wh oration,
ene ditonlty that the by-pass to this ‘cavers, without waterproat
Syphon was found. The by. feeling the etfcets of the

the fist sump (oo ball

2 er alata 5

A SAFER METHOD OF BELAYING OR LIFELINING - THE ITALIAN HITCH

The conventional waist belay ia really quite complicated and as practiced

by most cavers leaves much to be desired. The dravbacka to thie technique

or your own (lack of?) technique are beot illustrated by holding a fall

(real or practice).

If the waist belay ie applied correctly, it is etill quite difficult to
hold a fall when there is more than a emull amount of slack rope, especially
with a heavy person. Lowering off can be puinful, again particularly with @

heavy person. The main problem is that the lond comes directly on to the

‘The belayer could be pulled down the pitch, or pulled off
If the fall is held,the belay person

belay person.
his stance and let go of the rope.
is etill held into the system and is unable to move away if neceesary, without
fsirly elborate procedures.

To eum up, the waist belay is at its best when not uctually needed, vhen
it comes to actually holding a fall it is not very satisfactory, on the plus
side it can be used to give some assistance to the climbing caver.

‘The Italian Hitch has several advantages over the waist belay particularly
if tied directly to an anchor point.

a) easy to hold a fall even with @ very heavy person or with @ lot of elack
rope.
b) eusy to lower a person or lock off the rope and allow the belayer to

escape from the safety chain.
¢) No strain on the belayer.

d) Less to go wrong (ise. less to remember to do correctly) if tied to # good
anchor point with a large karabiner,

‘The main dicadvantages are (a) that it 16 not as easy to give a good pull,
but this can be done by 4 second person (belayed) in front of the Italian Hitch.
b) The rope becomes twisted, but this can be minimised by user ckill.

The Italian Hitch is unsuitable for 3 strand, stiff, or polypropylene ropes
~ but a Fig of 8 descender can be substituted for the Italian Hitch in these

cases and used in « similar fashion,
ITALIAN HITCH FOR BELAYING OR EMERGENCY ANSELLING

Form like a pair of glueses with one rope behind and one in front of

Put the loops together into u LAKGE kurubiner to complete the

the horizo

Itulian itch.
The knot is very easy to recognise: it ewings
over the karabiner and reverses itself if the
tt — rope is pulled alternately at one end then the
This reversal is a necessary function

other.
of the knot, so 4 large karabiner is essential.

The knot works by friction of rope running over moving rope and
‘The karabiner is

around the karabiner, it ia very effective in holding falle.

eally fastened to a very good anchor point at shoulder level, or less satisfactorily

ened to the harness providing you are well belayed.

? anese. ‘The rope 416 "fed" around the
karabiner whether paying out or
taking in. If there is a fall
the knot automatically ascumes the

e correct position, and it is easy

The Itulian Hitch can be locked off with a

tch (tuke care not to trap fingers) and released
under loud.

A second half hiteh can be added for security.

The Italian Hitch can be

used as an improvised Abseiling is

Original Jammer. Start with the probably best
Ttulian knot in the "taking in"

Hiten
Zarabiner position and insert an emergency use

restricted to

extra karabiner to prevent only, because

the knot reversing. Where

to put the extra karubiner? —

Remember the loaded rope Severely
Loaded goes over two karabinere. kinked,
Rope

Insert the extra one
behind the Italian hitch
karabiner.

The Itulian hitch i¢ unsuitable for 3-Strand, stiff or polypropylene ropeo. FT
COMMUNICATIONS FOR EXPEDITIONS PART $4

Having read the ridiculous atteapt at underground to surface conmmication

by the author of "Planning a successful Expedition to Axe Hole! (see previous

Newsletter) using carrier pidgeons fitted with Oldhams, I decided that an

intellectual approach was all that was required, so despite a certain degree
of brain damage due to inaiequate diets during and inmediately following the
years, the "Think Tank! (often rechristened the 'Stink Tank' by Jealous
rivals usually found amongst the lower ranks) comprising of our revered and

elderly statesman was commissioned to solve the problem, Fortunately the
brain drain had not depleted their numbers to any appreciable extent, dut
perforsanee had noticeably deteriorated with the arrival of a multitude of

40th, birthdays ( celobratecseveral times by somett ) and with the falling

of hair. No doubt this decreased hair activity has been caused by inaiaqate
blood supply to the brain, due to hardening of the arteries as a result of
aleohol poisoning and to a reduced inner brain tenperature caused byinadequate
insulation between sealp and atmosphere, Certain younger members have been
known to capitalise on this particular handicap and a black market in head
protection began to flourish on a particular foreign expedition. Personally
at this point I would like to register my objections to this particular fora

of exploitation of the less able.

ever, back to the main point of this article, communications, The Oldiu
idea was obviously doomed to failure due to the weight of the battery and the

ty in getting the correct size of helmet, (Caving Supplies were

ned but Phil Brown was doubtful of the commercial value of stocking

8 size.) The prototype system involved equipping the birds with

nd "Jones Lighting Syston minus the “Willy warmer " as this was
itt unnecessary, since not even male pidgeons are equipped with the regired
ge.(These lasps can usually be bought cheeply from the designer or

even exchanged for a small quantity of Ruddles County.) Unfortunately, due

ng difficulties the "willy warner" wire coil had to remain in place,
causing the birds difficulties on starless nights since the coil produced a
etic field cancelling out the Earth's magnetic field, thus making

navigation impossible.

ven on clear nights or sunny days when pidgeons revert
to nomoal techniques (for pidgeons that is) the peaked helmets caused further
5 by shading the bird's eyes and when the peak was renoved the bright
light seened to confuse the birds, who seemed to find difficulty in disting-
ng artificial light fron sunlight or starlight, Pidgeons weren't the

proble:

A nuaber of other animals with homing instincts were considered, buteach
tine the age old problem of lighting reared it's ugly head. The solution
finally came during the wonthly commitee meeting, held on the geriatric ward,

BATS 1

Unfortunately British Bats are protected by law, so it became necessery
to import foreign specinens fron a dubious source in Transylvania. These
arrived in an o@d-shaped wooden container, which has already proved useful
as a container for carrying bulky equipment and doubling up as a confortable
"bivyy' should the need arise. I"m sure that the more intelligent amongst
you will already have spotted the flaw --- Bats don't “Home” , This was
overcone by an extensive course of conditioning, (refered to as brain-washing
ty some authers) The idea was to persuade the bats to return to the desired
roost each time they were released. The wooden box was made more attractive
by the addition of a red velvet lining, and a number of experiments proved
the ideal food to be a mixture of pig-pudding and liquified raw liver.
Despite repeated atteapts to feed the animals on proprietory bat food con-
sisting of bed bugs (SWCC) and cockroaches (OCC) they seemed disinterested
in anything but the evil-looking concoction supplied by the loosl abbatoir.
The conditioning worked well, it was only necessary to release the bats un
derground.(They seened to work best after dusk, becoming inoperative round
about dawn, which fortunately coincides with one of the ‘dry periods nant-
doned in the previous article. With the attached massage the bat will then
fly to the open wooden container, placed close to the cave enterance,

equicped with an adequate supply of pig-pudding ete.
ysteu has not been without it's teething problems and one of these
seems to be the quality of operator, So far all those involved have disapp-
eared without trace during their first mission, no doubt the attrection of

the bright Lights of Buxton have proved too strong, but at least the bat
population appears to be increasing despite assurances thet all those supplied

had been neutered.No doubt these minor problems will be solved before the

next issue. J.R.Johnson.

FOR SALE
ideal furry pet for Xmas, Ring CCPC ofo Sein?
Quantity of small caving helmets, Apply.

Th

One "Jones Lighting System Name and address supplied.
WANTED

Experienced bat operators, Ring N'Castle 666.
Lost

Forty seven experienced cavers. Contec

** Ba

decided to use the 'old english’ spelling of PIGEON, hence PIDGBON.

tor's note, Due to great age of the auther of the above article, it was
(Guaranteed to oure sleeplessness.)

SUN, 18th. DEC, St, Cuthbertts
SUN, 8th. JAN. Marbvle Steps. Ireby Fell.
WON, 9th. JAN. CCPC. Agi
SUN. 29th. JAN. Swinsto, Simpson's et:
SAT. 14th, PER. Agen Allwedi, (Provisional date only.)
CCPC. Annual 'do' Biddulph Ams.

Rescue Practice.
Miek Fot, Diccan, Alun etc.

SUN. 11th. MAR. Lancaster Hole,

SUN. 25th. MAR. Juniper Gulf, Long Churn.

SAT. 7th. APR. Youth Course. Ilan.

SUN, 15th, APR, Meregill, Black Shiver, Tatham Wife.
SUN, 29th. APR. Grange Rig to Xmas.

SUN. 6th, WAY, GG etc.

SUN 10th Dow - Providence.

Sat. SUN. 14/15th JULY. Dan-yr-Ogof. (Provisional date only)

John Gillett is going to S.Wales on Sat. 17th Deo. and anyone wanting to do
OFD. 1 - 2. should contact John,

On the 29th. Feb. 1984, Mr. Jerrp Woolridge, F.R.P.S. is giving talk to the
Stoke-on-Trent Camera Club entitled “Wonderful World of Caves", Described as
a Caving show including, equipment, prints, slides and a hologram, The venue
is, Tawnay House, Webberley Lane, Longton, None members can attend.

AOMENDMENTS TO MEMBERS LIST.

Zig Wesacek , Hoze Tel. Redacted

Bottle, Peak Cavern, Reward, Apply.
WANTED

Experienced (middle aged ) leader for attempt on Moss Chamber, Experience in
Nursery/school/playgroup an advantage. Apply.

10,