TRIP REPORT: Webster Cave System (KY, US) 2006 05/26-05/29

[worldnaut]

This trip report was previously posted on the WCCSG site
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Pictures and Video links in full report at:
http://home.comcast.net/~worldnaut/27_May_2006.htm

Webster Cave Expedition Report
Location: Webster Cave, Breckinridge County, Kentucky
Time: 08:00 AM EDT / 07:00 AM CDT
Purpose: Begin Survey in Marathon Crawl

On Friday afternoon, I got a call from Chris Anderson informing me
that the Webster area had received about 8 inches of rain in the 24-
hour period between Wednesday and Thursday evenings. He thought there
was a good possibility that the cave would be in flood and that we
would not be able to get in the cave Saturday morning. I was already
busy getting things together for the weekend, but after this report,
I hurried up so I could get to the cave before dark and report on the
conditions. I got to the cave about an hour before dark to open up
the field house and check the cave. I pulled up next to Mr. Parks'
driveway since he was outside when I drove up. He said that the main
entrance had been overflowing that morning. As soon as I got out of
the car I could hear the roar from the spring entrance. After getting
the key for the field house, I grabbed my camera, tripod and cell
phone and split for the spring entrance. The sight was impressive.
That Webster Cave is wild, raw and untamed was on full display, which
also meant that our chances of getting to Marathon Crawl in the
morning were remote at best. Standing on the ledge above the
resurgence I called Chris on the cell phone and he could tell from
the roar that we needed to alert the members planning on driving long
distances in the morning that our first trip would likely not happen
on Saturday. After we settled that that was likely how things would
pan out, I said goodbye to Chris and spent a few minutes trying to
shoot some pictures and video in the fading daylight. As you can see,
Webster is at times a Beauty, and at others, a Beast. The water at
the very entrance is 6 feet deep in these shots.

The next morning, Jeff Gillette and Pat Mudd showed up at the field
house about 15 minutes early followed closely by Chris. Steve O'Nan
bet that we'd be flooded out and saved his gas money for a more
promising time. I showed them the DVD we'd made to give to the
landowners we came in contact with during the weekend. After that we
went down to the Spring entrance to see how things looked. They had
calmed down considerably from the scene 12 hours earlier but still
Chris thought there was little hope of being successful in the cave
this day. Jeff went in the main entrance just to see if he could even
get to Epitome Lake at this stage. When he emerged with his report of
the conditions at the foot of Webster Avenue we knew we had lost
Marathon Crawl for the day. Although Webster Avenue would be sumped
farther in, Jeff and Pat wanted to go back in to see just how
formidable the conditions looked with the cave in this stage of
flood. Chris and I decided that the best use of our time was to work
on the field house. We started to worry just a bit about Jeff and Pat
since they were gone so long and speculated that they had been able
to get past the low spots and kayaked all the way to the end of
Webster Avenue to see the giant vortex the lower river passage would
be exhibiting under these conditions. Eventually they showed back up
and reported that in fact, Webster Avenue was sumped and that calling
the conditions inhospitable was being gracious. We all pitched in on
the field house and by the time Jeff and Chris left for the evening,
the only thing we really lacked was hot showers. (Freezing weather is
not kind to un-drained plumbing). Pat and I enjoyed our new digs at
the field house and caught up on each other's caving histories and
adventures before discovering Webster Cave.

Sunday Morning was sort of a repeat of Saturday except that Ben
Hutchins made it in from Washington DC to join us. After checking the
Spring entrance again, we decided that although we thought we could
actually get to Marathon Crawl, the energy required to do so was
going to frustrate our ability to accomplish much once we did so.
Accordingly, we decided the best second plan was to go and attack
from the other side in Briar Hole. Ben, Chris and I did that while
Pat and Jeff once again entered the Main entrance of the cave to see
if they could get through now. When we three arrived at VanLahr Sink,
we were dumbfounded by the sight. It looked like it had been hit by a
tsunami. You can see from this picture that 72 hours earlier, the
water had been at least 20 feet over the entrance to Briar Hole and
VanLahr Sink. It was amazing. We plowed into Briar Hole after re-
shooting some surface survey that had some problems lingering from
the prior visit and began making our way toward the water filled
belly crawl that Chris says is the most intimidating in the entire
system. Our plan was to survey to the start of the crawl, thinking
that the crawl needs to wait for the driest of conditions before we
try and survey it. I was setting point until we came to the tight
canyon where I stopped on the last trip. I had no problem getting
through the first one but the second pinch gave me problems with my
length. Just like the first tight spot, the second was catching my
right kneecap in an orientation that combined with the gravity vector
gave me pause about pushing on through. It was downhill and I believe
I could have gotten in but wasn't so sure how easily I could reverse
the process against gravity and the passage dimensions. After about 5
minutes of shifting around, I came out to let Ben and Chris go in
front. Jeff and Pat had caught up with us by then and upon hearing
that I couldn't get through, Jeff and Pat left to go investigate
Basham Sink on the other side of KY 333 since Jeff is bigger than I
am. Chris and Ben worked on surveying over the tight spots (video got
chopped somehow at YouTube) in one shot to avoid all the twists and
turns and after they were out of the way, I started working it again.
After a while I decided that I had tried enough for the day and
decided I'd wait till next time for another try. It's not far beyond
this point (which Chris named PeeBee's Dismay) that the water crawl
(Impending Death) begins. I videoed Chris coming back out of the
tight spots and reviewing them for this report gives me fresh
optimism that I can get through the second, now realizing that it's
no deeper than it is. After we finished that we crawled back out,
munched some snacks and then headed back to the cars.

Just as we got back to the cars and unloaded our stuff we saw Jeff
and Pat walking up KY 333 returning from Basham Sink. We walked out
to meet them and they said that it didn't go. I didn't catch
everything they said because we decided to walk back over to it and
look at it again. Basham sink is a medium size sinkhole filled with
large breakdown. I went down one hole and Chris went down another.
Ben had already changed so he stayed up and I had dumped my helmet so
I was without a light. My hole pinched out but Chris wiggled through
a spot in a cavity just next to mine and down another hole. His sound
kept getting farther and farther away till I couldn't hear him
anymore. When I finally heard him coming back up, the way I heard him
carrying on, I couldn't tell if he was scared or excited. My first
thought was that a large piece of breakdown had shifted and scared
the `you know what' out of him. Turns out that wasn't it at all. When
he got out he was pretty excited. He was convinced that he had
actually just been down in Bundy Canyon. Only Pat Mudd still had all
his gear with him so they both went back down and I followed them as
far as the light would allow so I would know how to get in next time.
At one point I heard them chunk a good size rock and actually felt it
crashing down to the lower levels. They said getting that rock out of
the way made the way down much easier. When Chris finally came back
out we were dying to hear if they had made it to Webster Avenue. He
said he hadn't seen Pat Mudd in an hour and I told him they hadn't
been gone an hour. Pat had had his wet suit on and had disappeared
down a water filled crawl that Chris didn't want to tackle with just
his caveralls. Chris was now not so sure it was Bundy Canyon they had
penetrated but was starting to think it might have been part of a
side passage of Webster Avenue originating in the Schrodinger's Cat
region. Not long thereafter Pat reemerged and we walked back to the
cars. Pat had really been through the slop.

We decided the next objective would be finishing the survey in Melody
Hill Cave. This started about an hour long comedy of events
demonstrating why we don't get paid to do this. Eventually Ben, Jeff
and myself found ourselves in Melody Hill cave with enough equipment
to actually do survey in what was supposed to be dry cave. None of us
had on wetsuits and Melody was anything but dry. I didn't even have
on gloves and next thing you know we're crawling through foot deep
water in two foot high passage. I was concerned that we were ill
equipped but after clearing this set of pooled rimstone dams we got
into some walking passage and made our way about 600 feet into the
cave. At about this point the walking ends and we started surveying
in comfortable crawling passage with a fairly dry mud floor. We
didn't survey for very long (maybe 100 feet) before we came to a spot
where the passage split. None of us could get through on the left and
only Ben could get through on the right. The floor was just mud and
could easily be dug but we didn't have any shovels. It was here that
we set a permanent station and although we entered the cave intending
to finish the Melody Hill survey, about another 500 feet remains.

Back at the field house, I burned some DVD's for Ben and Jeff and
then Mr. Parks came up and Bush Hogged the yard. Jeff left and I
settled in for some much needed sleep. Then next morning I went down
to the Spring entrance to shoot the GPS location for GPS12 then
called it a weekend. All in all we had a great weekend except that we
didn't get to have any fun in the Big Cave. If anyone knows where we
can snag some bunk beds for the field house that would be a welcome
addition as well as some more old lawn chairs for the front porch.
Other than that, as soon as we get the water leaks fixed and can fire
up the hot showers we will be Cadillac'in at the field house. Last
word I heard, we have 3 new Webster first timers coming to the cave
for a survey trip on June 10th.

______________
Pat Brian #29135

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