TRIP REPORT: Webster Cave System 09/15/2007

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TRIP REPORT: Webster Cave System 09/15/2007

Postby Darklight » Sep 17, 2007 9:05 pm

I decided I'd start the trip reports for this excursion. I'm hoping
that maybe Troutman or Ryan might give one, too, from their perspective.

Overall, I think it was a very productive trip, though things did not
turn out the way we all had hoped. Webster, she, did not want to give up
very many of her secrets this day. We started massing at the Field House
on Friday evening. I arrived, followed shortly by Pat Brian (Troutman),
around 6PM. A team of biologists from UofL (Dr. Pearson, Andy Mudd, and
another who's name escapes me) were in the cave already doing a follow
up on previous blind fish counts. Pat Mudd (Muddman) arrived soon
thereafter wrapped in his new CAV (cave assault vehicle). Very nice Vue,
P. We had pizza and beer for dinner, and soon the bio team joined us as
we perused the new quads Andrea had been working on (I printed them out
24x36 inches--very nice job Andrea!). I don't know how many fish the
team from UofL counted, but they did report very cloudy water
conditions. I guess the recent rains may have caused this. They left
for Louisville that night, but Muddman talked Andy into staying for the
next days activities.

Though I can't speak for the rest of the Field House crew, I had a
pretty nice nights sleep for a change. It was cool and quiet inside and
we all got up at about 6AM for a quick trip into town for breakfast.
The place we settled on had two things going for it, and neither one was
the food. Back at the House and joined by Jeff Gillette and Ryan Stidahm
(Mark Phillips had to bow out for todays trip) we got down to business.
As we had enough for a well stocked survey team, Jeff decided to do some
work instead of caving, but let us borrow his kayak. So, with Ryan's
brand new boat, all five of us had lake transportation.

We staggered into the cave about 8AM, and most of us were on the water
and headed for the sump by about 0830AM. We made it to the sump face by
about 0930AM. The water level was about 12.5", slightly higher than my
last trip through. There was not as much air issuing out of the low
airspace, owing perhaps to the equalized temperatures, but it was still
blowing. One of my goals today was to try and conduct an air trace
study in Holmes Hall, but this would depend on weather air was still
being forced up the Corkscrew as it had been in previous weeks.

At about 1000AM we had made it to the Corkscrew. I broke a 25 year
tradition this day by removing half of my wet suit before venturing up.
Last time I was up stairs, I became so winded, to the point of
hyperventilating, because of the heat and constriction of my wet suit
top. I painstakingly took it off for this trip. What a pain that was!
Troutman did the same, as he had a tough time getting through the
breakdown crawl into Holmes Hall with it on last time. I'll let him talk
about all that if he wishes.

After filtering staggered through the breakdown crawl, we headed down
Western Holmes Hall to the end of the previous survey. A September 2
survey team had surveyed over 1000 feet of this passage, from UW11 to
UW32. We don't know much about what they did as no trip report had been
filled (guys?). We found Pat nearly asleep at the top of the steep climb
up to UW12. This is the section that stopped us on the initial survey.
Now, a hand line has been installed. Once the team assembled, we headed
deeper in (or is it deeper out?).

I think this section of Webster is of the best the cave has to offer.
Not highly decorated mind you, through there are some nice displays of
translucent-white soda straws, but fascinating nonetheless. The passage
becomes canyonous in places, nearly 20 feet high, with a beautiful
bedding plane phreatic tube at the top. Near the end of the survey, two
large chambers are encountered, littered with breakdown. The end of this
first chamber is UW32. This is where our survey began.

UW32 drops down into a lower chamber, not quite as large as the one
above, but cluttered with massive blocks of breakdown. Here the lead
goes forth, dropping further with mud sloped floors and drains. I
noticed an interesting geologic feature here in the walls. There is a
very distinct layer of rock that has eroded quite differently than the
layers above and below. Not sure what this is. Perhaps a GQ map will
help, but I saw it throughout this section and it appears to be the
layer the bedding plane passage is developed in.

At the far end of this series, the passage becomes more proportional,
then drops to a nasty belly crawl. Here the survey got tough, and we
realized that five people were not going to fit in this 1 foot high 3
foot wide tube. Muddman went on ahead to scout stations, while Ryan and
I did the compass and tape. We relayed data back to Andy and then to
Troutman who was keeping book. It all worked out well. The constant
flow of air deeper in lulled us on. Though requiring no shovel work, it
was a rough survey. Finally, the crawl ended in another section of
moderately sized trunk. Unfortunately, Muddman reported that he could
find no way on past an impenetrable drain. And was it muddy! He got
into this mud and found it was waist deep. I think he had a time getting
back out of it!

We surveyed into the trunk, named the Big Plug, to its terminal end.
All the air, which we had hoped would lead us over and back into Parks
Avenue, disappeared under a nasty ledge with a scant few inches of
airspace above the liquid-mud floor. It does not look good. Western
Holmes Hall is dead. Before leaving, I conducted my air current test. We
detonated a tracing device at the head of the tight crawl, then
retreated back down Western Holmes Hall to check for additional leads.
Our plan was to see if we could detect any of the smoke out in Parks
Avenue on the way out.

Finding no penetrable leads on the way out (we did find a few nice
drains but none could be entered even by Ryan) we fell back to UW 11 and
started a new survey of a crawl below the Junction. This lead, I am
confident, connects with the western terminus of Upper East Bore. It is
only about 60 feet from the crawl below the Junction. We surveyed
probably 50 feet to a tight impasse. It would need to be dug, and the
plot has yet to be generated, but I am sure we are even closer now.
Won't help any unfortunately, but a connection would be nice anyway.
After finishing up, we headed for the surface. I'll leave the details of
the survey data to Troutman and his report.

All of us made our way from upstairs and down the sloppy Corkscrew. The
only thing worse than taking a wet suit off in a cave is having to put
it back on! I got myself all dolled up once again, and headed for the
Sump. Andy was still looking for a huge blind fish he'd spied in the
East Bore Sump passage that had eluded him earlier, while the rest
climbed down.

I made it to the Sump alone, donned my hood, and traversed. When I got
out of the low air and back into the stooped headed towards the lunch
rock, something strange caught my eye. On ahead of me I saw a blue haze
hanging in the passage. At first I thought it was my breath blown out
ahead of me. But as I passed that last muddy crawl before the sump (the
one on the right as you are going into the cave) I smelled smoke and saw
it billowing from within. My smoke test had uncovered the much sought
after sump bypass! I haven't had much time to think about all this, but
air from the end of Western Holmes Hall is finding its way out this
small lead. Amazingly, the distance between these two points is over 600
feet. I don't know if this is a drain lead, or if the much larger Holmes
passage does in fact head over to Parks like I suspect; there is a
tantalizing correlation developing between the Big Plug and Boot to the
Head. Nevertheless, this validates my airflow theory and proved there is
some sort of connection between Parks Avenue and the upper sections of
the cave. I doubt we'll ever be able to make a physical connection
judging by what we saw today, but something is going on...

On the way out we were not able to detect the odor of smoke coming from
any other leads, such as the Air Vent, but this was inconclusive.
Perhaps we need to take a closer look/dig at Boot to the Head, or
earnestly try and get into the numerous upper level leads that one can
"see" along Parks Avenue. Could be there is still a way back up into
Holmes Hall. And that's not to say similar upper level over-routes
don't exist in Mulu.

Speaking of Mulu, as Holmes Hall is pretty much finished except for
small side leads off Eastern Holmes (and breakdown pushing), it's time
to start thinking about the Mulu survey.

We all made it out of the cave about ten hours later to a beautiful
sunny evening.

Some additional thoughts. We need to seriously consider flagging some
section of Holmes Hall to avoid any additional damage due to foot
traffic. Especially the section near the junction with Upper East Bore.
I plan on doing a photo trip up there soon (hopefully this season) and
we can flag it then. Anyone wanna go do some cave imagery?

For the cartographers, kind of a video sketch.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvLWmDK8-m0



CG
C.G. Anderson
http://www.darklightimagery.net
http://www.pbase.com/darklightimagery
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/WCCSG/

"I've done things God should have questioned, but I don't care".
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Postby wyandottecaver » Sep 18, 2007 7:03 pm

ahhh the joys of living vicariously through others! I will have to give bill a hard time for going fishing without me!
I'm not scared of the dark, it's the things IN the dark that make me nervous. :)
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