This is the third episode in a potentially
like saga. In 1978 CUCC, tired of the
Pyrenees, took
by storm for their summer expedition. Episode Two occurred last year and readers may remember the report I did
for the B.B. To recap, about a dozen of
us spent between two and three weeks at at Alt Ausse, a small village about
80km east of
nearby Loser Plateau. Loser is an
extensive plain undulating between 1600 and 1700m above sea level. The almost virgin lapiaz of the plateau is reached
bye steeply ascending toll road from Alt Aussee and a brisk hour or so walk
from the top. Last year we found several
promising caves:
97 Schneewindschacht – too tight
at minus 265m.
82 – Brauninghohle – sumped (perched) at minus 220m.
106 – Eislufthohle – 150m deep and unfinished.
Plus various other 100m pots.
The greatest incentive to return in 1978 was the unfinished
state of Eislufthohle. Although not our
deepest find in 1977, the shafts in Eislufthohle were of such a size and the
draught in the cave so strong, that we felt that the pot ought to yield a few
more secrets yet, there being 750m of depth potential still left. And with this in mind, we found ourselves
back on Loser in July/August of this year.
The expedition members fell into three categories
a) ‘Team Eislufthohle’ – 5 strong team of SRT
merchants, including Yours Truly.
b) ‘Team Ladders’ – 3 man, 1 woman team spending
their first year in
c) ‘Team Geriatric’ – 4 cavers plus
‘hangers-on’. More interested in
canoeing and haute cuisine, bless ’em; but as events showed, they can still
deliver the goods when, needed. Team
Ladders, and later aided at depth by Team Geriatric, did a very creditable job
of 107 – Gemsehohle – essentially a large draughting rift, choking at about
minus 280m.
As for Team Eislufthohle, then I think our fortunes could
best be described as mixed. A slow rig
in down last year’s cave was due to the presence of a greater amount of snow
and ice. In the end, despite enormous
ice boulders falling. Plugged Shaft was
rigged with a 300 foot length of rope with 5 belays and 1 rope protector. This affords, some idea of the technical
difficulties of rigging this large, spiralling broken, shafts. In defence of SRT on a pitch like this one I
most point out that we had comparable difficulties rigging and de-rigging the
thing last year on ladders, and once rigged for ropes, then routine ascents and
descents are not especially slow.
From the chamber at the bottom, round a corner, leads to
Saved Shaft. This 13m shaft defeated the
ropes men and ladders ruled. At the
bottom is Boulder Chamber (no cave is a cave without one, you know!) A crawl through boulders and a traverse over
the first pitch of the Keg Series (no draught) leads to a free climb and &
30m pitch, split by a large ledge. From
the bottom a narrowish rift leads to a chamber with a heavy drip. This was as far as we got last year and we
called the chamber The Tap Room (What makes you think we drink beer?)
So off we were again at last, pioneering new ground. The slow progress made during the rig is so
far, and the prospect of a deep cave, now prompted an interesting change in
policy – overnight trips. The lapiaz on
the plateau is impossible to negotiate after night fall, and so allowing for a
margin of error, it seemed logical to walk to the cave in late afternoon, cave
overnight and after 2 minimum trips of 10 hours, emerge into the morning
light. Good idea, we thought.
Indeed, the first overnight trip did pay dividends. I had the privilege (or misfortune) to be
half of this two man effort. We timed
things a little too close for comfort on the walk in. We had to virtually run to the cave in
failing light and found the entrance about ten minutes before darkness trapped
us on the plateau.
Once underground things seemed pretty much the norm. We soon reached the Tap Room. We descended a rope assisted climb that had
been rigged previously and followed an obvious traverse line to a small
chamber, the water having sunk into the floor at the bottom of the climb. The chamber had a nice big boulder poised in
the roof and a large enticing slot in the floor. A 10m pitch was rigged off a couple of bolts
down to a micro-ledge where the rift narrowed. A bolt rebelay was placed and a
fine, ever enlarging, 35m pitch was descended to a large ledge and a stream,
inlet. With the shaft being the ‘best
pitch ‘O the pot’ so far, spirits were high and we started putting in a couple
more bolts. These held a traverse line
that protected a bold step over to a ledge on the opposite wall, and also the
rope for the next pitch. This was 8m to a pool in a dribbly, dribbly
streamway.
The stream trundled on down a trench in the floor and we
traversed along again in a high rift about three or four feet wide. We soon reached a fine rocking boulder
perched squarely on the traverse ledges. We quickly realised that we were to break into something big. A bend and upwards above a massive boulder
jam was an immense blackness, impenetrable to a good NiFe beam. Ahead and downwards lay a second impenetrable
blackness. We placed another couple of
bolts. This took some time as the bolter
had to be life lined and rock anchor teeth kept breaking off, and anchors kept
getting stuck, and
Our sleepy beer starved brains were in need of a
wake-up. And how! The next pitch turned out to be a magnificent
60m job. Remember
– forget it! This fine free hang down a
sculptured corner of a much larger shaft was truly staggering. It landed on a boulder ledge about 4m from
the shaft floor. We abseiled past this
to reach the floor proper.
Downwards, the stream that had slithered down one wall of
the shaft sank into a too low passage. Upwards led to a balcony, giving a fine view of the ‘Hall of the Greene
King’. This is circular in plan and
approximately 20m in diameter. The
height must be in the order of 100m. At
this impressive spot, having run out of rope, having made the deepest
feeling pretty pleased with ourselves, we turned back.
As we did do, we noted that the water level had risen and
the big pitch landing was now being liberally showered. This and certain difficulties for your
humble, narrator when the rope got pulled up on the big pitch and lowered back
down through the boulder ledge, meant a thorough soaking. Without wetsuits, things were now getting chilly
and prussiking was the only way to keep warm. This was only hampered by the fact that every time you stopped for a
rest you fell asleep! We eventually
surfaced after a twelve hour trip only to dine on plastic ham and biscuits in
the pouring rain. We then left the
plateau. It has been a long time since
I’d left a cave feeling this cold and tired.
But the trip was a success. In one trip we added 120m of depth and despite the fact that it took a
couple of days to recover, overnight trips seemed a good idea still. The next day saw two more of Team Ropes
going underground. They descended the 6m
balcony pitch to the floor of the hall of the Green King. Next came a very large passage with some
proportionally huge hanging death, and this they followed to a short
pitch. This was descended 5m and several
inlets and side passages noted. The way
on seemed less than obvious, but when the draught was detected (despite the
large cross section of the passage) the way lay on down to a pitch of 25m. All the next part of the cave seemed very old
and contained a lot of dry powdery mud. Lack of tackle, time, energy etc., did not permit a descent of this
pitch and so the intrepid heroes returned.
A couple of night later I was back on the scene again, this
time as part of a three man team. We
descended the 25m pitch which went round the corner and had to be rebelayed
twice. It landed in a passage carrying a
small stream, probably the same one that sank earlier. From here, the stream passed into a very
narrow vadose canyon and we traversed out. The passage, although very tight at stream level was three or more feet
wide at traverse level. The total
passage height was beyond my NiFe beam. The streamway was a classic meandering vadose type, typical of many a
After a rather committing free climb (at least at this sort
of depth!) the traverse continued. Generally all the traversing was done on good, if not very continuous
ledges. After what seemed like several
hundred feet we clambered over a big jammed boulder chaos and on to the head of
another pitch. A rope was belayed to a
bolt and a chock-stone and a descent was made down 12m of muddy slope. Up until now things had been just comfortably
muddy with a mainly dry, powdery variety. This pitch however, later named The Fiesta Run, was a very glutinous
affair. This fact was later thought to
be associated with a shaft noted entering the roof at this point. The traverse ledges beyond seemed to clear a
little. We reached more chock-stones
with a further pitch beyond. Stones
dropped directly below fell for about fifty feet. Those that were lobbed outwards a little fell
a great deal further. We were running
out of steam here and decided to turn back. To be honest, we were a little disappointed the horizontality
Eisluftohle was adopting. We had envisaged
pitch followed immediately by pitch, followed by pitch, going down very deep
and all very easy! Instead, we had a
steeply sloping streamway occasionally punctuated by short pitches. Tackle carrying on the traverses would not be
easy and the streamway could go on for miles. However, our depth we estimated, conservatively, at 350m. Well satisfied with this we left the cave
after another twelve hour trip.
With just over a week of the expedition left a couple more
pushing trips could be had and even greater depth attained. Just then however disaster struck. We were driving down the toll road after the
above described trip when one of the disadvantages of overnight trips was
hammered home rather brutally. With the
front passenger asleep and me in the back still wide awake the driver decided
to nod off at the wheel. To his credit
he could have chosen a section of road adjacent to a drop of several hundred
feet, but instead settled for one of a mere thirty. Without the slightest hint of last minute
braking or swerving, we missed a telegraph pole and a tree by inches, went
through a fence cum crash barrier and launched ourselves over the near vertical
drop. The next few seconds consisted of
one of lifes great eternal moments. With broken glass flying and twisted, blood bespattered, metal all
about, the car seemed to roll over and over before finally coming to rest,
wheels down, in a river at the bottom of the drop. The driver suffered cuts to face and hands,
slight concussion and a fractured sternum. The front seat passenger suffered a bad gash in the head and was
suspected of having a lightly fractured neck. The car was a write-off and your seemly invincible narrator, I’m almost
ashamed to say it, had not a scratch (well, only one small one!)
You’ll be pleased to know that both the injured people,
after spending a week in hospital, and with one getting flown home, both made
full recoveries.
Whilst being fortunate inasmuch as three of has had been
spared the greater karts area in the sky, we (that is Team Eislufthohle) were
now a little short of manpower. Over the
next week we realised de-rigging with so few people as were left could prove
awkward. We even started fondling
insurance policies, wondering whether we could avoid de-rigging
altogether! We abandoned the grade 4
survey that had been started, half finished! Photographic trips were scrapped left, right and centre and now having
given up overnight trips, one alpine start allowed the bottom couple of pitches
to be de-rigged. And then just what we
didnt need, the weather closed in. With
low cloud and rain, we couldnt even see the plateau for several agonising
days, let alone navigate across it. We
were forced to kick our heels at the camp site in Alt Ausee until, two days
before departure, back came the sunshine. With a magnificent effort form Team Geriatric, bless em again, and in
the company of your long suffering narrator, the rest of the cave was
cleared. Phew!
And so back to good old British beer. The return journey was noted only for a
delightfully comfortable night spent on a bench in a lay-by of a German
autobahn; also for being waved through
lady! As for Eislufthohle, then I
think, judging by the large passage size at the bottom, and the drop test’s
performed there, not to mention the draught (or The War!) then to squeeze 400m
out of the place would be a mere formality. Beyond that, who knows? The local
expert, Karl Gaisberger, to whom many thanks, inspected the mud on our gear
from the Fiesta Run area and confirmed that is was quite old stuff, totally
unlike that deposited a sump backing up. Therefore with a sump not being, imminent and with the passage seeming
to enlarge all the time, Eislufthohle, already one of Losers most significant
caves, should become one of
deepest. It has to be said however, that
the cave is no longer the easy series of shafts it was. It is now quite a serious, undertaking. Consequently for
keenness of some of us, would be pointless unless we could put up a good crack
team, numbering at least ten. Dont miss
next years exciting episode; same time, same channel!
Many thanks to the Ian Dear Memorial Fund, without whose
financial backing, I may have missed the magnificent abseil; into the Hall of
the Greene King an experience to make life really worth living
..at least until
the drive back!