From a participant in the British cave-diving expedion to Huautla in
Mexico:
I was with the advance team who were mainly tasked to get the cave
rigged to the bottom. We rigged down to the 620 depot and then set
up and moved into camp 3 for four days. We also had Jason
Mallinson, the lead diver with us just itching to get in the sump.
On the seventh day (from the start of the expedition) Jason and his
gear arrived at the sump and he dived. He is a top diver and
relined sumps 1&2 in a single dive lasting 1.5hours, his first
dive. Since then the rest of the team have moved the other four
divers gear to the sump in preparation for a week long camp beyond
sump 2. There are five divers going through both to push sump 9 and
to climb the Rio Inglesi falls. I think they went through on monday
and tuesday this week gone, so expect to hear some news by next
wednesday.
The one thing that shocked me, in an otherwise fantastic cave, was
all the trash and gear abandoned by the '94 team. At the sump was
the remains of the dive platforms, much of which was washed into the
sump. There were composite cylinders with the pillar valves removed
and now full of silt, blatant abandonment. Nalgene bottles of
batteries which had imploded due to flood pressure and now leaking
acid. At Camp 3 there were around 30 nalgenes with all sorts of
crap in them from minging sleeping bags to leaching Kodachrome
film. There was also the rusting remains of the hydo generator, a
huge cable drum of untouched fibre optic cable and rusting gas
cans. Also, of course, were the rounds of rope, often knackered,
piled high at pitch heads. We started pulling some of it out but
don't know if the derig team will be strong enough to do it all.
Until this trip to Mexico I had been impressed with the conservation
ethics of the Americans who caved in Mexico, 'take nothing but
photographs, leave nothing but footprints', now needs a little
rephrasing!
--Mixon
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Don't be led astray into the paths of virtue.
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