RIDERS ON THE STORM FEB 2008

22.02.2008
Divers: Tom Malone, Artur Conrad

Last Saturday, taking advantage of the fact that most of you were in Belfast so the caves were not so crowded Tom and me we paid the visit to Polldeelin Spring. It's impressive rising of Coole River and one of the biggest risings in Ireland . It's a part of massive underground conduit draining West Lowlands. While on the surface the river is known under many names - Gort, Coole, Beagh, Owendalulleegh, Cannahowna... With underwater cave passages up to 10m by 20m in diameter it's one of the most important karst areas in Europe.
We've never been there before and we've based on information and rough sketch from Caves of County Clare and South Galway. General site has been located without any problems behind Kiltartan church. Water level was high and river flood plain was substantially flooded. Bases of all trees in the area were flooded as well so it was quite tricky to use them as the points of reference in finding the underwater cave entrance. There was no line from the entrance to the junction with Boleyneendorrish River 30m in as indicated in the book. It took us over 20min to reline this section with 5mm PE white line. Visibility not exceeding 1m, quite a flow esp. near the entrance, after initial boulder slope floor very silted/covered with mud banks. We didn't have silt screws with us so once mud banks started we were forced to belay on sharp projections near the roof (which we probably correct on the next visit as it will damage line or snoopy loop quickly). Finding way was very slow and confusing ? following left hand side wall we often found ourselves wedged in deep under cuttings, passage changes direction and depth, once I even found myself travelling with the flow (!) so I checked compass but it was showing south?not very reassuring.. Shocked  Finally we started laying 3mm PE as there was still no sign of any line. After around 60-70m in we encounter broken line (3mm?) loose toward the entrance and fixed by belays further into the cave. We kept on with our line going then parallel to the old one until Tom reached his thirds due to under pumped twinset (210 bar of 300 possible, ?) The plan was that if everything is OK I would continue on my own. But I didn?t think things were ok. Due to tough conditions I wasn't convinced of the quality of belays we did and ?.all right, I just didn't feel like proceeding on my own, the place was quite inhospitable that day. We reached 27m and I don?t think we were more than 100m in but I got impression that the arse job had been done and place is now ready for decent dive. Cave is supposed to level out soon on average depth of 34m. According to the book present limit (in 2000) was 200m. I don?t know who was originally behind this exploration (I would suspect Martyn and his Dark Shamrock Team, I've sent him email, we'll see ;-) I don't know neither if EOL has been moved further in since then, I wouldn't be surprised so much -  Jim? Anyway, this might be exciting project guys, even on OC we still have few meters to bite off I believe (with careful planning, thorough preparation and thoughtful logistics?).
I'm very interested where is the end of the line at the present, any idea?

 Artur