To: Tom Bemis – Cave Resourses
From: Duane Del Vecchio – Central Oklahoma Grotto
Subject: Trip Report (with Pictures)
Date: June 2, 2007
Location: National Geographic Pit
On Saturday, June 2nd, the gang from Central Oklahoma Grotto showed up at 8:30
a.m. on Tom Bemis’s doorstep…err…office to finish a project
we started thinking about four years ago. When getting the paperwork for working
in the cave, Tom informed us that just the day before he had gotten official
confirmation that the project was good to go! <whew! Just in time!!>
Ever since we were assigned to the National Geographic Pit to clean it back in 2004, we were thinking to make this our project to make a better net to catch things. The current system while fairly adequate did have some fall backs… it was rusting though in some places with the screen where the water was always dripping on it and there were some places where large gaps appeared between the shelf and the lower part of the pit allowing things dropped down the pit to possibly miss the screen and fall below. When asked two years ago if we could rebuild the cover, we were asked to submit plans to the park and see if they met specs etc… Last year (2006), we took exact measurements of the pit and came home with the thought to get ‘er’ done this year. Finally in February, it hit us that we better get a move on and started discussing the building of a better catch net system. We found a polyurethane netting material that was resistant to mold and rot, yet flexible and strong enough to take punishment from a weighted object (like a D cell battery) falling on it from the top of the pit. We finally sent samples to Tom Bemis to get park approval. We loaded up supplies (100 feet of 1 inch PVC pipe, about 75 connectors from 90 degree turns to T’s to 45 degree pieces, glue, drop cloths, zip ties, and tons of duffle bags to bring it all down. After the paperwork was completed, Tom helped carry all of our junk in his vehicle to the parking lot at the Visitor’s Center rather than us carrying it all the way over there. (Thanks Tom!)
We divided into two teams: The Pit Crew involving Dale Amlee, Duane Del Vecchio, Dale Town, and Jon Woltz; and The Flowstone Cleaners involving Anne Ault, Steve Beleu, Sue Bozeman (1⁄2), Becky Hunsinger (1⁄2), Mark Miller (1⁄2), and Kelley Woltz (1⁄2). The overflow (we had 14 people show up to work this year – our most ever!)(Though we could only take 8 down to clean up). The others got to do a Trash Detail which was to pick up trash from the top down and though out the big room. Those workers were: John Bozeman, Becky and Mark Hunsinger, Mark Miller (1⁄2), and Kelley Woltz (1⁄2). The 1⁄2 people worked half on one project and half on another.
The two Lower Cave groups went down with all of their gear (pipe, sponges, water bottles, buckets for mud, etc...) The scrubbers helped the pit crew get all of the bags and pipe etc... down into lower cave, then headed off for their section. Their work and experiences will be covered in a different report.
The first part of the pit crew was to clean what was on the catch net, then disassemble the net. We had wire cutters to clip the zip ties, pocket knife to cut the string treading throughout the screens, and a PVC cutter (looks like a hand pruning shears for the garden but made to cut PVC pipe and leave no shavings behind) to cut the pipe into manageable pieces to haul out of the cave. The screening was separated and able to be compressed into a small enough roll that we could get it into a double bagged trash bag. The pipes were all cut into approx. 4 foot sections and placed in trash bags. These were then hauled to the foot of the ladders that bring people into lower cave to await transport back up to the trail and up and out of the cave. We then began the process of building the framework. Dale Town meanwhile was cleaning the pit itself and noticed black rubber like someone was walking in the pit. It was soon after discovered that Dale’s boots soles had rotted and the foam rubber below was disincarnating before our very eyes. He quickly abandoned the shoes (which got put in the trash bags) and then valiantly walked out of lower cave, up the ladders, down the trail, up the elevator to the surface, across the walks back to the cars parked on the mountain in his socks to find out his wife had the keys. Back down to the Big Room where he was a trail interpreter at Nat. Geo Pit until Lil (his wife) came by and he got the car keys. He went back up and changed into surf (water shoes) and came back to join us. He bumped into Sue in lower cave and she volunteered to leave her group at scrubbing flowstone and find all of his footprints where his shoe had left rubber and clean it off of the trail. (Thanks Sue… she spent 4 hours cleaning individual footprints along the trail to the pit).
Meanwhile while Dale was on his exhibition, Dale Amlee and Jon Woltz built the mini screen on the other side of the main pit. They ended up keeping the frame as it was still in good shape. They put on the new mesh and tied it down. Duane was cleaning the rubber out of the pit. We then laid out the fittings and tried to see the product in our eyes… a few changes had to be made from the plan and we eventually built it different than at first thought anyway. We decided to build two screens (nets). It has always been a problem getting things that were located in the center of the screen so that you could clean up. We aimed to build a 2 piece system with the furthest back screen being lifted up to pour items onto the shallow screen which can be reached from the sides or even inside the shallow part of the pit, which thus, would make cleaning the screens much easier. We used one leg at the large speleotherm for support as there is no ledge in that area and built around the base to the sides. Each joint was measured and pre-fitted to see if it would conform to the shape of the surroundings. Then each piece was glued into place. With 45 degree fittings we were able to make little bends where the shelf around the pit wouldn’t agree with straight 90’s and this also allowed us to make up elevations toward the back end of the pit as they could be rotated to fit terrain. Cross T’s were built to strengthen up the framework in the middle to be able to hold a relative amount of weight without sagging the pipes or the screen. The first frame was finished by 2:00 p.m. Having that done, we had a better ideal on how we were doing this and were able to get the second frame done in 1 1⁄2 hours. It took a little over an hour to put on the mesh on both frames. We took no lunch break as we weren’t sure if we could finish all of the build in one day if we did.
The mesh is secured to the PVC pipe with zip ties. The place where mesh meets mesh was tied at 2 inch intervals with zips with the capability of tipping the far screen into the close screen without coins and objects sliding under connecting mesh (they go over instead). We overlaid the mesh so that it extends beyond the pipe in some cases to catch objects that might slide down the rocks or to cover a space between pipe and pit. We used 192 zip ties, 85 feet of pipe, over 50 connections, wore out a pipe cutter blade, and approx. 50 feet of 4 foot wide mesh. We exited lower cave about 5 p.m. and with our exhilaration of getting the project done (and what we believe done well) we were a bit noisy (loud actually) and got chewed on by a park ranger who gave us a lecture We were subdued and took our trash, leftover parts and equipment, and tired bodies out of the cave and back to Carlsbad for our annual “end of project” dinner at Chili’s. Extra mesh was left over at Cave Resources in case of need.Our thanks to Tom Bemis, our Cave Resources contact, who helped us over the year to get our proposal though committees just in time to be able to work on the project. All costs were paid for by individuals or the Central Oklahoma Grotto and no expenses were occurred by Carlsbad Caverns National Park.
On a personal note: this was my
eighth year doing a restoration project either with the old Texas club or
COG and it, to me, was the most personally rewarding
trip of all. The planning, building, and completion of a project years in planning
made this a special trip and one that was most satisfying. Our thanks to Tom
(who always bends over backwards to help us) and Carlsbad Caverns Cave Resources
office for allowing us to come to come to such a wonderful location and for putting
up with us! <grin!!!>
Web reports, slide shows, and picture gallery of this trip are available at:
http://www.okcavers.com and go to trip
reports.
Report Submitted by:
Duane Del Vecchio
Central Oklahoma Grotto
June 7, 2007
Download this report (with pictures) in Word Format - click here