Caving Secretary's Report 1979
1979 has been a reasonably active year for the B.E.C. and
all major and minor
During the year the Wigmore site has been tidied up and the
cave capped but not locked. The club has
re-opened Tynings and as soon as a stile and fencing has been put up the key
(kept at the Belfry) will be available to bona-fid caving clubs.
There has been a large increase this year in the number of
club trips to other regions particularly
The last 2 points worth mentioning are that valid C.C.C.
temporary permits are now available at the Belfry. The club also has its own Lamb Leer key which
is available at the Belfry.
A meeting between the B.E.C. committee and the St.
CuthbertÂ’s Leaders was held on Sunday 20th May to discuss insurance and I have
copies of the minutes for those interested.
Martin Grass
1.8.79
Tackle Masters Report, 1979
During the last year, 180ft. of ladder has been rewired and
all except the ultra-lightweight ladder has been dipped in lanolin. We have purchased enough rungs to produce 15
twenty foot ladders (ultra-lightweight) and 15 twenty foot standard
ladders. To complete this task of
building new ladders we are waiting for the delivery of taper pins and talurits
from the manufacturers.
At the beginning of the Club year the tackle key was removed
from general access and arrangements were made to enable members to apply to
the Committee for a personal key. Four
ladders and 2 tethers together with two lifelines were left in the shower room
for general use by members. This
equipment was rotated to even out the wear. Although members were able to obtain their own key to the tackle store
by first applying to the Committee only two keys were requested. This system is by no means perfect but it was
felt by me and the Committee that a tightening up of tackle access was
necessary due to the fact that we had lost so much tackle in the previous
years. We have had returned 5 ladders
but there is still a considerable amount of tackle still missing.
The following list is the accountable tackle as at 3 August
1979:
Spreaders 1, 2, 3
Tethers 7, 10, 12, 13, 16.
Ladders: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8,
9, 11, 12, 13, 15, 18, 20, 21, 22, 23, 33, 44, 45 and 48
Ultra-lightweight ladder: 24, 26,
28, 41, 42 & 43
450ft of super Braidline Nylon
10mm
1000ft of digging rope.
I would like to take the opportunity of thanking Graham Wilton-Jones
and Garth Dell for their assistance throughout the year and also the members
who altered the stone Belfry making tackle storage easier.
John Dukes, August 1979