1999 FISHER RIDGE SUMMARIES

Compiled from the DUG SCOOPS

Fisher Ridge Summary, January 1999 by Peter Quick

During the month of January there were two survey weekends into the Fisher Ridge Cave System. The first trip took place over the New Year's weekend. Ron Adams led a trip back to the end of the Eveready Extension. Accompanying him were Tony Marfia, James Burkhart, Jon Jasper and Cailin Hayes. Ron had last been to this area in late May, 1998 with both Tony and James.

The trip back to the survey took a long time. The survey was started about ten hours after they entered the cave. The passage dimensions were not great, in general a low tube not wider than five feet and no taller than three feet, typically less. There was very powerful air flow in the passage, enough to chill the surveyors. 22 stations were placed for 550 feet of survey. The passage direction was mainly east. The survey was called off when the passage degenerated to a foot high by 3 feet wide with sharp cauliflower formations on the ceiling and walls. The air flow was still strong. The cave was exited after 26 hours.

The next trip took place over the weekend of January 16th. Three teams entered the cave. Suzanne DeBlois led Les Carney and Jake Kiser on a bio-collecting trip in The Lost Carbide Complex and brief mop up survey in the Quick Exit area. They netted some microbes and about 260 feet of survey.

The next survey team consisted of Steve Miller and Brian Davis. They went to the end of the Screamway survey via the NT13 passage. Steve and Brian climbed up the drop that had stopped the previous trip from continuing in the Screamway. They places 30 stations for 492 feet of survey. The Screamway survey continued right above Eclipse Canyon. Three loops were tied into the Eclipse Canyon survey before the Screamway finally ended in a mud fill.

The last team to survey in the cave consisted of Peter Quick, Mike Fitch and Eric Higbie. Peter led them back to the Eclipse Canyon and to the Over The Top passage to do lead checking and mop-up survey. They found one good side lead that they mapped west for 700 feet to a low muddy fill. They then did some mop-up survey in various places along Over The Top and in total placed 52 stations for 1225 feet of survey. Two areas of leads were not checked in Over The Top; a canyon and pit series, with a water fall (rope required) near the western end of Over The Top, and the upstream end of the Gleem Stream (a somewhat damp stream canyon survey) at the far eastern end of Over The Top.

LOOKING BACK ON 1998

1998 marked the renewal of exploration in the Northtown Section on the Fisher Ridge Cave System after a thirteen-month hiatus of activity. Mapping and exploration had stopped in November of 1996 after the second trapping in a year of cavers by flood waters. Work on the Quick Exit took place over 21 months (overlapping the 13 months of non-exploration) before its completion and gating. During 1998 there were 37 survey trips into the cave. Six miles of survey was added to the caves length taking the cave from 82 miles to 88 miles. No major discoveries were made, although a number of nice trunk segments were mapped. The survey potential still seems good with well over 150 leads to be pushed. At the present rate of survey (slow but steady) the Fisher Ridge Cave System should break 100 miles in length by the end of the year 2000, essentially in its 20th year of exploration. Sometimes its seems weird that I have dedicated nearly 20 years of my life to the exploration of the Fisher Ridge Cave System. Luckily weird introspection doesn't come so often as to dampen my enthusiasm for pushing the cave just a little bit further.

Fisher Ridge Summary by Peter Quick

Over the last reporting period (February & March 1999) there was only one survey weekend into the Fisher Ridge Cave System. This took place on the weekend of February 13. Two teams entered the cave. The first team of Suzanne Deblois and Jon Smith headed out the Not Too Bad Passage and over to the NH Canyon survey. The NH Canyon runs roughly to the southeast from the intersection of the Giant's Pass and the Not Too Bad Passage. It had been previously mapped for 36 stations and still kept going. Jon and Suzanne managed to place another 50 twisty stations for about 400 feet of additional survey. The canyon sort of crapped out at the end, but a 50 foot pit leading to what appeared to be a BIG lower canyon was found. They plan to return to this vertical challange in April.

The other team consisted of Joe Meppelink, a caver that accompanied him from Texas and Tony Marfia. They headed out to the GYP Survey, roughly located under Northtown Church. They mapped about 400 feet and tied in a loop. They did a little bit of poking around and estimate that there might be another 400 feet of mop-up in the GYP area. This was Joe's first trip as a sketcher and he seemed to enjoy it. Now all we need is for Joe to send copies of the survey notes to either Peter Quick or Chip Hopper so that the survey can be entered into the data base.

Upcomming trips: There will be a couple of survey trips into the cave over the weekend of April 10th. After that there are going to be Memorial Day weekend activities in the cave system. Also, this years Speleofest is being held at the Hart County Fairgrounds in Munfordville over the Memorial Day weekend. If one registers early enough for the Speleofest the Sunday Banquet is going to be held inside Short Cave! Seating is limited to 300 people. Questions about these upcomming trips can be directed to Peter Quick.

Fisher Ridge Summary April, May, June 1999 by Peter Quick

Since the last newsletter there have been a number of trips into the Fisher Ridge Cave system.

April 10, 1999

Les Carney and Peter Quick performed a surface survey from a USGS benchmark with a known latitude and longitude to a survey point on Peter's property that is tied into the cave survey. A one mile loop was surveyed. Les supplied the laser transit and surveying expertise, while Peter supplied the energy to run back and forth three times for every survey shot (front and backsight) and cleared the woods of ticks for Les. This survey will better link the USGS DLG topo plots that Chip Hopper is running and combining with the cave survey. The topo overlays he produces should be a bit more accurate.

Also during the same weekend Jon Smith, Suzanne De Blois, Matt Reese and Trip Litchfield returned to the NH survey armed with vertical gear to drop some of the pits previously encountered near the beginning of the NH survey. Two pits were dropped and a total of 17 stations and 325 feet of passage was mapped. A pit at the end of the NH survey was never reached or checked out. (See trip report in last issue for details of this trip)

May 23, 1999

Jonathan Schwer and Chris Coswel took a short trip into the Quick Exit and picked off a loop that connected to the Lost Carbide Complex. 18 stations were placed for a total of 250 feet. The passage was a small twisty canyon.

Memorial Day Weekend, May 29 - 30, 1999

Jonathan Schwer, Mike Dowden and Eric Higbie returned to the end of the Forever Ready Canyon (near the GYP survey and Eveready Canyon). They brought a rope, a hand drive bolt kit and some vertical gear. They did a 15 foot bolt climb up to a good looking canyon that beckoned them from a previous trip. The climb led to 213 feet of canyon passage (15 stations) before they were stopped by another pit with a larger 35 foot bolt climb back up to the continuing canyon passage. In addition another hanging lead was also seen. Jonathan will probably doggedly pursue this area for a few more trips.

Chip Hopper, Eileen Hopper, Dave McFarlane and Joel Sparks entered the cave and found a nice tube side lead in the area of NT 36 in Northtown Ave. They were originally headed further into the cave but decided that this unexpected lead was a better destination. 23 stations were placed for 495 feet of survey. Additionally they left a few leads to return to in the future.

The big trip of this weekend was led by Peter Quick. Accompanying him were Jeff Zink, Pete Dickman and Suzanne De Blois. A mini camp trip was planned. Two days of survey separated by one night and two cooked meals was the plan. In addition to the usual camp gear, vertical gear and wetsuits were added because the packs were too light and the passage was easy to travel. The first day's destination was to continue the Lost Lagoon survey. For those who don't remember this trip was a follow up to Steve Miller's heroic/foolish survey of 480 wet feet in his underwear. Steve and Les had mapped in the Lost Lagoon in December at higher water levels and were stopped by near sumps. Wetsuits were donned and the Lost Lagoon passage was first pushed downstream through some nice 20 foot wide wall to wall water passage to an apparent sump. The water levels were clearly lower than they had been on previous visits to the Lost Lagoon. Right before the downstream sump Pete Dickman found a muddy overflow route that took the team through an ear dip. The passage continued as a muddy crawl with no air flow. When another 15 foot long ear dip was reached the survey was aborted. Pete pushed ahead for another 150 feet and reported more of the same mud tube, with no air flow. 19 stations and 700 feet of survey had been placed. They returned to the upstream direction and picked up where the last survey had left off. Only 5 stations and 187 feet were mapped before a sump was reached.

The crew made their way back to Northtown Ave. where they dumped the wet wetsuits and picked up the camp packs. A spot in Northern Northtown Ave. was picked out as a good camp spot, only about 3 minutes away from a water source. Camp was set up, meals were eaten and some strong snoring was had. About 8 hours later another meal was eaten and camp was packed up.

By about noon on Sunday the cavers were headed off to do some mop-up survey in KN Canyon. Peter had at least eight leads to check, so the hope was that there would be enough to keep busy with. The first lead checked was right where one climbs up into KN Canyon from the infeeder passage. 50 stations were placed in a mostly tight and twisty canyon passage before it got too tight to continue. At least it was dry. When the crew got back to KN Canyon, Peter climbed down into a passage not 4 feet lower than the just finished survey. This passage appeared to be just a lower component of the above passage but turned out to be totally unrelated to it. The upper passage had headed east and then south while the lower passage headed north. The survey in this passage led to a nice complex of loops and leads. At least 300 feet of passage was checked but not mapped as the survey progressed. Ultimately the passage intersected a larger passage, 20 feet wide by 4 feet high, with a meandering 10 foot high by 4 foot wide canyon in the ceiling. A few hundred feet was checked in an eastern direction before deciding to survey in the western direction (the survey shots were much longer). After a few hundred feet the passage ran into the wall of a huge sinkhole (the same one that terminates Northern Northtown Ave.) and filled with mud. Another 48 stations had been placed in this lead. In total these two leads in one spot in KN Canyon had yielded 1867 feet of new passage with significant prospects for more survey. Probably 600 feet of passage had been scooped and not yet mapped.

June 12, 1999
Jonathan Schwer, Les Carney and Chris Coswel added another 300 feet to the end of a side lead off the Lost Carbide Complex. The passage was a muddy crawl that headed east.

Also during the same weekend Suzanne De Blois led Ted Fuller, Jake Kiser and Heather Lumppio back to the NH survey (Near the Giant's Pass) to continue dropping pits in the floor of the NH survey. The effort clarified the remaining obstacles (the pits didn't go) and a little survey was accomplished. (See this issue for trip report).

The grand summary of all of the above action is that the Fisher Ridge Cave System is now just 1500 feet shy of 90 miles in length.

Fisher Ridge Summary August & Early September 1999 by Peter Quick

In August there were two trips into Fisher Ridge. The first took place over Aug 22nd and 23rd. Jonathan Schwer and Shane Fryer took a trip into a lead off of Eclipse Canyon. The lead was an hammer/dig that moved a lot of air. It had been turned up in late 1995. Jonathan had been one of the folks on the trip so he had remembered the lead. It was speculated that it might bypass a breakdown fill that ended an overlying trunk segment. After about three hours of work and two obstruction areas cleared they popped up into the continuation of the trunk passage. They scooped for about 300 feet in 20 wide by 8 high dirt floored gypsum passage. The passage continued. They left the cave and made plans to return over Labor Day weekend to survey it.

The next trip was on August 28th and 29th. Suzanne De Blois, Mike Ficco, Chip Hopper and Keith Ortiz decided to have a look at the end of Park Ave. to see if the drought had lowered the downstream sump at all. A series of events led to the loss of Keith's caving gear (which was routed to the wrong airport). Enough gear was reallocated to enable Keith to make the trip out to Park Ave. The terminal sump turned out not to be a bit lower despite the very low level of the Green River. Apparently its water level is determined by some sort of dam ahead in the passage. A final 35 foot shot was placed to a 3 inch low air, the passage sumped shortly ahead. The crew headed back to the postulated Chasm Drain stream passage to continue the survey that Peter Quick and Suzanne De Blois has started last December. Another 410 feet were placed before the crew was stopped by a 15 foot nuisance drop that couldn't be free climbed. Larger passage was seen ahead, and was accompanied by good strong air flow. Some lead checking was done on the way out but nothing further was mapped. 17 stations had been placed for 443 feet of survey.

Over the Labor Day Weekend there were two trips into the cave. The first was by Steve Miller and Les Carney. Steve and Les mapped a damp crawl for about 100 feet that headed toward the end of Chartres Ave. The lead was off the big passage that takes off south from Northtown Ave. and almost goes to Chartres Ave before ending in a mud fill.

The other trip was Jonathan Schwer's return trip to the new trunk off Eclipse Canyon. He was accompanied by Mike Dowden, Dave Eck and Shane Fryer. They mapped 1965 feet in 59 stations and stopped at a 18 inch high by 6 foot wide dirt floored passage that seemed to continue. The trunk passage (no name yet) averaged about 7 feet high by 20 feet wide and was usually smooth floored. It was interrupted a number of times by fill but there was always a lower passage that could be followed that would bypass the fill. A number of good leads were passed, including a 100 foot dome that had a big unreachable cross canyon. The passage headed south toward the Doll's Head Trunk.

NEXT PLANNED TRIPS & PARTY

The next planned trips are over the weekend of September 18 (contact Brian Davis) and over the three day Columbus Day weekend, October 9th. All DUG members and Fisher Ridge enthusiasts are encouraged to come down over the Columbus Day weekend. A potential Party may occur on Saturday Night after some tourist & photo trips into the cave on Saturday. So if you are interested in something other than hard core caving and want to look around at the major trunk passages in the Northtown section of the cave this is a great opportunity. Sunday to Monday morning will be the real caving trip time. Contact Peter Quick if you are interested in the October weekend.

Fisher Ridge Summary, October 1999 by Peter Quick

Over the Columbus Day weekend, October 9 & 10, fourteen cavers showed up on Northtown Ridge at Steve's Karst Resort for some photo trips, lead reconnaissance trips and actual survey trips into the Fisher Ridge Cave System. On Saturday Peter Quick and six other cavers ventured into the cave to do some lead checking via the lead off the rotunda in Northtown Ave. (opposite the Too Low For Comfort passage). The trip followed Bob Anderson's survey "Bob's Survey" from the rotunda out to Northtown Ave near station NT23 and then worked its way to the Northtown Thruway and returned to the rotunda room via the Lower Crust survey. A number of good leads were noted. At the same time Charlie Pflanze and three others entered the cave with a bunch of photographic gear to do some photo shoots in Northtown Ave. On Saturday night a slide show was given at the Karst Resort.

On Sunday, October 10, three teams entered the cave for survey work. The first team consisted of Brian Davis, Pete Dickman and Suzanne De Blois. They headed over to KN Canyon to map some leads turned up on the last trip out there in August. Pete had been on the previous trip and was acting as the lead guide. They picked off a couple of leads, the first being a lower canyon that headed toward the Quick Exit. It got too tight after about 175 feet. The next lead was far more productive. 21 stations were placed in a gypsum passage that headed east and northeast. It finally got filled with flowstone and became impassable. A little more mop up survey too place before they left the cave. They had placed 49 stations for 1113 feet of survey.

The next team consisted of Mike Fitch, Eric Daugherty, Les Carney and Todd Fisher (no not the one on Fisher Ridge). Mike had decided to go back to some of the leads that had been seen the day before near the rotunda off "Bob's Survey". Mike had decided that he would train both Eric and Todd in the art of compass reading as neither had surveyed before. Les had agreed to survey with them for a number of hours, but that he would have to leave the cave early. They mapped a number of loops, the best of which went for 21 stations, about 650 feet. They only finished off a few of the leads that were noted the day before. They exited the cave with 54 stations and 1422 feet of survey.

The final trip consisted of Peter Quick, Jonathan Schwer and Shane Fryer. Jonathan led them back to his new discovery "Quiet City" the trunk passage he had mapped on Labor Day. The passage was quite impressive. It had formerly been a complex trunk passage with three twisting interconnected levels and many big side leads. Unfortunately the entire complex had been filled entirely with dirt at some distant time in the past. Subsequent erosion has washed some of the dirt out of parts of the trunk complex and thus enabled us to map and explore in this area. Every one of Jonathan's leads from his last trip either ended in collapse or massive dirt fill. No lead went more than 12 stations. Still 59 stations were placed for 1477 feet of survey. A couple of small loops were not mapped and one good looking canyon lead in the floor was noted (it is temporarily too small to enter). The breakdown crawl leading into Quiet City that was dug open by Shane Fryer is a very tight and unstable looking horror, so be careful when visiting this area.

All in all an additional 4013 feet were added to the caves length over the Columbus Day weekend. The cave should now be around 91 miles in length!

Fisher Ridge Summary November & Early December 1999 by Peter Quick

During the month of November there were two trips into the Quick Exit of the Fisher Ridge Cave System. The first trip took place over the weekend of November 13th. Suzanne De Blois, led Mike Ficco, Trip Lichtefield and Jake Kiser back to do a bit more poking around in leads in Park Avenue laden with vertical gear, a Hilti hammer drill, a couple of ropes and other climbing stuff. They first headed to a lead suggested by Peter Quick, a big canyon passage that had been interrupted by a dome shaft and a vertical climb which had stopped the previous survey crew. As happens often the climb that stopped the previous crew was bypassed without the need for all the climbing gear. Luckily? another climb was found that necessitated use of all the heavy equipment but wasn't completed. A standing rope was left rigged for a future climbing assault.

The attention of the crew then turned to what appeared to be a walking canyon passage that took off from Broadway, the low wide trunk passage that parallels Park Ave. for a distance. The entrance to the passage had previously been seen to start as a knee deep wade. As luck and dry weather would have it there was just a little water in the entrance of the passage. 35 stations were placed for 828 feet of survey before it got late and the crew had to exit the cave. The passage trended south southeast and was scooped for another 300 feet with good airflow. The passage is under solid ridge and could easily keep going for another 1000 feet unless it develops a mud or water fill problem.

The next trip took place on November 20th. Jonathan Schwer and Shane Fryer entered the cave to do a reconnaissance of the GYP Passage and do a bit more poking around in the Forever Ready area. They completed a climb in Forever Ready that took them down a canyon for about 150 feet before it ended in a mud fill. The made their way back to GYP and spent some time admiring the splendid crystals and cave cotton that is so plentiful out there. No leads were noted and the area can probably be pretty well written off for survey potential. They exited the cave after 12 hours with no survey footage.

In early December, the 3rd through the 5th, there was another one of Peter Quick's two day mini-camp trips. Five people made it on this trip; Peter Quick, Jeff Zink, Pete Dickman, Suzanne De Blois and Jon Smith. The camp was once again set up in a convenient place in NW Northtown Ave. The first day the group was broken into two teams. Peter, Jeff and Jon headed to the Sand Swim (the survey was started in 1994) that takes off north from the NW Other World. After just 5 stations into the survey it was found that the passage split. The right component was chosen because of its wider although lower nature. Wide passages almost always mean longer survey shots. 1259 feet and 41 stations after the survey began the passage finally crapped out. There was still fairly good airflow but the passage just became too small to continue. Meanwhile Suzanne and Pete headed to some consolation prize leads further along in the Other World. There was the distinct impression that they were to mop up some lousy crawls that previous crews hadn't even wanted to look at. The first lead yielded results inversely proportional to expectations. Suzanne and Pete placed 50 stations for 1000 feet in a complex and changing passage. In places it was grim breakdown crawls and other places nice canyon passage. A number of promising leads were noted. When they stopped surveying they checked ahead and found a connection with the Chasm Passage. This new passage had bypassed a heart stopping traverse and a muddy 45 foot pit that used to have to be traversed to get out to the leads in the Chasm.

The next day two new survey crews were formed. This time Suzanne and Jon headed out to the Sand Swim to map the left hand fork found the day before. They surveyed 666 feet before the passage crapped out, bringing the survey in the Sand Swim to 1825 feet for the weekend. Peter, Pete and Jeff headed over to KN Canyon to do some more mop-up survey. KN Canyon has consistently yielded more passage than expected on these mop-up trips. Along the way a couple of small loops were mapped in Northtown Ave. The survey objectives in KN Canyon were two leads in the downstream direction from where KN Canyon is entered. An initial lower level loop was mapped and then a lead at station KN42 was mapped. The lead at station 42 went 200 feet before filling with breakdown. The final lead to be checked was a narrow ceiling channel crossing the top of KN Canyon. In the original survey notes it was described as a 2' h x 6' w twisty canyon. The passage turned out to be fairly straight and not too bad to travel along. It was absolutely full of beautiful gypsum flowers and other gypsum formations. After 10 stations the narrow canyon split into an upper and lower component. Jeff checked to the right while Pete followed by Peter checked the even smaller lead to the left. The left lead was no more than 3 feet high by 2 feet wide, in places smaller. It too was filled with gypsum flowers and formations that were hard to avoid in such a confined space. The passage twisted and turned. Hundreds of feet were traveled when suddenly the passage intersected a six foot wide and 4 foot high tube going in two directions. A couple hundred feet were checked to the right and the passage kept going. A couple hundred feet were checked to the left and the passage then intersected a seven foot diameter tube. It was decided that there was way too much to survey this trip and that the survey should continue in the direction that Jeff had checked back at the first intersection. A half hour later when Pete and Peter rejoined Jeff and related the good news the survey continued to the right in a tight canyon. Another 10 stations were placed before it got too tight to continue. They had mapped 823 feet in 45 stations for the day.

In total another 3785 feet were added to the length of the Fisher Ridge Cave System, pushing the length of the cave to around 93 miles. There ought to be a trip into the cave over the New Year's weekend and then another over the Martin Luther King weekend in mid January. The mid January trip might be another mini-camp trip since they seem to be so productive in survey footage.