To try and dig into a cave below my house?

[TimeToChangeNameAgain]

There’s a small network of caves in my town which were open as showcaves until the 80’s but then all shut off. The dad of my dc’s best friend is a keen caver type person and showed my dh a map of these caves which appear to go directly under our garden.

The pair of them plus 4 kids have been in the garden all weekend and managed to dig what looks like a grave. At the moment I’m leaving them to it because I’m assuming they’ll lose interest soon and they’re not actually going to find this bloody cave. The dc’s are so excited about it - convinced that they’re going to have it as the best den ever and find loads of fossils.

They won’t actually suddenly fall into a cave will they? The stuff I can find about the original caves says that they’re granite and limestone - they’re just digging through earth and a few stones at the moment. I’m assuming they would have to actually chisel away loads of rock before they hit a cave but I’m completely clueless. I really don’t care about them digging a hole in the garden but I don’t want them to actually find anything.

Would you try to stop them? Or just leave them digging? They won’t start up again until next weekend and I’m hoping they’ll have lost interest by then and I can turn their grave into a little pond.

Sounds extremely foolish OP.

Your husband can hire an excavator from the tool hire shop. He'll need to widen out the trench so the sides are shallow and don't cave in as he goes deeper. The caves will be fairly deep and probably in rock so he'll probably just end up with a big hole which he will need to fill in or turn into a pool.

At least the garden will get a good digging.

My kids once decided they were going to dig a mine in the back garden. The dog helped.

They got bored after a couple of feet - shifting soil is incredibly hard work - and I turned the hole into a pond.

Honestly, two feet deep by about six feet long is a LOT of earth. I reckon your kids will be fed up as soon as the weather turns a bit inclement.

Make sure they shore up the sides as they get deeper. Point them towards the Jack Dibnah series where he decided to dig a mineshaft.

They'll lose interest a couple of hours after they hit rock.

There's a reason that there is health and safety rules re digging holes....

If anything other than knee deep... I'd stop them... If they want to contrinu you need to open the space up so in profile it changes from a sharp V, to a very wide V.

Stop them or get someone with proper excavating experience to supervise....

Being trapped under a collapsed hole isn't fun

I totally get the attraction, there's a network of tunnels under the town i grew up in and they fascinated me.

Digging into it really isn't safe though, chances of falling into a cave are pretty slim but as others have said there's the chance of the hole collapsing. I know you're hoping they'll give up when they hit rock but does caver friend's map show the depth of the caves? Do you know anything about the layout from when they were open? I mean the entrance is 20m down hill from you, so the caves could well be really deep under the hill.

If you want to put DH off point out that as they were a tourist attraction they are presumably owned by someone so i suspect in the very unlikely event they managed to get into them they'd be trespassing.

PLEASE consider the safety aspects of this even if they actually do manage to break a new entrance to the cave system. Show caves with employees and educated safety personel are one thing, caving alone with children no less is extremely dangerous.

Not only is it dangerous for your kids/their friends/DH/DH's friend (who I suspect hasn't actually done THAT much caving or he'd know better), but it's also dangerous for the rescue crews of volunteers who will inevitably have to be called out when someone falls down an unexpected shaft or someone gets stuck. I will reiterate - experienced cavers DIE in situations like this, sometimes the rescuers have to come from so far away that precious hours have passed while someone is stuck in the cold with the potential of blood being cut off from various limbs.

Google Neil Moss, please. It's a story that should never be forgotten. My dad was part of this rescue effort and it haunted him to his last days. They never did get him back up. There is no way in hell I'd let my kids go into a (closed) cave system without the proper education, equipment and a team of experienced cavers. No way at all.

What about the Neighbours? I cant imagine they are thrilled at the prospect of a hole being dug next door!

They’ll get bored, leave them to it, enjoy the piece and quiet while it lasts.

My Dh is a keen caver and would do that sort of thing (maybe not in the garden though). They are likely to be able to get to that cave (if said friend is good enough at reading a map and locating where the cave is vs your garden)

Two pence worth:

• if anyone does this, they need to have a REALLY good idea of how do some digging like this. Yes its feasible but it needs to be done the right way. Expect plenty of timber etc... to support the sides for example
• Does the friend in question have any experience about digging? Its not the same thing to go underground and do a dig.
• Any experience on what they expect to find (eg a big drop)?
• IF they do get through, you will end up with a nice hole in the middle of your garden, possible with a door over it to protect anyone else falling in. Are you happy with that? What effect will it have on the prce of your house/health & safety/council etc...?
• Your dcs will not find fossils and whatnot. Esp not if this was a show cave before.

Tbh, I think the friend in question is talking shit and has no ide what a dig entails, how to get about it etc... If he was serious, he would hve gone about it in a totally different way.

I'd also like to say.
Caving with children is NOT dangerous per se. (My own dcs have done many trips underground like this - not in a show cave). As always it depends on who is taking them, how and where.

But I have to agree with @Damntheman. The friend has no clue and thats the reason why he is dangerous. Starting with talking with the OP and her dh about what it actually entails (it wouldnt be just a bit of earth on the side of the garden)

@Damntheman a caver worth its salt wouldnt fall down an 'unexpected' shaft.
There are many reasons why they might fall (or get stuck, esp if there is water running). But an unexpected shaft should not be one of them.
People going underground like this should have maps, and be able to know their way around enough to spot such a huge hole they could fall into....

This is totally the sort of thing my dad would have done when we were kids.
As long as they’re sensible-surely them
Being outside and physical is loads better for them than being inside driving you batty. It’ll be a great memory for them too when they’re older.

I'm an archaeologist and the biggest concern for me is the size of the hole and risk of collapse (as you seem to be aware of pipes and cables).

When I dig a hole, for example a 1m square we only dig it 1m in depth before we step in. The next level will only be 0.5m in width while only the depth increases. This method of halving the excavation area continues for every metre dug. We also wear hard hats if anything is above head height (or shoulder in some special cases). You also need to be aware of where the spoil is, you want it a good distance away from the trench otherwise it increases the risk of collapse.

I would absolutely put a stop to this now even if I was doing it in my own garden as no-one appears to be fully aware of all the risk or taking the appropriate measures to ensure safety. I'd also be concerned some of the adults involved wouldn't take the risks seriously (collapse can occur at any depth and archaeologists dig in ways that are conscious of this).

Caving with children is NOT dangerous per se.

No, of course not - but digging a grave-sized hole in the garden with children and seemingly little experience may well be.

Plus, the DCs' aim seems to be to access the tunnels as a 'den' to play in - if they do find an entrance, it doesn't sound like the plan is for adult led caving activities - more that the children want to go off and play in their extended underground 'garden'.

Agree it's not so dangerous when caving with experienced, educated cavers Nom :) Sadly a lot of people who think they're these things probably aren't.

Unexpected was perhaps the wrong word to use, but many decent cavers have found their way into a hole they weren't meaning to. Neil Moss for instance, he was only 20 but he wasn't green or wet behind the ears (although green enough to split off alone admittedly). Got himself into a hole he didn't know was a corkscrew shaft and end of story. Horrible thing. Holes one falls into don't have to be huge. My whole family are cavers and my dad, as stated before, was chairman of the caving society in the UK as well as one of the leading speleologists. Oh the stories I've heard..

This thread makes me think of those kids in Thailand that got stuck. Makes me shudder!

It is something that my brothers would have done when we were kids, it sounds fun but the safe Mum side of me wouldn’t be able to let them keep digging! I remember going to the beach when we were able 10 with our Dad and digging out a hole that was over 6 foot deep!

To be fair I'd be tempted to do this too. I guess they are just trying to find the previously boarded up entrance? However the risks have been articulated here, and less I'd be worried about structural damage, they have not been filled in for a reason, and it will have been looked at if they need filling in, but more that someone could get badly hurt. They have blocked the entrance for a reason, and it could be a risk to humans.

I don't know the answer to the question

but I wondered what you meant by "show caves" please OP?

thanks. Very interesting thread!

At best they'll just wreck your lawn.
At worst they'll create a sink hole that swallows up your house or causes subsidence.

Surely the network was closed for a reason. Yes, usually because the person on whose ground the entrance is doesn't want to allow access.

OP are these natural caves or are they man-made?

Autumn Show caves are caves that are open to the public for money, things like Wookey Hole or White Scar Cave, that the non-caving public are taken round by a guide. Usually they are closed because they're not making enough money rather than for any safety reason (like a collapse), but of course to explore them safely by yourself you need caving experience, to have learned the techniques and the dangers.

I agree Damn. Ive been doing quite a lot of caving and DH is still digging regularly.
I am very aware of how people think they are good at caving and actually have no understanding of the risks at all. Having done the training to be part of the rescue team (in france - not sure they have one here in the UK), I am also keenly aware how hard it can be to move stretcher around in a cave (and you really dont want to be the 'lucky' person who lies in the stretcher during the exercise!).

That's why I am saying that the friend has no clue about what it means to go digging in a garden like this. Unless they ony plan to dig half a meter down and then give up, its just stupid to do that with so little knowledge/equipment.

Can I just clarify too?
Going caving with a child is one thing. Digging the ground to create another entrance is something totally different that requires a different set of skills.

As I said, going caving with a child isnt an issue per se.
Going digging with a child is a completely different thing. I think that digging like this with a child is dangerous and stupid., even whe you know what you are doing.

I suspect we are very much on the same page Nom! And good for you on the rescue training, that's not easy at all both physically and mentally. The caving community needs more people like you!

They do have a rescue team in the UK, they're all volunteers if you wanted to join up! British Caving Rescue Council (BCRC), they're a REALLY great group of people. You can find a list of the independent regional teams here www.caverescue.org.uk/rescue-teams/