UAYCEF's August 2004 Monthly Bulletin
VERTICAL WORKSHOPS: Just a reminder that UAYCEF will be running a series of vertical workshops over the course of this year, to include the following dates: Aug. 28 & Sept. 18. Details can be found at the UAYCEF Activities Schedule at: http://www.geocities.com/cnico22000/activities/activities.html
WHO SHOULD ATTEND?
· Are you using a right-handed ascender as your top ascender in your Frog system?
· Do you constantly get on rope without at least one prussic loop being readily available?
· Are using cowtails made of static cord instead of dynamic?
· Do you need practice in the area of deep drop rappels (i.e. drops with excessive rope weight)?
· Do you need to learn how to do change-overs?
· Do you need to learn how and when to use a pigtail?
· Are you using a single locking carabiner to connect your rappel device?
· Are you planning to learn how to use a etrier and/or cable ladder during the course of a caving trip?
If you answered ''Yes" to any of the above questions, you might want to attend the workshop, rather than to try to learn these skills at the last minute in a cave when things might not be going exactly as you would like (ex. getting stuck under a waterfall, overshooting a deviation, having to pass an unconscious caver on rope, etc.)
Currently, negotiations are underway to use a facility in Westchester County the first Wednesday of each month for vertical workshops starting in November. In addition, this same facility will be used to conduct sessions of the two and a half-day long Vertical Orientation Course of the National Speleological Society. Dates and other details will be forthcoming in future UAYCEF monthly bulletins.
UPCOMING ACTIVITIES: You can find details on other upcoming vertical workshops and trips at: http://www.geocities.com/cnico22000/activities/activities.html
Some upcoming trips/events include the following:
· August 28th - Vertical Workshop (Contact Tom Oakes at toakes@snet.net )
· September 19th - Clarksville Caves in Clarksville, NY
· Septemeber 21st - Central Connecticut Grotto monthly meeting - Slide show about UAYCEF's "Priests Grotto" project, as covered by the BBC, National Pubic Radio, the NBC Today Show & The NY Daily News
· Mexico – November 19th thru 29th
· December 9th -
· Ukraine - Dec. 29 - Jan. 5, 2005: During the day ski & cave on Crimea's Ai Petri Plateau, overlooking historic Yalta 3000 feet below. At night travel down to Yalta by cable car, tour the city, and then swim in the Black Sea, before returning back up the plateau, and your lodging at a ski chalet.
· Puerto Rico - March 5th to March 13th, 2005
Unless otherwise stated above, all inquiries about cave trip participation should be directed to Chris Nicola.
NEWS:
UAYCEF Director Chris Nicola has accepted a position on the Executive Board of the Proyecto Espeleologico Sierra Oxmolon, which has now discovered over thirty virgin caves in Mexico's Aquismon region. Currently, preparations are being made for this year's Thanksgiving week expedition, which will take place from November 20th to November 28th. Any person interested in joining the expedition should contact Chris Nicola at Chris Nicola. Please note, in addition to searching for new caves, participants will also be expected to work with those teams surveying previously found caves.
UAYCEF's "Priests Grotto"
project was featured in the June/July edition of National Geographic
"Adventure" magazine. Additional media coverage was provided by the
NBC Today Show, the BBC, National Public Radio, New York Daily News, Montreal
Gazzette, and Long Island Newsday. On
June 14th Chris Nicola gave a special presentation at New York City's
"Half King" restaurant at the request of "Adventure" magazine.
Information about the project, as well as an up to date listing of
future presentations/events, can be found at: http://www.geocities.com/cnico.geo/homepage/presentations.htm
New Deep Cave Record: The depth of the Republic of Georgia's Voronja cave has been extended to below -1800 meters. For details go to: http://speleolog.ru/news/10krubera/ For a history of the region go to: http://www.geocities.com/cnico22000/voronja/arabika_history.html
New Deep Pit Record: http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/08/09/croatia.deep.cavern.ap/index.html
Discovery of John the Baptist's Cave: http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s1179113.htm
Cave diver fatality in Florida: http://www.wcjb.com/news.asp?id=10418
Caves in the News: A link, entitled "caves in the News" has now been added to the UAYCEF homepage which can be found http://www.uaycef.org
British Cavers David Hounslow and Collin Hatward, who have participated in several previous UAYCEF expeditions, will be touring the TAG region from September 18th to October 3rd, 2004. Tony and Christine Voudy of Georgia will be acting as their hosts.
SELECTED PAST ACTIVITIES:
(1) Tenth Longest Cave in the World Secured ! – In August of 2003 UAYCEF
funded a complete overall of the exiting gate system at Ozernaya Cave in Western Ukraine. Additional gates were also installed, now
making this one of the most secure caves in Eastern Europe. This 77 plus mile
cave is not only the 10th longest cave in the world, but also the second
largest of the World’s Giant Gypsums, with the 130 plus mile Optimisticheskaya
taking the lead. These are just two of the caves that participants of
UAYCEF’s annual expeditions visit on a regular basis.
(2) Ukrainian Caver’s US Tour – UAYCEF sponsored Tetyana “Tanya” Yermakova’s six-week, seven state U.S. tour from October 5 to November 16, 2004. There are many cavers whose tireless effort and dedication served to make Tanya’s trip such a successful one. At the risk of leaving someone out, for which I apologize ahead of time, the following deserve special recognition for all that they did to make Tanya’s trip one of the most memorable, exciting and enjoyable experiences of her life:
Emily Davis & Mike Warner of Speleobooks, Bob Cohen, Larry Davis, Ben Gunther, Peter Haberland, Chuck Porter & Connie LaPorta, John Sagendorf and the Howe Caverns crew, Jay Jorden & Sheila Knight, Craig & Olga Taub, Mark & Cathy Skove, Peter & Noreen Lenahan, Vera Lyudmirskaya, Anatoliy & Lydia Knator, Christine & Tony Voudy, Mike Walsh, Gordon Birkhimer, Kurt R Waldron, Bob Hadley, Julie Schenck, Julie Jenkins, Becky & Les Lorenz, Craig and Tiki Hall, Valeriy and Luda Rogozhnikov, Sally Dewes, Dave Mc Clung, Alexander Barton, Bernie McBurnett … and the list goes on J
While Jay Jorden’s full report of Tanya’s experiences can be found at the below website, a condensed version of it can be found in the this April’s edition of the NSS News, along with a very nice photograph of Tanya, taken by Peter Lenahan.
http://www.geocities.com/cnico22000/TripReports/tanyatripjayreport.html
(3) Puerto Rico Trips – From March 4th to the 8th, UAYCEF once again ran it’s annual trip to Puerto Rico. In addition, it arranged for Peter Lenahan, who was not able to make the this trip and had to visit the island on his own, to go caving with Martin Hernandez and Orlando Garcia , two long time local caving friends of UAYCEF.
Peter’s trip report can be found at: http://www.geocities.com/cnico22000/TripReports/lenahanpr2004report.html
His pictures can be found at: http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=2bsj0nll.9p4zqnjt&x=1&y=5owqpg and at http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=2bsj0nll.6px02fft&x=1&y=-gd6uup
The following went on the annual trip: Chris Nicola, Bob Cohen, Sally Dewes (stayed till 3/10th), Lidiya & Anatoliy Kantor, Alex Argiro, Ellie Hanson, Keith Gronwald (stayed till 3/10th), Luis Espinasa (stayed till 3/9th), Ellie Hanlon, and David Stuebner (see group photo at http://home.att.net/~uaycef/Photos/PR2004Group.jpg).
(4) Local Cavers At Explorer’s Club Dinner - On March 20th Bernie Chowdhury, Kevin O’Brien and Chris Nicola attended the 100th Anniversary Dinner of the Explorer’s Club where in addition to having the opportunity to eat such “Exotics” as spiced glazed termite, roasted scorpions, mealworms, and roasted tempura Tarantula, they got the chance to hear the following list of distinguished speakers:
· Sir Edmund Hillary
· Jim Fowler
· Sylvia Earle
· Don Walsh
· Bertrand Piccard
· Steven Squyres
· Brad Washburn
·
Buzz Aldrin
And on top of all this, Chris got to sit next to Teddy Roosevelt. Well not really, he was actually a professional impersonator named Jim Foote; a relative of legendary northeast caver Sarah Foote, of Leatherman fame.
ver. 8/27/04
