OUCC Proceedings 9 (1979)

Martin Laverty

This cave was discovered and explored by the French group, Speleo-Club Orsay Faculté (SCOF). They also surveyed it, using (as we now realise after consultation of a dictionary and Caving International No. 1) a compass and Topofil. The latter is a device for reeling out cotton thread and recording its length. The thread bestrews the passage like some demented spider's web. The final survey was distinctly uninformative: there is no depth information at all, nor notification of climbs or pitches. We followed the impressive old phreatic roof tube 'upstream' and climbed down the narrow, deep vadose trench to the active streamway, which was followed for a short distance up- and down-stream. The stream was of such magnitude that the dye we introduced seemed to exhibit no flow at all. It will be interesting to see if the cave stream is identical with that seen in the adjacent Vega de Justillagar (Jou Seco on Miötkes' map). This certainly seems possible. We will be interested to know the results of SCOF's dye tracing from Frieru; a member of SIE (Barcelona) thought that they had obtained a result, but didn't have any details. The possibilities appear that the water goes to Cueva del Viento, or to the large resurgence in the upper Pomperi valley. The chemistry of the latter indicates a large streamway with little solutional activity affecting its water.