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Article: IN TOO DEEP; The bright young adventurers of the Oxford University Caving Club plumb some of the deepest systems in the subterranean world. Occasionally they die doing so. At the age of 50, former member and Mail on Sunday writer David Rose went back below ground on a 132-hour odyssey to explore man's compulsion to map its furthest boundaries - whatever the cost.(Features)
- Article from:
- The Mail on Sunday (London, England)
- Article date:
- August 23, 2009
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2009 Solo Syndication Limited. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Byline: David Rose
It's well after midnight, more than ten hours since we left the surface. Still we're heading down. My harness clipped to a nylon rope, I swing my legs and then my body over a blade of rock, out horizontally over the darkness to a pair of metal bolts drilled into the wall. It is the top of a vertical shaft whose depth I can only estimate.
From somewhere below comes the rumble of falling water and a chilly draught. For a moment I dangle from the bolts, hard steel rawlplugs drilled into the rock, and adjust the heavy equipment bags that hang from my waist. Then I thread the rope through my abseil device, squeeze its 'dead man's handle' ...