asscciation for mexican cave studies box 7672 ut station austin ...

11SUMIDEROYOCHIBby Bill SteeleBlake Harrison's caver truck, the ltRog of Steel," pulled out of Kirkwoodon March 4 occupied by Blake, Jill Do~an, Joe Lieberz, Carmen Soileau,~like Van Note, Jim Smith, and myself. A 55-hour through drive netted thecrew the desired rendez-vous ~ate in Yochib village, north of San Cristoballas Casas, Chiapas, Mexico.}like Boon and Wes Davis from Calgary, Alberta. had been at Yochib forthree weeks prior to our arrival. They worked on rigging the cave in preparationfor the expected large turnout of AMCS cavers intent on finishing offthe cave. This was the fifth expedition to Yochib.Sumidero Yochib is an intelligent cave. Each step one takes in it mustbe calculated and confident. The water that flows in the entrance has beenestimated at 4~ cfs during its lowest ebb. enough to never allow swimmingupstream against the flow, but enough to allow strong deep water that canpull the unwary over an edge.Joining us when we arrived at Yochib were Norm Pace, Jean Jancewicz,Warren Anderson, and Chris Albers from Colorado. During the time spentpreparing gear and settling into a camp. Wil Howie from }lississippi andGareth Davis from Wales joined us, brin~ing our number to fifteen persons.The Canadians had rigged to the drop prior to Camp I. Boon and Weshad had a rough time of it entering with duffle after duffle of tacklenecessary to rig this vertical river cave. Some things had chanr,ed. Beneaththe first drop where we had swum a choppy lake the year before, nowwe could wade chest deep rough water guided by a rope. The long canalsoon after this lake was waded through in '76, now it was over one's head,requiring a 75m rope rigged to exit this trough.Along in Boon's gear was a phone line he had picked up to install toa prospective Camp II at the terminus of previous exploration. This consistedof one mile of wire on a foot diameter spool, two phones, and asix-volt battery power source. The two riggers had brought the line tothe end of the 75m canal. It.was felt by Boon that it wouldn't be feasibleto camp underground without daily word from the surface as to what the rainprospects were apt to be.The first day of cave entry by AMCSers saw three separate groups enteringwith the purpose in mind of securing both traverse rigging and phone linesall the way to a speculative camp lIon some flowstone deep in the cave.Hammocks were taken in to be strun~. The camping team was to be Gareth Davis,Howie, and Boon. Four days was to be the length of their intended stay.The initial rig~ing team consisted of Van Note, JanceWicz. Smith, Howie,and myself. Boon's desire had been for us to rig down to a Camp II, taking allgear found on the way with us. This ~urned out to be too much to handle. Bythe time we had reached Camp I. we had more 8ear than we could carry. letalone swim and maneuver. At Camp I, we deliberated and concluded that we shouldtake only gear we knew to be needed to get to Camp II, leaving the campersto carry their own gear down or camp at Camp I if the rigging wasn't completed.The phone line was being brought into Camp I by Soileau, .~nderson, }~bers, andPace. Beyond Camp I, Boon, Davis, and Davis were going to carry on with it toCamp II.From Camp I we headed down rigging into Bad Dreares. Ne found here thatthe rocks we had stepped on previously to cross the river were gone and thewater deep. For moments it seemed we would need to cross way above and boltdownwards. Van Note saved the occasion with a superb dive on pang belay byfour ready haulers. The wave he caught took him into a cul-de-sac ~~lere he