Club Trip Report 30th May 2026 John Thomas Nat, Ray, Mark, Bryan, Dorothy, Conall, José, James Aim to visit sump and put Nat the diver into the water. 10m handline, 10m traverse line, x2 12l cylinders. Drysuit under oversuit. Excellent Trip thank you to all for your immense help! Really exciting progress made. Callout taken by Irish Cave Divers. Everyone in the group had a tackle bag to carry each over the fields and into the cave. The cave starts with a low horizontal crawl,

New passage pushed in Cats Hole. Cats Hole B Sorry @⁨Bryan caving⁩, @⁨Mark⁩ the new hole was pushed. Ray went to show me where the room was and I gauged thst I could fit after we moved one boulder. We rigged a 10m rope and without any srt kit played about with rigging carabiniers into a descender. After finding a suitable config we need up just converting to a belay system. The room dropped 2m into a boulder chokes room. A passage right was first expired but terminated quickl

Lower Stream Passage, Sump 1 & Extensions Ray & Nathaniel (3/05/26) The night before, a discussion took place on what to do tomorrow. Either Palnasac Sump, Nathaniel Diving and I dig out the rift so i can fit to explore it or Freda's Hole Sump. (I didn't plan to go through on this), So if was left to decide in the Morning. Around 11am awaken for me, so breakfast and coffee was got the gear ready. Nathaniel walked in and Freda's if was! We took Nathaniels van up, parked up and

Diver: Nathaniel Cavers: Ray, Mark, Chris, Adden, Dorthery , Peter Dive report from Pollnagollum of the Boats Fermanagh last weekend 25th April Dove midnight Sump with x2 3ls Line is regained ~10m into the sump. Contious through the airbell and beyond through a narrow sandy squeeze. This was passed and belay with cut line left. Suspect either broken or was the final tie off. Way on is dark opening but I did read of Arthur that everything closed down. Anyone have reference to

Nathaniel & Ray 23/04/2026 Ray finished work early, arrived back at the Hub, and Nathaniel was there so we decided to take a small trip over to look at Polnasac, where there was a landslide after the floods in July 2025 to see if we could still get in. So the main aim for the trip was to look at and access the sump in Polnasac and the Pool in Hanging Rock Cave. Polnasac sump area looking a little different, but still accessible. A rift was looked at to the left, which I could

26/04/2026 Peter & Ray With a later start than Saturday's caving at the time of noon, leaving from the Hub (Caving Hut) we decided on Little Gortmaconnel pot, as Peter had not done it. Nathaniel was already away from around 9 am or before cave diving at the Mable Arch Caves, he had awoken me earlier by the sound of air out the back while he was getting ready to go. myself and Peter got the rope and other rigging gear packed up, an a quick stop at the shop for some snacks,

March 22nd Ray, Mark, Bryan We parked up and Ray cheerfully told us it was only a “bit of a trek” to the entrance. Spirits were high heading off, and not long into it we stumbled across a café, which felt too perfectly timed to ignore. Coffee was had, excuses were made, and we convinced ourselves it was essential preparation for the “real” climb ahead. Eventually we dragged ourselves away and pushed on up, helped along by the scenery and the promise of what was ahead. At th

Report 11 April 2026 Cave: Carrickcoppan 3 Peruvian Pot Cavers: Ray, Peter, Mark, Nathaniel Equipment: Type A 20m Rope Day 1 of the horizontal leader training was met with apocalyptic weather. Strong winds and hard rain. We convened in the Barn to begin a briefing that evolved into a full day event, covering a massive range of information on Pre-trip checks, Weather, Group information, Cave choice, access to caves, call outs & overdue, access to dry clothing, emergency comfor

21st March 2026 After the AGM meeting that morning, we were itching to get out caving. After a decent fry up we hit the road, the weather was fantastic. Nearly too good to be in a cave all day. But we didn’t travel from Dublin to Yorkshire for sunbathing. The plan today was to do a classic Yorkshire trip, a pull-through of Swinsto Hole. A pull-through caving trip is: “…an advanced technique wherecavers use a single rope to descend a pitch (shaft), then pull it down from above

Mark & Ray (Bryran to come later) 20th March 2026 After arriving at Leeds Airport, we hired a car to get to YSS Caving Hut. We decided to try to get some sleep for an hour or two before we head out caving. Mark fell asleep, while I couldn't do so. When Mark arose out of his beauty sleep, we geared up and headed over to Runscar Hill to do some easier in-and-out surface-type caves, which we thought were just walking passages, but there seemed to be a fair bit of crawling to s

Gleniff Horseshoe 21st February 2026 Mark, Bryan & Ray ( Was meant to be a lot more members on this one, but things happen, worked out for the best really, as it turned out to be a trip that too many wouldn't have worked and be a lot of waiting around, too cold and wet for that stuff) Ray & Mark met up at the Hub for around 10 am, piled all into one car and headed over to the meeting point over at the Horseshoe area, where we met Bryan, who had camped up on the mountain, "May

Nathaniel, Ray 10/02/2026 Headed up to Cuilcagh Mountain, parking at the Marble Arch Show Cave Carpark, After getting the Key for the gate, we headed across the dry valley rifted area to the right at the end of the carpark, exploring some areas of interest, not finding must bar one hole between boulders where we tied the camera and a light to a rope and lowered it to see, but to later see on the footage there was little bar a bit of rubbish down in there. On over towards Crad

Saturday 24/01/26 Shannon cave trip Bryan, Ray, Mark and two Cornish miners that where visiting. Meeting at The Hub for 11 am. After deciding the cave to be the Shannon cave system. The weather has been miserable all week with steady drizzle all day. A cautious approach to any cave we do must be taken. Taking two cars, we drove up to the farm yard below the track to the Shannon, a quick chat to the landowner and his wife, who had breakfast cooking and the fire blazing in the

Trip report for Noones hole 27th December Me and Ray met up at the Hub, threw the gear together, and headed off. Ray rigged the first couple of pitches and I took the last two. At the bottom of the first pitch Ray spotted what he thought was a bit of calcite sitting on a ledge. He poked it. It was a dead fish. And for reasons unknown, he then sniffed his finger. I wasn't enticed to follow that decision.. We pushed on through towards Crucifixion Crawls which were as grim as ev

Trip Report 2nd Jan 2026 Rat Run West Gorge System. Nathaniel, Peter, Oisin This cave was found in 2018 by a group of cavers, it subsequently had a collapse and was left unexplored until Ray rediscovered it and stabilized it using scaffold. The cave itself is very tight, with seldom any room to sit up, demanding and slow crawl/ worming all the way through. Given the small nature of the cave small bottles were required so I borrowed a set of Ray's 3L bottles and requested the

Trip Report 31st December 2025 Nathaniel, Alex, Siofra, Peter & Ray What better way for a year to finish than to build upon the old and prepare for the future. This trip started from a simple phone call to another cave diving buddy wherein to possibilities of diving over the new year period came up. After a previous successful mission through Upstream Sump 1 previously with Ray I knew that the sump was a great training ground and development site for sump diving. The carry in

"Prods Pot on 29/11/2025 Bryan & Ray We meet at the Hub for 11 am on Saturday morning. The plan was to go to the Mines in Sligo, but with time running a little late, it was decided to go for a trip down Prods Pot in Fermanagh. Got the gear from the gear store and drove to the parking site, got geared up on a frosty, cold mountainside! We started the walk up to the cave following the Ulster Way for three marker posts, then going left down to the Doline in the trees. Ray rigged

"We got off to a later start than planned(blame the whiskey) but eventually met at the Hub, grabbed the gear, and decided on Pollnagossan for the day. It was just the three of us: Bryan, Ray, and Nathaniel. After the drive up we got changed in the cold and headed down into the doline to find the entrance. Dropped in and straight into the rift crawl. Worked our way through the crawls until we reached the Car Wash, which soaked all three of us whether we liked it or not. Just a

Friday 19th December Cavers: Ray & Nathaniel Cave: John Thomas Cave, Co. Fermanagh, NI, UK After Ray’s less-than-successful diving attempt on the North Coast on Thursday — involving bad wash, swell, being knocked over, and ending up sprawled on the sand like a beached whale — we were already questioning our life choices. Thankfully, the sea had won it for me, while Nat continued the dive, but the caves were still calling, and I still learnt a lot so it was ok. On the driv