Tresviso Caves Project - Road to Certain Death - Cave Diving

Описание: Operating from the mountain village of Tresviso (Cantabria), in the eastern massif of the Picos de Europa, the current expedition team has been mapping and exploring caves in the area since 2015. However cave exploration here has been taking place since the early 1970’s when Lancaster University Speleological Society (LUSS) first visited the area.
Tresviso is situated above the Urdon gorge where a major cave, Cueva del Nacimiento (also known as Cueva del agua) resurges. The water which leaves the cave is captured by the Canal de Urdón which takes it to the nearby hydroelectric station. Each day millions of litres of water flow out of the cave which is indication of how significant it is for the hydrology of the limestone mountains which tower above the gorge.
In 1976 the cavers exploring Nacimiento located an unusual feature. After Colin Boothroyd scaled an 8m waterfall they found a deep sump pool immediately at the top of the climb. Inspired by Monty Python they named the cave passage the ‘road to certain death’ and the sump itself became ‘certain death’.
Rob Parker was first to venture into the water in 1985 and again in 1986 when he reached -64m and reported an ascending shaft leading on. Gavin Newman then took up the challenge of diving here which culminated in the 1996 trip where he made a film for the BBC’s extreme lives series about diving the sump with Phil Short. The film was called ‘the road to certain death’ and features Gavin, Phil, Colin, Jim Thompson and Mark(?)
Since 1996 the sump has remained dived until this year when I was able to make an attempt to explore it thanks to an excellent team of cavers from the Tresviso Caves Project. The sump is located approximate 1 hour from the entrance but before I could dive we needed to re-climb the 7m water fall and rig ropes in this section. Then the heavy and bulky diving equipment was carried to the sump for me to dive. I was expecting a deep dive with significant decompression and chose to use a KISS Sidewinder with TMx bailout/dil. At the furthest point reached by the previous explorers the way on was clear to me, a tall rift which opened out quickly into a huge passage. After 200m of diving and route finding the passage had ascended to 6m depth where after completing my final deco stop I was able to surface in a medium sized lake. Following the cave upstream I soon encountered sump 2 which I passed after a 40m dive to reach a sizable dry chamber with several possibilities for future exploration.
A massive thanks to all the cavers on the Tresviso Caves Project expedition who made this possible and to the previous explorers of this fantastic cave.