Barbados: Map caves for peace of mind

[L Roebuck]

Map caves for 'peace of mind'
by CARMEL HAYNES, Nationnews.com

MAPPING UNDERGROUND CAVES is a costly exercise but Government could consider doing so to provide peace of mind for Barbadians.

This suggestion was made by one of Barbados' leading contractors, Achal Moorjani, following a presentation to the Barbados Association of Professional Engineers (BAPE) yesterday at the Barbados Yacht Club, Bay Street, St Michael.

"We've known all these years that we have caves. I mean Cave Hill is called Cave Hill because there are caves there – and we know that it can happen and with the instrumentation we have now we can map it.

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[jonsdigs]

Caves and landslips in Barbados
The Barbados Advocate
Sep 16 2007

THE tragic collapse of a section of the apartment building at Arch Cot Terrace, Brittons Cross Road, St. Michael about 5 a.m. on Sunday, 26th August, 2007, and the death of five members of the Codrington family, should serve as a wake-up call to the politicians, the Town Planning Department and the emergency services...

...The geology of Barbados shows the island, which is 115 000 acres of which 6/7ths is coral stone, 300 000 years old, is honeycombed with thousands of caves, ranging in size from small pocket caves, to the massive Bowmanston Cave, which is over one and a half miles long, and 300 feet below ground level.

The Barbados Water Authority has pumped water from this Bowmanston Cave since the 1880s. Entry to the cave is gained at the Bowmanston Pumping Station where 4 persons at a time are lowered by a winch in a bucket three feet by three feet, with persons standing in the bucket, and holding on to the cable for dear life. The winch lowers you 280 feet into the well: a dam flooded with water through a manmade tunnel for 200 feet. The tunnel is about six feet wide and seven feet deep, and it is necessary to swim fully clothed with your light. It is completely dark except for your light. My team, with compass and measure mapped the cave over two separate days. Frank (Froggie) Gibbons, land surveyor, plotted the route on a Barbados topographical map. It disappeared into a hole too small to enter west of Bowmanston Pumping Station at Kendal Plantation, St. John, a distance of about one mile. The cave varied in size from narrow passages of five feet wide and ten feet high, to 20 feet wide and 50 feet high, with water flowing constantly. It took two 15-hour surveys to complete the distance, going into the bucket at three p.m. and out at 6 a.m. the following day. For food we carried only chocolate bars in a waterproof bag. We always carried three sources of light: Two flashlights with extra batteries and bulbs and a carbide lamp per person, and candles with waterproof matches, and sturdy boots, which invariably were torn to shreds at the end of the day. One had to be particularly careful if there was a sign of a fresh rockfall, as this was an indication of other rockfalls to closely follow. There are several other popular caves around Barbados, with Harrison Cave developed as a tourist attraction in the 1970s, still the main tourist attraction today. Cole's Cave in St. Thomas is also well known...

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