Trip report by Mike Kovacs
Trip date: 2025-05-03
Trip purpose: Rescue Cache Service Trip in Upper Thunder

Trip participants: Bill Gee
Mike Kovacs
Candace Kovacs
Shane McCurdy
Jack Rufener
Jerel Waters

Entry Time: 9:30am
Exit Time: 4:00pm

How far: We entered Carroll Cave via the Backdoor Entrance to the Round Room, SLUG Cairn and ultimately to the Rescue Cache at/near the Breakdown Barrier.

Injuries: No

Trash: The only items removed from the cave were the defective lighters and old matches in the rescue cache which were replaced with new lighters and matches in dated and vacuum sealed bags.

Biology: Cave Fish = 15 Eight of these were in one small area.
Grotto Salamander = 1 (at the ladder)

The trip report: All of the team members were in the silo by 9:15 am and we were all in the cave by 9:30am

Bill Gee pre-rigged a deviation to attach to the rope at the regular rigging points against the ladder and cable. This proved to be very efficient for the descent. The deviation was rigged to an adjacent rig point in the silo with a prussik knot on the rigging point for adjustments and a pulley on the other end that connected to the main rope.

After we were all in the cave, we removed our vertical gear and started our journey into Upper Thunder passage. On the way from the ladder, we learned Jack Rufener, Jerel Waters & Shane McCurdy had not visited the Angel Pool rimstone formation. We decided to take that route and check out the Angel Pool and look around the passage for a few moments before continuing with our objective.

When we reached Flat Rock Falls, Mike Kovacs previously had requested Bill Gee to show the team the location of the entrance to UR1 and The Land of Shock and Awe so Bill kindly pointed out the entrance to the passage!

We arrived at the Round Room at approximately 10:45am and discussed how this is one of the usual camping spots in this part of Upper Thunder passage. We made pretty good time from the ladder to the Round Room, so we decided to carry on to the Second Azure Pool (the Chocolate Bunny) for the team members that had not seen it before as well as to make this a good stop to eat lunch.

On the way to the Chocolate Bunny, we entered The Bone Room and discussed why it is called ‘The Bone Room’. Shane McCurdy hypothesized maybe it’s because it is also a known camping area and perhaps that’s where people like to rest their weary bones! It’s the best we could come up with as The Bone Room is remarkably FLAT, consisting of a medium-hard clay floor and almost literally nothing else! No BONES about it! 🙂

We arrived at the Chocolate Bunny at 11:15am to take photos, eat and hydrate. We departed at approximately 11:45am.

On this final leg of the mission, we passed the SLUG Cairn and pressed on through seemingly everlasting breakdown passage and rooms as Candace joked that every room we passed through sure looked like ‘The’ Collapsed Dome Room. Lots of breakdown in this area. There’s plenty up climb up-climb down areas through this section of Upper Thunder.

We arrived at the Rescue Cache near the start of Breakdown Barrier at approximately 12:30pm. We took an inventory, documented it and inspected the items therein. Jack observed that, upon inspection, a BIC lighter had lost its spring & flint somehow. We replaced the lighters and matches regardless of their condition with two lighters and a box of weatherproof matches in a vacuum sealed bag which is dated so we can test to see how long a vacuum seal will withstand the moisture.

We also added a vacuum sealed BIC lighter with a desiccant pack in a dated vacuum sealed bag as well to see if the desiccant pack helps at all for long term storage. Jerel, Jack and Shane all shared some pretty good ideas about adding a striker of some sort to the cache, so if the lighters still have fuel in them but no flint, or the lighter has too much moisture, as a last resort you could still potentially get a flame going.

We also attached a braided reflective paracord piece to serve as a highly visible marker for the cache itself.

From this point we blazed back toward The Round Room and arrived there at approximately 2:00pm and took a short break before the final push back to the ladder.

We all arrived at the ladder about 3:20pm and Candace volunteered to replace a busted piece of speaking tube that Bill provided. Our knife wasn’t as sharp as what the job dictated and there was also calcium build-up on the tube itself up in the shaft about 6 feet, so this job was very wet and a bit slow moving but Candace and Jerel completed this final mission for the day. Shane also provided a super cool miniature wonder-bar/prybar that helped pry the old tube away from the calcite build-up on the speaking tube.

In the meantime, everyone else geared up for the ascent. Candace was the first to ascend as she was already on-rope at about 3:40pm. The rest of the team made their way up the ladder, and we were all out of the cave at 4:00pm.

*Notes
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Rescue Cache:

Current Inventory:
Four 1ft pads sleeping pads for sleeping/sitting etc.
Cutting board
Splint
Cache of zip lock bags
Two gauze rolls
1 bag of medium candles 7 count
Exam gloves (nitrile) and matches in the same bag
Safety pins
Thermal blanket
Triangular poly bandages
Rite In The Rain note pad and pencil
Trash bags

Replaced/Added Inventory:

1 vacuum sealed bag of 2 lighters and 1 box of weatherproof matches
1 vacuum sealed bag containing 1 BIC lighter and 1 desiccant pack
Reflective Paracord to serve as a visual identifier for the rescue cache.

More photos and some GoPro short movies are on Google Drive.