Marcus wanted to go and have a look at sump six in P8 (Jackpot) in Derbyshire. Several years ago he did some work towards sump ten but had always by-passed sump six which branches off between sumps five and seven, both of which drain into six. With sump six being the lowest point in what is known as the downstream sumps (one to ten) it offers a good digging potential. So our aim today was to try and get to six if the other sumps were open.

A lightweight trip was planned using lead previously staged down the cave and only taking minimal equipment. (How impressed was Marcus when we got to the sump and I pulled a camera out of my bag?) Unfortunately we were unable to locate some lead left by another diver (Jim) and I didn’t have enough weight to sink properly so I only had a quick look into sump one.

Marcus did rather better. The first three sumps were open and sump four only needed a small amount of work to make it passable. Sump five was more heavily obstructed by silt and sand. Marcus exited the sump after making a couple of meters by digging.

We then left the cave which is now nowhere near as popular as it used to be. The total trip time was about 6 hours.