Word: windlass
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Belgian-French cave-exploring team went back to Basses-Pyrénées, made the long, hard climb from Licq-Athérey to Lépineux's discovery. They brought climbing ladders, cement to secure loose rock in the side of the chimney, and a windlass to lower the explorers into the unknown. Expedition Chief Max Cosyns, a Belgian nuclear physicist who goes after spelunking records on the side, estimated the chimney's depth by timing the echo from rocks that ricocheted off the limestone walls. The explorers were looking for a drop of about...
...week preparations were completed. Discoverer Lépineux had the traditional right to make the first descent. He buckled on his parachute harness, put a steel helmet over his woolen cap, adjusted his miner's head lamp and his altimeter, hooked his harness to the cable of the windlass and, after a quick handshake all around, stepped off into the void...
...dropped one meter every six seconds, all the while reporting regularly to Cosyns over a special telephone connected through the center of the cable. At 130 meters, the expedition got a bad scare when a short circuit cut off communication for a few moments. But by the time the windlass dial registered 300 meters, excitement on the surface was running high. If Lépineux continued for just a little longer, he would break the long-standing vertical drop record of 318 meters.* "Stop," he finally called. "I am on the bottom." The windlass dial registered 356 meters...