# ridge quarry june 2009



## tommo (Jun 14, 2009)

well what can i say, this is the first of a 2 part day 

meet up with some others, styru,root + 2 ladys( root is the king of the swing!! lol),bearclaw,budice and one of his mates

first up was ridge quarry, after meeting up at the pub and sorted out car sharing, we headed up to ridge.
we all got out and got kitted up only to walk round the corner and for me to come head on with the smallest of small holes to get through :banghead

** LITTLE BIT OF HISTORY**

Ridge Quarry is a small underground Bath-stone quarry at The Ridge near Corsham in Wiltshire,when they where mining it they found a geological fault in the rock which ment they had to follow the good rock and this created a 2 level quarry,it was quarryied for limestone up untill 1914, then Ridge was requisitioned by the War Department in which it was used to store TNT and cordite.the war department then cut out 2 slope shafts from the surface in to the quarry and fitted them with narrow gauge railways for the transport of munitions in and out the quarry. Conversion of Ridge Quarry posed few problems as virtually all the clearing work had been done by the Ministry of munitions during the first World War. The gross area of the usable part amounted to nine and a half acres of which 3 and a half acres consisted of support pillars, leaving six acres for storage. 

ridge then became one of the first munitions stores in the area Ridge Quarry was never converted to the same extent as the rest of the Central Ammunitions Depot Corsham so it became surplus soon after the war had finished.
during the second world war it was mainly used by the RAF for munitions storage up until 1955, then after that the place just had maintenance under the Ministry of Works and Building, which where put in charge just to keep it ticking over
then in 1975 it was bought by the neston estate and just left to be explored.


on with the explore

so all in all a good morning out, had a good look round ridge and also some of the old workings 

cheers to all that came and help make the day what it was :thumb

some pics below but was having a nightmare with focusing today, so not that great






































group shot, soon to be on britains most wanted!! lol


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## Foxylady (Jun 15, 2009)

Ooh, this looks cool. Limestone quarry, yeah? Do you have any history/info about about it?
Pics are fine. Nice work.


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## tommo (Jun 15, 2009)

Foxylady said:


> Ooh, this looks cool. Limestone quarry, yeah? Do you have any history/info about about it?
> Pics are fine. Nice work.



Yeah of course I forgot all about it, will edit the post tonight when I get home


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## james.s (Jun 16, 2009)

Very nice and well lit


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## klempner69 (Jun 21, 2009)

Very good shots indeed with an excellant piece of history.Look forward to seeing some of these places soon


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