Very unique place to say the least, looks like with the right tools (scuba gear anyone? haha) and big enough balls you could get lost down there exploring its bowels.
just to add my two penarth to this report which is fantastic btw part of the reason for the vortexes of air is that part of the second singlebore tunnels was during the late 60 early 70s sealed up for experimentation on the effects of two trains passing in along tunnel .this was to do with the channel tunnel that was abandoned in 1974 .some of the vents and cross passages were sealed to aid this .also standage was the only long tunnel to have watertroughs inside the tunnells to allow trains to take on water without stopping these were fed by the large watertower at the diggle end of the tunnel this was only possible as standage rail tunnels are dead level throughout something else that is unique to standage for a rail tunnel of any length .if you had carried on along the trackbed for aprox 1/2 a mile you would have come to the shorter butterhouse tunnel on the lifted micklehurst loop this has been sealed at one end with an earth enbankment .
It's the mutts nuts - reckon you could stay down there all week and still keep finding new stuff.
Photography's great as usual and a mega write up - nice one!
Thanks guys.
I'm doing a more detailed history on this place.
I've a load more pics and history for the set.
I'll add the link to the finished thing when it's all done (sometime next week)
There's the canal tunnel included too