Drain of The Week.
Hmm, nah, its not coming back for good, just for Xmas n New Years.
This DOTW is a double whammy. Twice the waterfall wonders. Get you all away from all that boring old brickwork n setting the gaze of your peepers onto some shiny early 1990's reinforced concrete, with some freshy fresh fresh noughties rendering in behind.
Behold the Greeks!
Diodes 1993 edition of the known doc described his latest 1992 find thusly:
"Fantastic, astounding, mind bending! More features in one drain
than any other! Nuclear powered! Faster than the speed of light!"
Hercules Pillars. 1000m long is you include the side tunnel. Nine waterfalls, bunker-esque construction, bendy tunnels, weird stainless steel fittings and an almighty crop of churn pillars.
Diode discovered it while scoping out the M2 Motorway, which was under construction. In 1992, prior the the motorways completion the upstream creek simply ran into Hercs infall under its own steam, rolling languidly along the flat floors of the twin 6ft rectangles to crash noisily over the waterfalls. But as work continued on the M2, they found they had to build an underpass to get the creek under the motorway. While they were at it they also addressed the one major problem with the creek and drain.
They drain a landfill rubbish dump. Landfill generates huge amounts of polluted groundwater and similarly to mines, the water cannot be released into rivers. Given the small amounts of leachate running through Hercs a system of pools and collectors were installed. The pools to grab sediments and allow water to evaporate rather than flowing into the tunnel and the collectors to try and pick up the worst of the pollutive flow and pipe it out to leachate tanks at the outfall.
So with the completion of the M2 and this unusual pollution solution, Hercs had a set of pools installed at its infall, a concrete encased overflow pipe set into the tunnel to the 3rd waterfall, and leachate collectors mounted to the last waterfall in the main tunnel and last two in the side tunnel.
As a more popular drain in Sydney, Herc's has seen a myriad of explorers, expos and strange events such as the Annual Drolf Masters.
most ppl start at the beginning. The Underpass. A 9ft high becobwebbed concrete duct that takes water from a creek pond 200m under the motorway. Its uneventful save for the section where the flat concrete floor gives way to remains of the natural creek bed.
CREEKAGE
Around a bend and its all over, 70m of concrete channel, a 5ft rcp off to the right dumping water in from beneath Wicks Rd.
The canal has in the last 10 years become a haven for graff artists and despite its rather obscure location, piecers still layer its walls in the hope that a truck driver might look down from his high driving position up on the motorway n see it.
The canals drops unceremoniously into a pit, around neck deep on most ppl of reasonable height, this pool drains into a 1ft diameter fibreglass pipe thats encased in a concrete rectangular prism that bipasses everything from there to the third waterfall, running along the inside of the left hand of the bifurcated ducts ahead. A second pit acts as a stagnation station for the last load of water that breached the wall separating it from the first pit and on the receiving end are the two 6ft high ducts.
THE CANAL
THE INLETS (ONLY ONE IS ILLUMINATED COS I RAN OUT OF TORCH)
The Inlets plays host to a unique warning sign telling of deep and sudden drops, leachate pollution and methane, not to mention confined spaces. Most ppl ignore them n wander on in anyway.
I recall the first time i did Hercs, in mid 1997. Id not encountered a drain waterfall in the 20 odd tunnels id done before so i was mildly apprehensive. But the major lack of water in these first tunnels put my mind at ease. The diversion pipe pretty much... diverts all the flow thru the tunnels n over the waterfalls silently and efficiently, leaving only water leaking in from the ground around to lube the floor up.
The first waterfalls, 2X2 equaling 4, 2 for each tunnel, are bone dry, with rungs down one side and the diversion pipe off to the side in the western tunnels case.
SMALLERFALLS, ONE OF.
Upon entering the drain you can usually, unless theres a drought on, hear the main waterfall ahead and after negotiating the second dry fall in whichever tunnel you chose, you'll reach a small pool of ankle deep water, collected above the lip of the fall, being channeled into a stainless steel leachate collector mounted to the weir below, encased in scum. To the left the diversion pipe dumps its contents over the edge onto a splashpad; to the right there are handholds and a central ladder down, serving both tunnels.
The main waterfall room is impressive, around 25ft high and 30 feet long, the leachate pipes join from their collectors and run, clad in stainless armor to protect them from flood debris, down into the main tunnel.
THE FALL ROOM
LOOKING DOWN
The main tunnel is interesting. Its been painted black, almost with a tarry substance that has long since completely dried. The leachate pipe runs along the ceiling 10ft up and water covers the floor entirely in its flatness.
Quickly a bend comes along and the whole tunnel starts to lean, the floor dropping away slowly taking ceiling height to 12ft. Like a train going round a tight bend on its tracks, so the drain leans into its curves, the water flowing diagonally sideways to the crook of one wall.
A side tunnel comes in like the prow of the Cape Don crashing through a pier. the separating wall shaped like a boat prow, behind it hiding a tall narrow tunnel that stays narrow but sadly shrinks vertically as the floor slopes upwards from the intersection.
THE BOAT PROW JUNCTION AFAR
THE BOAT PROW JUNCTION CLOSE
This side tunnel is worthwhile, if a bit stoopy. You have to watch you dont clatter your head on the leachate pipe with its fittings and capped off branches. The first section always seems to play host to unusual wildlife, toads, frogs, bats and in the case when these photos where taken, a Ninja Turtle!
BUT WHICH ONE?
This little bugger wasnt happy at the intrusion, n soon after i took its picture scrambled off n was swept away by the flow.
Ahead is a smaller waterfall, dumping its diversion pipe and collecting leachate. The tunnel at the top is barely 5ft high and leads to a second taller fall, the second being about 15ft high.
THE LEACHATE DUMPER
The last waterfall is small, but sits in an airy grille room, with flow coming down the fall into a pit which in turn channels into the diversion pipe. Up ahead the tunnel regains another 4ft in height and you can comfortably dodge all the redbacks hanging from the ceiling to emerge in a wasteland on the side of the motorway.
A VERY OLD (10 YEARS?) PICTURE OF TRYLOK, MR INDIA, OGRE AND DIRGE AT THE LAST FALL.
Back in the main tunnel, the leaning madness continues before swapping sides, the walls yawing out the other direction as the bend opposes its former direction, leaving you to cross the sudden sideswipe of the waterflow.
LEAN THE OTHER WAY
Then its only the dead straight to the end, a walled enclosure, head off by 15 rectangular pillars, walls painted black, warning signs and leachate pipes adorning them, described by Diode fittingly as:
"The most impressive entrance yet (the pillars). This must have been
designed by some reincarnated Nazi architect."
And indeed it does have an SS feel to it, all the thick concrete and unbridled edges.
NAZI?
The pillars themselves sit in three rows of three, interspersed by two rows of two. Lucky number 13? They're set into a gentle slide and the water weaves around them arriving in a normally empty pond that sits flanked by the same 30ft high walls on two sides and an 8ft wall to the exit side, concrete staircases leading up out into the bush behind the tip.
PILLARS
At times the pond has filled up, backing water halfway up the pillar slope, but its rare cos once in one hundred year floods tend only to come, once in a a hundred years. Between these centennial occasions the pillars wait, like the guards on some strange prison to try and hold back the water when it rushes for freedom like so many rioting prisoners.
Uppppppstream of Hercs Pillars Drain is Zeus, named simply cos in the Greek mythology genealogy tree, Zues was the head honchho, Hercs dad, of sorts. The drain as such couldnt be considered mightier. It certainly came from humbler beginnings, starting out asa a 400m long 7ft rcp containg a few bends which local bat species used to wind their ways past. Then a big complex was built and the big guns got broken out.
Most ppl dont bother with the outfall as its a swamp, muddy stinky n wet n why bother negotiating it when the rest of the tunnel's a nice dry doddle.
So instead you head up into the Officeworks carpark, next to the Shell station on the corner of Wicks and Epping Roads. Here there is a grille, but its only half useful, as it only gets you into the section above the waterfall, an 10ft high concrete job with no rungs or ladders. There is a grille downstream of the fall, but its recently been padlocked shut. So in this case i had to resort to other methods.
ATOP THE WATERFALL
AND BELOW
The 7ft rcp ends at a large pillared chamber beneath the office works. Above the rcp is a large set of grilles (that for years comprised of just chain link fence) The grilles hang on hinges, with lightweight return springs. So i grabbed a milk crate, hauled a grille open n wedged the crate under it, squeezing in thru the gap.
CRATE IS RIGHT
Getting into the upstream involves only the grille and the tunnel doesnt go far before splitting into two 12 ft ducts, both of which end at large diagonal road grilles, with little sluice ramps and in the case of the left tunnel a 5ft rcp towards shrinkerdom.
BANANA SPLIT
I mostly took pics of this short drain, cos its nearby and is of similar design to Hercs. And i could squeeze it in before beddy byes.
With 4am creeping its way towards me, i climbed out the grille, got in the car, n went home.
BUT BEFORE THAT...
This DOTW is a double whammy. Twice the waterfall wonders. Get you all away from all that boring old brickwork n setting the gaze of your peepers onto some shiny early 1990's reinforced concrete, with some freshy fresh fresh noughties rendering in behind.
Behold the Greeks!
Diodes 1993 edition of the known doc described his latest 1992 find thusly:
"Fantastic, astounding, mind bending! More features in one drain
than any other! Nuclear powered! Faster than the speed of light!"
Hercules Pillars. 1000m long is you include the side tunnel. Nine waterfalls, bunker-esque construction, bendy tunnels, weird stainless steel fittings and an almighty crop of churn pillars.
Diode discovered it while scoping out the M2 Motorway, which was under construction. In 1992, prior the the motorways completion the upstream creek simply ran into Hercs infall under its own steam, rolling languidly along the flat floors of the twin 6ft rectangles to crash noisily over the waterfalls. But as work continued on the M2, they found they had to build an underpass to get the creek under the motorway. While they were at it they also addressed the one major problem with the creek and drain.
They drain a landfill rubbish dump. Landfill generates huge amounts of polluted groundwater and similarly to mines, the water cannot be released into rivers. Given the small amounts of leachate running through Hercs a system of pools and collectors were installed. The pools to grab sediments and allow water to evaporate rather than flowing into the tunnel and the collectors to try and pick up the worst of the pollutive flow and pipe it out to leachate tanks at the outfall.
So with the completion of the M2 and this unusual pollution solution, Hercs had a set of pools installed at its infall, a concrete encased overflow pipe set into the tunnel to the 3rd waterfall, and leachate collectors mounted to the last waterfall in the main tunnel and last two in the side tunnel.
As a more popular drain in Sydney, Herc's has seen a myriad of explorers, expos and strange events such as the Annual Drolf Masters.
most ppl start at the beginning. The Underpass. A 9ft high becobwebbed concrete duct that takes water from a creek pond 200m under the motorway. Its uneventful save for the section where the flat concrete floor gives way to remains of the natural creek bed.
CREEKAGE
Around a bend and its all over, 70m of concrete channel, a 5ft rcp off to the right dumping water in from beneath Wicks Rd.
The canal has in the last 10 years become a haven for graff artists and despite its rather obscure location, piecers still layer its walls in the hope that a truck driver might look down from his high driving position up on the motorway n see it.
The canals drops unceremoniously into a pit, around neck deep on most ppl of reasonable height, this pool drains into a 1ft diameter fibreglass pipe thats encased in a concrete rectangular prism that bipasses everything from there to the third waterfall, running along the inside of the left hand of the bifurcated ducts ahead. A second pit acts as a stagnation station for the last load of water that breached the wall separating it from the first pit and on the receiving end are the two 6ft high ducts.
THE CANAL
THE INLETS (ONLY ONE IS ILLUMINATED COS I RAN OUT OF TORCH)
The Inlets plays host to a unique warning sign telling of deep and sudden drops, leachate pollution and methane, not to mention confined spaces. Most ppl ignore them n wander on in anyway.
I recall the first time i did Hercs, in mid 1997. Id not encountered a drain waterfall in the 20 odd tunnels id done before so i was mildly apprehensive. But the major lack of water in these first tunnels put my mind at ease. The diversion pipe pretty much... diverts all the flow thru the tunnels n over the waterfalls silently and efficiently, leaving only water leaking in from the ground around to lube the floor up.
The first waterfalls, 2X2 equaling 4, 2 for each tunnel, are bone dry, with rungs down one side and the diversion pipe off to the side in the western tunnels case.
SMALLERFALLS, ONE OF.
Upon entering the drain you can usually, unless theres a drought on, hear the main waterfall ahead and after negotiating the second dry fall in whichever tunnel you chose, you'll reach a small pool of ankle deep water, collected above the lip of the fall, being channeled into a stainless steel leachate collector mounted to the weir below, encased in scum. To the left the diversion pipe dumps its contents over the edge onto a splashpad; to the right there are handholds and a central ladder down, serving both tunnels.
The main waterfall room is impressive, around 25ft high and 30 feet long, the leachate pipes join from their collectors and run, clad in stainless armor to protect them from flood debris, down into the main tunnel.
THE FALL ROOM
LOOKING DOWN
The main tunnel is interesting. Its been painted black, almost with a tarry substance that has long since completely dried. The leachate pipe runs along the ceiling 10ft up and water covers the floor entirely in its flatness.
Quickly a bend comes along and the whole tunnel starts to lean, the floor dropping away slowly taking ceiling height to 12ft. Like a train going round a tight bend on its tracks, so the drain leans into its curves, the water flowing diagonally sideways to the crook of one wall.
A side tunnel comes in like the prow of the Cape Don crashing through a pier. the separating wall shaped like a boat prow, behind it hiding a tall narrow tunnel that stays narrow but sadly shrinks vertically as the floor slopes upwards from the intersection.
THE BOAT PROW JUNCTION AFAR
THE BOAT PROW JUNCTION CLOSE
This side tunnel is worthwhile, if a bit stoopy. You have to watch you dont clatter your head on the leachate pipe with its fittings and capped off branches. The first section always seems to play host to unusual wildlife, toads, frogs, bats and in the case when these photos where taken, a Ninja Turtle!
BUT WHICH ONE?
This little bugger wasnt happy at the intrusion, n soon after i took its picture scrambled off n was swept away by the flow.
Ahead is a smaller waterfall, dumping its diversion pipe and collecting leachate. The tunnel at the top is barely 5ft high and leads to a second taller fall, the second being about 15ft high.
THE LEACHATE DUMPER
The last waterfall is small, but sits in an airy grille room, with flow coming down the fall into a pit which in turn channels into the diversion pipe. Up ahead the tunnel regains another 4ft in height and you can comfortably dodge all the redbacks hanging from the ceiling to emerge in a wasteland on the side of the motorway.
A VERY OLD (10 YEARS?) PICTURE OF TRYLOK, MR INDIA, OGRE AND DIRGE AT THE LAST FALL.
Back in the main tunnel, the leaning madness continues before swapping sides, the walls yawing out the other direction as the bend opposes its former direction, leaving you to cross the sudden sideswipe of the waterflow.
LEAN THE OTHER WAY
Then its only the dead straight to the end, a walled enclosure, head off by 15 rectangular pillars, walls painted black, warning signs and leachate pipes adorning them, described by Diode fittingly as:
"The most impressive entrance yet (the pillars). This must have been
designed by some reincarnated Nazi architect."
And indeed it does have an SS feel to it, all the thick concrete and unbridled edges.
NAZI?
The pillars themselves sit in three rows of three, interspersed by two rows of two. Lucky number 13? They're set into a gentle slide and the water weaves around them arriving in a normally empty pond that sits flanked by the same 30ft high walls on two sides and an 8ft wall to the exit side, concrete staircases leading up out into the bush behind the tip.
PILLARS
At times the pond has filled up, backing water halfway up the pillar slope, but its rare cos once in one hundred year floods tend only to come, once in a a hundred years. Between these centennial occasions the pillars wait, like the guards on some strange prison to try and hold back the water when it rushes for freedom like so many rioting prisoners.
Uppppppstream of Hercs Pillars Drain is Zeus, named simply cos in the Greek mythology genealogy tree, Zues was the head honchho, Hercs dad, of sorts. The drain as such couldnt be considered mightier. It certainly came from humbler beginnings, starting out asa a 400m long 7ft rcp containg a few bends which local bat species used to wind their ways past. Then a big complex was built and the big guns got broken out.
Most ppl dont bother with the outfall as its a swamp, muddy stinky n wet n why bother negotiating it when the rest of the tunnel's a nice dry doddle.
So instead you head up into the Officeworks carpark, next to the Shell station on the corner of Wicks and Epping Roads. Here there is a grille, but its only half useful, as it only gets you into the section above the waterfall, an 10ft high concrete job with no rungs or ladders. There is a grille downstream of the fall, but its recently been padlocked shut. So in this case i had to resort to other methods.
ATOP THE WATERFALL
AND BELOW
The 7ft rcp ends at a large pillared chamber beneath the office works. Above the rcp is a large set of grilles (that for years comprised of just chain link fence) The grilles hang on hinges, with lightweight return springs. So i grabbed a milk crate, hauled a grille open n wedged the crate under it, squeezing in thru the gap.
CRATE IS RIGHT
Getting into the upstream involves only the grille and the tunnel doesnt go far before splitting into two 12 ft ducts, both of which end at large diagonal road grilles, with little sluice ramps and in the case of the left tunnel a 5ft rcp towards shrinkerdom.
BANANA SPLIT
I mostly took pics of this short drain, cos its nearby and is of similar design to Hercs. And i could squeeze it in before beddy byes.
With 4am creeping its way towards me, i climbed out the grille, got in the car, n went home.
BUT BEFORE THAT...