Apologies for an under-estimate on the pile-driving

Accusations of exaggeration are more common in your Audlem Online correspondent's experience, but for once we have under-estimated badly. In yesterday's story about the pile driving at Moseley's Yard ("Is The Earth Moving For You Too?") we said "Estimates as to how deep the pile driver is going range from 6 metres to a massive 13 metres." While we thought the 13 metres might have been pushing it, we are now reliably informed by a local resident that the piles have been going down up to 18, or in occasional instances, almost 19 metres – that's over 60 feet in old money!

The reason, it's been suggested, is peat – the material that is, not the man operating the pile-driver. Was Moseley's Yard an ancient peat bog, we wonder, or perhaps the army of Irish navvies who built the canal simply brought their heating material of choice from Ireland and stored it near the canal so it felt like home! Perhaps local geologists or historians could enlighten us.

Another 30 piles have yet to be sunk and the work will continue today and probably tomorrow

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