June 5 Gezer Update

By Gary D. Myers

The good news is that whole team was well enough to go Tel Gezer today. The lingering sickness was beginning to slow our work. The health team members were wearing down from the increased work load. It was a blessing to have a healthy crew.

With a healthy crew and another innovation – pulling two bags at once with the wench – the team removed 127 bags of dirt and debris. We were elated with total because early on the digging was quite difficult. And during the afternoon, large rocks hampered our digging.

Just after 4 p.m. we called it a day. We had reached 50 feet from our measuring point. Because of the long wait time (5 minutes) for the wench to travel down the tunnel and pull a bag, someone decided to hook one bag and tether another with a heavy-duty strap. The plan worked like a charm and helped us reach our largest bag total in over a week.

The bad news is that we have yet to reach the cave/cavern opening.

We must be close

Dr. Dan Warner and Dr. Parker are confident that the end of the tunnel is near. They believe we will reach the cavern before this year’s dig is over in less than a week. In fact, they are hopeful that tomorrow will be the day. With hopes running high, Warner and Parker are employing a new strategy – cutting a probe. Thus far the team has been clearing out the entire 9-feet width of the cave to about 7-8 feet deep. Rather than clearing the entire width, tomorrow we will only clear a portion of the width in order to speed our progress toward the cave entrance. There will be much rejoicing when we reach the end!


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The Gezer Water System project is co-sponsored by the Israel Nature and Parks Authority and New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary under the direction of Tsvika Tsuk, chief archaeologist at INPA, and Dan Warner, co-director of the Center for Archaeological Research at NOBTS.