So why didn't they do that:
a) when the shaft first collapsed on top?
b) before the recent rains came (water ingress was given as the reason the halt to works a week or so ago)

??

i visited Silbury Hill on Sunday afternoon [19 August 07], it was bedraggled with construction site equipment (inert), workers' portacabin extempore village (no sign of life), persistent drizzle and lots of chalky mud everywhere; the caterpillar diggers have left a wide muddy track all the way round one side of Silbury; there is a forlorn visitors' information point, roadside of the hill, with a flimsy sign fixed to the fence, fluttering in the grey breeze. there are neither visitors nor experts in bright yellow, hard hats, enthusiastically disseminating words of wisdom: the spot is entirely vacant. above the tunnel entrance is marked out - in blue rope - the shape of a long subsidence, running up the hill, directly over the tunnel. before the ominous-looking, shuttered entrance to the re-opened tunnel stands a motionless mechanical digger, apparently abandoned? the entire site is eerily silent and resembles more the messy aftermath to some awful catastrophe, rather than the sprightly prospect of an efficient EH project, so deftly filmed for PR posterity several years ago, when the initial steps were being taken to stabilise the hill, and ultimately restore it? where are the cameras, state-of-art technology, helicopters, snappy press releases, smart presenters and television experts now? what is happening at Silbury? what is happening to Silbury?!

:(

Ric

ps. i wrote to Eric/Lord Avebury - he advises everyone concerned to write, phone or email English Heritage to object to their plan to bury a 'time capsule' inside Silbury Hill.