Experimentation with a poker showed that the tunnel was about below ground but also running approximately 30° off the intended course. The tunnel had several narrow escapes from detection or accidental destruction due to digging by either the guards or other POWs, but by the beginning of October it was past the wire and the three men started to make their final preparations. They decided to make the break in the period of no moon at the end of the month and escape on Friday, 29 October 1943. This was 114 days after the first digging commenced.