What is the correct belay command here?

Healyje wrote: "Falling"means just that and only that; nothing about it implies anything whatsoever about the type of 'catch'. How a belayer responds depends on whether there is line-of-sight, an understanding of the leader's position and circumstance, and their ability and experience level. In this case the leader was likely concerned about excessive slack between themselves and the belayer, wanted it taken up, and shouldn't have needed to say anything at all if their belayer was attentive and knew what they were doing. In the case of a leader who's out of sight, don't screw around or try to get fancy, just lock that puppy up.

ive seen plenty of folks get spiked into the wall when they said loudly "TAKE" instead of "falling" when they were above their bolt

if all you want was a lock off, you shouldnt have to say a word

"take" means to reel in the slack quickly, even dropping down if needed

"falling", i expect a dynamic belay if im higher up on a sports climb with a clean fall

its pretty important for the climber to call it or talk with yr partner before hand when yr out of sight on a sports climb if you need a specific type of catch ... more than once ive seen someone get spiked into a wall on when the partner was out of sight on a steep overhang (or the angle was such that is hard to see what the climber is doing) and all the person did was "lock off" ... resulting in a tweaked ankle or two

this is especially true with much heavier belayer, grigri and a not so soft catching rope ...

to put it simply theres not enough time to say "hey buddy give me a dynamic catch as im falling to i dont smack into the lip of the roof i just pulled a minute ago" as yr peeling off ... so "FALLING!!!"

also definitely dont say take unless you REALLY want a take

Redpoint by Dan Hague, Douglas Hunter

whatever you do make sure you discuss these commands with yr partner before hand

;)

I usually just say "AAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!"

I'm from a time when if you were climbing you were climbing trad. The term used then and what I still use today is WATCH ME. Old habits die hard. This basically let the belayer know things were getting dicey and to expect anything. In this case and assuming the belayer could see the climber then if the climber calls Watch Me, then the belayer should have been able to see there was a lot of slack in the rope that needed to be managed.

Nathanael wrote: Well you can be damn sure the rope is going to be tensioned when he falls, so if that's a concern then you've got bigger problems.

To clarify, it is the top piece that can be compromised by a pretensioned rope when the leaders above his last piece. If your top piece is a bolt than it may not be an issue as far as gear failure. But you still are more likely to spike into the wall as Bear also mentions. If your top piece is a nut it could get tanked out right then. If it is a cam it may rotate perpendicular to the direction of the fall. Then when you fall there may be some tension in that cam. It may not rotate back to the direction of the fall and will be compromised. This is especially true with very flexible stems. We saw this last year when the guy said take above three or four small cams. They all ripped out and he broke his back. Photos of the cams indicated they were close to perpendicular to the fall when they ripped out.

Optimistic wrote:...while reaching up to clip a piece he suddenly pumped out and began saying, "take, take, take!"

If there's a bit of slack out, I can understand why the leader would yell "take," but it's still nt the best command to use. One of my climbing partners, who really does not have the best lead head, has had the bad habit of yelling "TAKE!" when she's about to fall, or more often, as she is downclimbing, out of control and into a fall.

There have been several times when she's yelled "take," and I don't, because I can see that she's well above her last bolt, but if this were to happen on a climb where she's out of sight, it could be really bad. She weighs less than 100lbs; if a belayer were actually to pull in slack and take as she's falling, she would get a really hard catch and possibly break an ankle as she gets pulled into the wall. Stupid.

As others have said, the proper command for this kind of situation would be "watch me," and then "falling."

I would rather hear "falling". If the belayer is paying attention they would see he/she is struggling to make the clip. Once he/she has missed the clip and about to fall the belayer needs to start walking backwards while taking up slack.

Maybe saying "take up...about to fall". However, I would be worried the belayer might end up taking too much slack and result in a really hard catch/fall.

This has happened to me and I just dropped the slack held on a couple more seconds for slack to be taken up and said "falling". My belayer however pays attention and knew I was struggling. He probably already assumed I might fall even after making the clip.

I'll through in my n00bish two cents:

"Take" means to take in the slack and my weight because I need to rest.

"Falling" means I'm about to come off and I need a catch.

"Watch me" means I may fall through this section, manage the rope appropriately and be ready to catch me.

I agree with those who've said that "take" when you're above your last bolt or placement is asking to be pulled off the wall. This would only be acceptable if I new I was going to fall and I was concerned about hitting a ledge so wanted as little slack out as possible.

my pals and I use "Hotdog!" and "Popcorn!"

Whatever works so long as you know 'forehand.

When I started climbing in 1971 nobody used the word “take”. It was “falling” or “tension”. Tension was close to the current meaning of take, but in the yo-yo style of the day, one usually lowered off after being on tension.
Sometime in the late 80s, I was climbing at Vedauwoo when my partner yelled “take”. Never having heard the expression in my previous 20 years of climbing, I didn’t do anything but soon realized she was falling so I went into braking mode as fast as I could, but not before she fell at least 10 feet. After she stopped swearing at me, she asked why I didn’t “take” as soon as she uttered it. I asked, “What does take mean?” She answered, and then I said, “Why not just say tension?” She replied something to the effect that “take” was what everybody now used. She had just returned from a climbing trip to France, so I assumed it was a translation of “prendre” (I still don’t know what French climbers say when they want “tension”.)

Rob.calm