Rock climber dies from fall in Big Cottonwood Canyon

The past is and always has been better than the present.

Mark E Dixon wrote:

There is no point arguing with folks who live in a nostalgia fantasy world.

There is a point figuring out what those experienced folks are talking about. Nostalgia fantasy world often means "they have that more experience and knowledge versus mine so I am not even able to estimate and realize. There are chances they are not giving shit, it is me that naive and ignorant".

Nevertheless, lowering and rappelling accidents are usually avoidable.

Lowering and rappeling accidents have the common objective cause - gravity works. Everything else is climber's responsibility. Climber's responsibility starts when they decide to climb.

As a group, we climbers should encourage behaviors that will minimize these awful occurrences.

As climbers we'd better realize given objective hazards (ref. gravity works, weather changes, etc). Everything else are consequences of our actions. Rappeling and lowering accidents are due to climber's behaviour and decisions.

It is that simple. It is a climber's choice to climb, to choose partners, to stick to a route, to select style and tactics, to equip, to acquire skills, to apply skills, etc, etc, etc.

Gravity works as well as gadzillions other objective factors. It is our decision how to deal with them.

Mark E Dixon wrote:

As a group, we climbers should encourage behaviors that will minimize these awful occurrences. 

As a group, you have an incredibly hard time recognizing and understanding what behaviors are causing these awful occurrences, and worse, you are highly resistant to acknowledging and accepting them.

Healyje wrote:

Again, it's irrelevant and yes, the climbing demographic exploded at a much higher rate, but that doesn't hurt my argument at all given the accident rate of that demographic.

Accidents were relatively rare so they got reported bitd. All you have to do today is look through MP and other climbing forums and try to find ANAM entries for the vast majority of the non-fatal drops and accidents - you won't find them because they're not there. 

Look, have you dropped anyone? Ever been dropped? Know anyone who has dropped or been dropped? Seen anyone dropped? Been in either end of a lowering accident? Know anyone who has? What percentage of folks on this thread alone do you suppose can answer 'no' to all those questions. I can, and that's over forty-three years of climbing and I expect most of the geezers will answer similarly.

The only fantasy world going on is that of those of you 'modern' climbers who think all these accidents are 'normal' or that they similarly occurred at the same rate bitd.

P.S. Oh, and it had nothing to do with us being 'better' bitd. It was a matter of us operating totally aware, under no soothing illusions, and with no device dependencies. That you would somehow manage to interpret it that way after all that has been said is a pretty sad commentary on the likelihood of any change in current attitudes or the accident rates now being experienced. Clueless in a word.

Unfortunately, you don't seem to understand middle-school level math, so it's hard for me to argue with you.

I'm going to wager that the accident rate to ratio of climbers has largely remained constant over the years and has maybe even decreased with the advent of better gear. I see the perception of increased accidents largely the result of the internet and near instant reporting of every little bump on the head. 

LccClimber wrote:

I'm going to wager that the accident rate to ratio of climbers has largely remained constant over the years and has maybe even decreased with the advent of better gear. I see the perception of increased accidents largely the result of the internet and near instant reporting of every little bump on the head. 

My intuition is that you are correct. And the data, as charted by mpech above supports your position.

But even one lower/rap accident is too many.

@Pavel- not sure I follow your argument. Of course gravity is present, that's what makes climbing possible. 

Of course it's the climber's/be;ayer's joint responsibility to protect themselves.

But what are the concrete attitudes and habits we should be encouraging in each other to decrease these avoidable accidents?

I don't think it's a mystery-

Tie a knot in the end of your rope.

Do a buddy check before the climber leaves the ground.

Take belaying seriously.

Don't ever let go of the brake hand.

Don't take your climber off belay until you have incontrovertible proof that is what he/she wishes.

Test the system before unclipping from the anchors. Whether it's a lower or a rappel.

I'm sure there are others, glad to hear them, even from befuddled AARP climbers from the golden age.

mpech wrote:

Unfortunately, you don't seem to understand middle-school level math, so it's hard for me to argue with you.

And you don't seem to understand what makes the difference between living and dying so there's little point in arguing with you.

LccClimber wrote:

I'm going to wager that the accident rate to ratio of climbers has largely remained constant over the years and has maybe even decreased with the advent of better gear.

And you'd be entirely wrong. In fact, some of your 'better gear' is actually what's behind many of the accidents.

Mark E Dixon wrote:

My intuition is that you are correct. And the data, as charted by mpech above supports your position.

Again, nothing whatsoever about the mpech's ANAM data supports that conclusion. Subtract the alpine and try to correlate forum accident reports with ANAM reports and you'll come up empty a for large majority of them. But hey, you guys keep right on pretending there's no serious problem in the demographic.

Oh, and mpech, was that a 'no' on all those questions above? Mark, how about you? And LccClimber while we're at it? Can you guys answer 'no' to those questions?

Mark E Dixon wrote:

we should be encouraging in each other

No point. Working personal skills and knowledge is THE way to improve.

I don't think it's a mystery-

The list's been provided is just a list. Skills and knowledge are skills and knowledge. There's no list to be used where skills and knowledge are required.

Just another $0.05 to the discussion. Climbing is not "how to pass a test". Climbing is improvisation. Thus it cannot be reduced to check-lists, but to be based on a solid knowledge and skillset.

Mark E Dixon wrote:

My intuition is that you are correct. And the data, as charted by mpech above supports your position.

But even one lower/rap accident is too many.

@Pavel- not sure I follow your argument. Of course gravity is present, that's what makes climbing possible. 

Of course it's the climber's/be;ayer's joint responsibility to protect themselves.

But what are the concrete attitudes and habits we should be encouraging in each other to decrease these avoidable accidents?

I don't think it's a mystery-

Tie a knot in the end of your rope.

Do a buddy check before the climber leaves the ground.

Take belaying seriously.

Don't ever let go of the brake hand.

Don't take your climber off belay until you have incontrovertible proof that is what he/she wishes.

Test the system before unclipping from the anchors. Whether it's a lower or a rappel.

I'm sure there are others, glad to hear them, even from befuddled AARP climbers from the golden age.

I'll add some... 

Inspect your gear.  

Visually inspect your tie in.  Every time you tie it make sure it is through both tie in points, and especially that it is retraced.  A strong backup knot is also recommended.

Keep hair away from the belay device or rap device

Address the climber/belayer by name when shouting commands at busy areas. This is to keep other parties safe.  Better yet, don't use any commands at all, pre arrange before you leave the ground.   

Wear a helmet. 

There are more... 

Pavel Burov wrote:

Just another $0.05 to the discussion. Climbing is not "how to pass a test". Climbing is improvisation. Thus it cannot be reduced to check-lists, but to be based on a solid knowledge and skillset.

Check lists are "knowledge" passed from one climber to another.    If someone reads them and practices them, they develop a routine, thereby becoming more "skilled".  Once they have more experience,  the routine may evolve and "improvisations" may be made.  

The point being,  a checklist is a good way to start.  Accidents like this one would be rare if more climbers adopted a good checklist. 

cyclestupor wrote:

Check lists are "knowledge" passed from one climber to another. 

Nope. Check lists are extremely useful tool.

cyclestupor wrote:

a checklist is a good way to start

No. Checklists are useful tool if and only if are used properly.

They are not to start. They are to check.

Mark E Dixon wrote:

My intuition is that you are correct. And the data, as charted by mpech above supports your position.

But even one lower/rap accident is too many.

@Pavel- not sure I follow your argument. Of course gravity is present, that's what makes climbing possible. 

Of course it's the climber's/be;ayer's joint responsibility to protect themselves.

But what are the concrete attitudes and habits we should be encouraging in each other to decrease these avoidable accidents?

I don't think it's a mystery-

Tie a knot in the end of your rope.

Do a buddy check before the climber leaves the ground.

Take belaying seriously.

Don't ever let go of the brake hand.

Don't take your climber off belay until you have incontrovertible proof that is what he/she wishes.

Test the system before unclipping from the anchors. Whether it's a lower or a rappel.

I'm sure there are others, glad to hear them, even from befuddled AARP climbers from the golden age.

Here's a rule most of us could add: understand that the arrogance and  overconfidence of "it will never happen to me/I will never be that stupid" is a very dangerous place to be.

Stay safe, friends, all of you. Best, Helen

Pavel Burov wrote:

Nope. Check lists are extremely useful tool.

Whatever you want to call them works for me.   As long as you agree they are extremely useful

Tim Lutz wrote:

even though like 100 people were climbing in the whole world in the 70s on a given weekend compared what ever it is now.

There are probably more people now standing in line to check in to a climbing gym on any given moment on any evening than climbed the entire week back in the 70s.

Old lady H wrote:

@Billcoe, what would be the 1% of a belayer dropping someone that isn't their responsibility? Other than acts of god sort of stuff? This is NOT meant as any kind of insinuation for this accident, but I'm not coming up with anything. Best, Helen

Well, this is not a good thread to go on about stuff like this but you asked so I'll try and pitch an answer. I was giving an allowance for no particular reason. As noted, there is a lack of actual stats. I was thinking about Magic Ed having the massive bolted block he was on snap off and having his belayer get slammed up into a roof as Ed and the block whipped together....that kind of thing. That would not be an actual example as it's fairly recent and Ed's belayer was knocked out and his grigri held Ed from certain death many hundreds of feet off the deck, but that KIND of thing I was giving an allowance for. I'd gone with 99.9% at first but changed it down. 

I'd once been at a remote spot when a rope broke while a kid was rappelling on it. Kid augered in bad. Stuff can happen. In Ed's instance, that was operator error IMO. He bolted that block. I too once stuffed a bolt into a large block. Only after careful examination, mine is still there. Doesn't make me better or worse than Ed, I don't know what his process was or what he was looking at. Ed's route was crazy long, mine 3 pitches, so I had more time to think and look no doubt. Certainly Ed putting the belay under a roof is generally a very savvy move as loose rock won't tag your belayer's knoggin on those new routes that still always seem to have that fresh loose rock potential. In the kids case, that was operator error as well in my view. rope owner carried an unbagged old fuzzy rope in his trunk. I don't do that. I date them with tags on a rope bag when new and always keep them stuffed them into a rope bag unless I'm doing a long hike in someplace. They are never put away wet and are stored in a dry dark basement in a rope bag. He didn't do such things. His rope broke in two. None of mine have done that yet and I currently own about 20 ropes. Back in the day most folks tied in with bowlines. They could and did become untied. An unbacked up firgure 8 never would become untied. Which is why about everyone but Healyje and Rgold use a figure 8 these days. 

Not applicable on this thread, but my point is that stuff happens Helen, we can and should try to control as many factors as possible. That people today hand a Grigri to a girlfriend (or whomever but I know of 3 girlfriend versions)  in a gym and after showing them how it works before they tie in and commence to climbing, much to their later chargrine, amaze's me to no end. It is one of the easiest and most obviously significant factors to be able to control for safety. Yet folks don't. 

Franck Vee wrote:

. I'm going to make an unsupported statement, but that I will find hard to dismiss: 

You could just call it what is and say "I am making this up, but I think it's true."  

Billcoe wrote:

...He bolted that block. I too once stuffed a bolt into a large block...

Bill, aside from having had to deal with a lot of deaths in climbing, is a genuine choss-master which counts for something when it comes to all things loose. He's also a bold, big-as-your-kitchen trundler in the Slim Pickens 'ride'em big' Dr. Strangelove tradition (albeit while roped from above, but still...). I myself lived in NH for a couple of years climbing at Canon where otherwise solid 50'x50'x50' blocks come down with surprising regularity so maybe I'm a bit more circumspect about it. 

His point - that shit happens - is an unavoidable reality in a long [trad] climbing career, particularly if you're inclined to FAs as he and I are. Hopefully, as part of such a career, you develop good instincts, intuition and fast reflexes because you are eventually going to be tested by the unforeseeable and / or unexpected at least a couple of times along the way.

Thanks, Joe and Bill. Good for all of us to keep in mind.

Best, H