Bryce Yaple wrote up his account: I just broke it up, a non-edit, for readability
I’ve been getting messages and questions regarding the accident and rescue on Stiffler’s Mom this Past Monday, June 11.
With the permission from the climber’s wife, I thought I would offer my account as a learning opportunity in an effort to take away something positive from a bleak experience.
My partner, Tyler Davis, and I had been climbing in little cottonwood since 7 that morning.
We were working our way up the canyon by bicycle, ticking off various multi pitch classics in a sufferfest-like, day-long challenge.
We had completed the sasquatch variation of pentapitch and had started up Stiffler’s when we first saw the party wrapping up pitch four of the climb.
I lead a link of pitches one and two,
then turned over the lead to Tyler who lead pitches three and four, also linked.
This placed him at the top of pitch four with me following up as the fall victim began the sixth pitch.
I was moving through the bolted slab atop pitch three when I first heard screaming. It was about 1:10pm.
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My partner called down to me that he had just seen the party leader take a long fall over the roof and we needed to get up there fast.
I rushed through the remainder of pitch 4 to meet Tyler at the belay.
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The victim’s wife was within earshot at this point and communicated that the leader was bleeding from his face and could not move but appeared to be breathing and conscious.
I started up the pitch 5 variation, left of the direct line while Tyler belayed and contacted emergency services.
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When I reached the victim, he was hanging upside down from his line, one leg hooked around it and arms hanging with his face against the slab.
Blood was pooling around his head and running down the rock.
He had stopped fifteen to twenty feet below and ten to fifteen feet climber’s-left of the pitch six belay ledge.
Still on lead, I continued to the belay where I fixed my line and descended with a grigri back to the victim.
His wife, with her husband’s line tied off, belayed Tyler up while I began evaluating the situation.
`The victim’s line was clipped into the second bolt of pitch 6 and a red camalot c3, attached with an unextended alpine draw, dangled at his knot.
His helmet was heavily damaged and his face was still bleeding but the wounds did not appear to be threatening.
`Able to speak, he communicated with certainty that he had sustained some sort of neck or back injury
and that any sort of movement was too excruciating to make on his own.
This made it clear to me that a descent without proper stabilization and assistance was out of the question.
While the position he was in was incredibly painful,
`Tyler and I initially made the difficult decision not to move him given the possible neck or spinal injury he had sustained.
Tyler had now reached the belay ledge and was on the phone with search and rescue describing our location and the details of the situation.
In his compromising position, the victim began frantically asking to be moved and expressed fear of losing consciousness.
Under the direction of EMS over the phone,
we told him that any movement risked additional neck and spinal damage, including paralysis.
Despite this
, him and his wife both eventually decided that his position was unendurable given the projected rescue ETA
and requested that we attempt some sort of stabilization.
Tyler and I had begun planning and setting up a system to carefully bring the climber to a horizontal position when Andy Rich,
after observing the situation, had made his way to the base of pitch 5
and informed us of his EMT experience.
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We quickly lowered a fixed line which he ascended to level of the victim.
Andy and I then continued our devised procedure to carefully move the victim to a stable position
while Tye returned to the ledge to relay info from EMS.
I attached several slings with a prusik to the climbers line and adjusted them to support his legs once horizontal. Using a double length sling,
we were able to secure a makeshift chest harness around the climber and attach it to my line. Once in position, we instructed the victim’s
wife to begin slowly lowering her husband to align his hips and shoulders, resting him horizontally across our knees.
We slowly brought his lower half down and rolled him facing upright,
Andy supporting his neck while I worked to keep his back straight. While we did this a DPS helicopter appeared, hovered close, then retreated.
Tye soon confirmed over the phone that a long line hoist attempt would be made and we were to keep the victim stable while
a rescue crewman secured him in a body sling.
About 15 minutes passed before the helicopter came into position over us and began lowering the crewman.
We worked as carefully as possible to get the sling around the victim while minimizing the amount of neck and spine movement.
Fitting it around him was difficult and tedious due to our precarious position against the wall and the clutter of gear still attached to his harness.
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Eventually, we were able to secure the victim in the sling and, after cutting him loose of our tethers,
` the DPS crewman signaled the heli to move up and away from the wall.
From fall to extraction, Tyler and I estimate about an hour and thirty minutes passed.
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Based on Tyler’s account of the fall and the climber's observed position after the fall,
it appears he fell at least 50 feet.
Tyler observed the climber move past the second bolt of the pitch, place the red c3 and then venture above to easier terrain
before appearing to lose his balance and fall backward.
`Tyler says that he attempted to outrun the slack but as he fell past the lip of the roof, became inverted either by snagging his feet on the rope or his feet catching on the stone.
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I hope that this account answers some questions and clears up any confusion around what happened.
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More so, I hope that it can serve as educational material to hopefully prevent future, similar accidents from happening.
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I don’t want to divulge any private information about the climber’s current status
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but I will point out that the his wife reported in another thread that “He broke 5 vertebrae in his neck & 5 in his thoracic.
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The thoracic injury is minor while the neck will require a brace, but no surgery.” A full recovery is expected.