an unexplained accident

Russ Keane wrote: All actions, for both the climber and the belayer, when lowering, are dependent on the feeling of tension in the rope.  The people are basically feeling each other.    I think Senor Arroz nailed it.   When the climber stopped at the ledge, the belayer was confused and opened up the GriGri lever, so when the climber stepped off the ledge it was open and the rope zipped through.

" I can see how someone lowering at 2/3 open Grigri might instinctively open it up MORE when their climber suddenly stops lowering.  And then, the device is wide open and prone to the rope suddenly yanking through."   

now I understand this.  It is certainly possible.  It is also possible they belayer did this, and doesn't even know they did it, or recall it, or did it almost unconsciously...then the device locked, stretched and she hit - I am not saying this happened nor am I pointing a finger - but I can see it.  

I have to say from the start of this conversation the somewhat simplified  version of Occam's razor (from Contact) has been going through my mind - all things being equal the simplest explanation is usually the correct one.  I'll let the readers judge what that simplest explanation is.  

I will say for my part and in my partially in  my "defense" and what I learned - I shouldn't have introduced another rope into the situation - I should have made more of an effort to solve the situation independently.  Lower her or rap independently in any number of ways on my rope.  That being said we were completely climbing with another party and reaching out for group assistance was, IMO completely understandable.  We were making use of what was available to us.  Tying in on the bight...I am not sure why we did that - I guess to make it faster - it was sloppy, it led to the long tail hanging from the bight which may or may not have contributed to this incident.   I followed that direction from the ground and its potential impact did not compute with me at the time, in the moment.  It could have led to there not being enough rope to get the climber to the ground.  It is still possible that is what occurred and the story I am being told is not accurate - I hope to God that's not the case and would be highly shocked if it was but in reality I just don't know.  If the rope came tight on the device as I was told then that is not true...which is a relief, and it also would explain the not minor, but reduced nature of the injuries to what they could have been.

I was told...the fall definitely took place at the ledge or immediately thereafter so either slack had built up somehow (my previous question...if the rope had not gotten stuck or wrapped around something...is that even possible?) and was released when she weighted or slack was inadvertently released from the device at that point when the rope was unweighted on the ledge.

I am not sure to what degree I suffer from hubris/complacency/over confidence but I do appreciate Suburban Roadside's willingness to say it and I will and am certainly examining that.  Based on my previous experience on these climbs this entire situation should have been fairly routine.  It's possible that my actions could have, but didn't directly contribute to this at all. I am NOT trying to absolve myself of responsibility.  But I also don't need to mercilessly slay myself for the horrible person I am.  Better decisions could have been made but I don't think the choice to lower her on the other rope in the situation we were in is entirely indefensible or negligent.  I was taught in WFA and in other classes to make use of what you have.  Sure, stay self sufficient and be able to be self sufficient but if you need help and a doctor is standing right there..ummm...kind of a no brainer.  So I could have done things differently but what I did was not entirely without logic.  I try to do everything right, I climb every week - I am in my 4th year of climbing rock and ice.  I go out with guides, I read, I take classes, I talk to and climb with experienced skilled people, I practice, I write long things like this on the internet :), I subject myself to this level of dissection - point being I take this seriously and I want to learn and not repeat what happened here.

I’ve read much of this thread but not carefully and not all. Apologies if this is a repeat - but I think not way off ...

Generally speaking, is difficult to have guaranteed performance in a a system with many unknown variables:  

• different length / diameter rope, 
• unfamiliar device, 
• inexperienced belayer / climber, 
• unfamiliar route,
• unusually long tail,
• unfamiliar partner / people
• etc

With many unknowns in play at once, it gets hard to not have a surprising outcome.

Only generic suggestion I have is to work harder at reducing unknowns.  Be decisive / assertive that while something does not seem wrong, it is just not familiar enough yet or now for these circumstances.  And that today you choose to not roll it into the mix.

And if you get down to having just one known unknown, the focus can more productively turn to mitigations.

And may god help us with the unknown unknowns. 

Patrick C  said "...An early post on rope stretch talked about 25-30' of it. Some ropes stretch 30%. If you have 100' going up from the belayer and 75' coming back down, that'll provide rope stretch of 30% of 175', which is a potential of 52.5'. The part on the ground on the other side of the belay device isn't in the equation. "

1) Only in the scenario where "there's 25 ft of slack beyond the device and coiled up at the belayer's feet" would there be the possibility of 30% stretch. I believe the UIAA requires 7% or less of stretch under 80kg ("body weight") and most single ropes are way below even that figure. 30%, 40%, even 100% is possible on a long leader fall, but if we rule out the "pool" of rope beyond the device, there needs to be some scenario postulated whereby that kind of slack could develop while the climber being lowered is still providing tension on the rope. So far, not one can think of a situation, tail stuck or no tail stuck.

2) "The part on the ground on the other side of the belay isn't in the equation". CORRECT, BUT ONLY because it is/was a 80m rope ( 262 ft). A climber who ties into the rope with a Fig-8-on-bite+ biner at the anchor of a 100ft climb with both ends of the rope down (as per a TR, and as this one was) needs a 300ft rope to be lowered. (less the body weight stretch of 200 of those feet)  Even with the 80m rope only about 62 ft remained "on the other side of the belay", so it was a very good thing Neils pulled up 30 ft of rope before she tied in !

Robert Hall wrote: Partric C said "...An early post on rope stretch talked about 25-30' of it. Some ropes stretch 30%. If you have 100' going up from the belayer and 75' coming back down, that'll provide rope stretch of 30% of 175', which is a potential of 52.5'. The part on the ground on the other side of the belay device isn't in the equation. "

1) Only in the scenario where "there's 25 ft of slack beyond the device and coiled up at the belayer's feet" would there be the possibility of 30% stretch. I believe the UIAA requires 7% or less of stretch under 80kg ("body weight") and most single ropes are way bvelow even that figure. 30%, 40%, even 100% is possible on a long leader fall, but if we rule out the "pool" of rope beyond the device, there needs to be some scenario postulated whereby that kind of slack could develop while the climber being lowered is still providing tension on the rope. So far, not one can think of a situation, tail stuck or no tail stuck.

2) "The part on the ground on the other side of the belay isn't in the equation". CORRECT, BUT ONLY because it is/was a 80m rope ( 262 ft). A climber who ties into the rope with a Fig-8-on-bite+ biner at the anchor of a 100ft climb with both ends of the rope down (as per a TR, and as this one was) needs a 300ft rope to be lowered. (less the body weight stretch of 200 of those feet)  Even with the 80m rope only about 62 ft remained "on the other side of the belay", so it was a very good thing Neils pulled up 30 ft of rope before she tied in !

just to be clear and somewhat exonerate the person on the ground - I started puling up rope - I still dont know how much I pulled up and really never will - but it was obviously enough - it wasn't until I had pulled up a bunch that they said - tie a bight.  It was not said prior to starting to pull the rope up.  My original intention was to pull it all up.  But I do recall starting to get confused and sorting through it  - I was like ok now I have this pile of rope here - I am going to have to feed this back down and the belayer is going to need to take in ALL this slack...ok....and as Suburban Roadside said...it was almost as if urgency was manufactured  -communicating with a party on the ground, going back and forth - when in realty, we were FINE.  She and I were on a giant ledge on a huge anchor chilling.  I could have taken two hours to sort out a solution and it wouldn't have mattered.  Slow is smooth and smooth is fast.  One thing at a time.  Simple.  Sequential.  Once I introduced the other party  (and I don't blame them) the complexity just spiraled, in retrospect of course.

If MP limits me and I don't reply thats why...but I appreciate everyone's insight here.

Suburban Roadside wrote: neils, you are right to expound outwardly with these heavy thoughts...

Gravity Sucks Constantly
Stuff happens
Bad Stuff seems to happen in slow motion but in reality, it only takes a split second

The moments of grandeur are framed by the moments of terror & misery, these sorts of things, the compounding of small factors that then mix to produce the most undesirable results
happen.
These scenarios are what we have to guard against, by following the unwritten rules as exactly as we can,
 but and still, things happen.

 I have been  climbing for a long time

My worst injuries, near death moments -have, come from un-roped hubris/complacency/over-confidence (same thing)
 When I have been tied to a rope & climbing smart I've only had minor epics

 by following 3 main rules

 Keep it stupid simple, always - Complexities, changes in a "by the rote way", bring in unknowables

Never give over your critical thinking to "the rote way" -with that comes complacency, try to think 3 steps ahead

Triple check,& check constantly, breath deeply and slow down if there is no need for urgency
- when the need arises hope that it kicks into automatic due to repition of "the rote way"

From This point of view, Yes I can see that too. & add to it the facts of a lighter weight climber & a system where there is 'rope-drag' & stretch, I think that there could well have been a larger amount of slack in the system, not so much observable, as slack at the clip in point or in front(at the feet of) the belay... but just a bit of slack at both of those places might have given a clue?

(was the lowering climber & the Belayer in communication & in sight of one another?) 

In The End This thing we Love to do,

 this playing with gravity

Is deadly serious, It only takes a second, for there to be no second chance

And it is only by our angels' blessings that there are not more funerals 

Anyone read Anasasi Boys by Neil Gaiman? This dude reminds me of the psycho boss guy in that story. Talks all in clichés and confusing sentence structure. I feel like I am reading a foreign language.

OK I've read the whole thread. I'm very familiar with the area. Here are my thoughts.

1. Tying in to the middle of the rope for a lower is not particularly sketchy or disfavored-- so long as everyone is really sure there is enough rope. I find Suburban Roadside's theory interesting-- that this practice leaves so much rope hanging that it impedes the belayer's ability to feel the climber's weight on the rope. But I don't really buy it. I would think that the belayer could still easily tell the difference between when the climber is weighting the rope and when not.

2. I think the "rope was stuck and then came unstuck theory" does not explain the fall. It may have been the cause of a DISTRACTION, i.e. it caused the climber to pause while being lowered and then the climber and belayer both failed to notice a loop of slack had developed while the climber paused on the ledge.

3. It seems pretty clear to me that unweighting and then weighting the rope while being lowered caused the accident. Both the belayer and the climber share some responsibility for this, and the climber, being inexperienced, probably did not realize how much stretch comes into play when you re-weight a rope in the middle of a lower, even when the rope appears tight. It doesn't take all that much slack for there to be a significant fall introduced when you re-weight the rope mid-lower.

4. If I'm thinking of the correct ledge it is less than 30 feet off the ground. I don't think it would take that much to introduce enough slack for the climber to touch down when the rope is re-weighted. So the climber stops on a ledge and the belayer plays out some additional slack without realizing it. The climber doesn't notice and goes to re-weight the rope... and bang. 

neils wrote: 
I guess what I am getting at is...if we don't have the long tail there does this still happen, ever...and if so, how assuming the belayer did not lose control or have gri gri panic? Explain to me how slack can potentially get introduced even if nothing got stuck.  I want to understand that.

There's a saying in the medical world, "When you hear hoofbeats, think of horses not zebras." What that means is don't get drawn off and distracted by intriguing and exotic explanations for an observation (It's a ZEBRA!) when the observed facts (hoofbeats) most likely would come from horses. I think that applies here. You can spend all day trying to figure out how 30 feet of slack somehow gets "introduced" into the belay system. But the most obvious explanation is that the belayer made an operator error. It's easy to do. Especially now that you've explained it was a lightweight climber on a lower that probably had some significant drag. She hits the ledge (or the rope catches). Lowering progress stops. Belayer opens the GriGri lever wide open. She steps off the ledge or the stuck rope clears. ZING!

One of the most common lowering mistakes I see is people trying to use the GriGri lever to control lowers rather than really using the brake hand as a brake. 

SethG wrote: OK I've read the whole thread. I'm very familiar with the area. Here are my thoughts.

1. Tying in to the middle of the rope for a lower is not particularly sketchy or disfavored-- so long as everyone is really sure there is enough rope. I find Suburban Roadside's theory interesting-- that this practice leaves so much rope hanging that it impedes the belayer's ability to feel the climber's weight on the rope. But I don't really buy it. I would think that the belayer could still easily tell the difference between when the climber is weighting the rope and when not.

2. I think the "rope was stuck and then came unstuck theory" does not explain the fall. It may have been the cause of a DISTRACTION, i.e. it caused the climber to pause while being lowered and then the climber and belayer both failed to notice a loop of slack had developed while the climber paused on the ledge.

3. It seems pretty clear to me that unweighting and then weighting the rope while being lowered caused the accident. Both the belayer and the climber share some responsibility for this, and the climber, being inexperienced, probably did not realize how much stretch comes into play when you re-weight a rope in the middle of a lower, even when the rope appears tight. It doesn't take all that much slack for there to be a significant fall introduced when you re-weight the rope mid-lower.

4. If I'm thinking of the correct ledge it is less than 30 feet off the ground. I don't think it would take that much to introduce enough slack for the climber to touch down when the rope is re-weighted. So the climber stops on a ledge and the belayer plays out some additional slack without realizing it. The climber doesn't notice and goes to re-weight the rope... and bang. 

thank you for this summary Seth.  I have met you briefly a couple of times although you may not recall me.  I know you to be a reasonable, intelligent, responsible person.  You have climbed with some folks I know and I have read your blog as well.  I used some beta from it on Moonlight a couple of weeks ago :)  Point being I trust your opinion and you are known quantity to me.  You know the area well and you are talking about the correct ledge.

At this point I think I agree with you and I think you said it quite well.  Others said the same or similar things, but I am thinking this explanation makes the most sense.  This does not absolve me of my mistakes of course and I will take this as a learning opportunity on my part.

Neils I think I remember you! Anyway don't kill yourself over this. Lucky nothing too bad happened and it is something anyone could have done. You were mostly just a spectator anyway. 

I'm impressed. I've never seen so much written about so little

To sum it up: Don't do weird shit.

HMMMM?!

lets see?

GDavis Davis wrote:
You're just mad it wasn't the belay device this time.
When all you've got is a hammer everything starts to look like a nail...

Wait? It was ~in part~  the Device/Belay


YUP
GUNKS DAZED (Sorry,GDavis Davis (?)  no  delete by me(~)}=7, Added here to avoid the posting limits)

Tradiban wrote:
I'm impressed. I've never seen so much written about so little

Andrew Krajnik ·Wrote 6 mins
I see it all the time

Bwhahhaahhaha!
Thats funny 'cause it true!

Neils-  I honestly do not think tying a bight mid-rope to lower the guy was a bad idea.   For real, this secures the climber to a bomber rope with a belayer on one end.  

Now, SethG sums it up well -- except I still don't see how ... "the climber stops on a ledge and the belayer plays out some additional slack".    He/she literally pulled slack through with other hand?   If you are lowering someone and the tension stops, you throw rope out?   It doesn't go through the device on its own without tension.   I am lost here because it just doesn't make sense.

Tradiban wrote: I'm impressed. I've never seen so much written about so little

I see it all the time.

Tradiban wrote: I'm impressed. I've never seen so much written about so little

To sum it up: Don't do weird shit.

You're just mad it wasn't the belay device this time.

When all you've got is a hammer everything starts to look like a nail...

Suburban Roadside wrote: HMMMM?!

lets see?Wait? It was ~in part~  the Device/Belay

Nope this can happen with any belay device.

gunkz dased

Russ Keane wrote: Neils-  I honestly do not think tying a bight mid-rope to lower the guy was a bad idea.   For real, this secures the climber to a bomber rope with a belayer on one end.  

Now, SethG sums it up well -- except I still don't see how ... "the climber stops on a ledge and the belayer plays out some additional slack".    He/she literally pulled slack through with other hand?   If you are lowering someone and the tension stops, you throw rope out?   It doesn't go through the device on its own without tension.   I am lost here because it just doesn't make sense.

Next time you get lowered, stop at a ledge, You go from barely weighing it, where most of your weight is on the rope, to where the weight slowly transfers to your feet. That transfer of weight is where the rope continues to get paid out, and because of stretch (on a very long rope) it can add to a significant amount. I've seen people drop 10 feet easy on a skinny rope stepping off a ledge.

...static elongation of modern ropes runs anywhere from 7-10%. With 175 feet of rope out, that's between 15 and 17 feet from stretch alone once the climber stepped off the ledge. Add in a couple of feet from the rope caught on something above and releasing plus the belayer getting lifted in the air from a 15-20 foot TR whipper and the numbers easily allow for a deck from 20-25 feet.

Ian F wrote: ...static elongation of modern ropes runs anywhere from 7-10%. With 175 feet of rope out, that's between 15 and 17 feet from stretch alone once the climber stepped off the ledge. Add in a couple of feet from the rope caught on something above and releasing plus the belayer getting lifted in the air from a 15-20 foot TR whipper and the numbers easily allow for a deck from 20-25 feet.

in addition...if there was even a couple feet of slack out and she stepped of the ledge doesnt that start to go into the realm of dynamic elongation - i.e. like a 2 ft lead fall onto a slack rope - which I assume would cause even more stretch.  Is that right?

Andrew Krajnik wrote:

I see it all the time.

This is quite true, there is a serious obsession going on about little ol' Tradiban.

neils wrote:

in addition...if there was even a couple feet of slack out and she stepped of the ledge doesnt that start to go into the realm of dynamic elongation - i.e. like a 2 ft lead fall onto a slack rope - which I assume would cause even more stretch.  Is that right?

Maybe, but I wouldn't get hung up on the the exact length estimates - it doesn't take that big a fall to break an ankle.  The notion that injuries can happen just from poorly managed tension on a long TR has come up on this forum before.