What is the stupidest/unsafe thing you have seen at the crag?

Top-roping on a single bolt with multiple slings connected with non-lockers to extend the 'masterpoint'. They'll probably be ok, but why?

Father setting up a top rope for his family on a less than 2 inch diameter birch. Might have held his 50lb kids; no way on his 200+ lbs. Kicker: bright, shiny new gear clearly rarely (never?) used, including a Figure 8 belay device.

Captain Ahabwrote:

At the top of the sea cliffs at Acadia, a summer camp climbing instructor (~22yo) asked a camper (~15yo) to lower him using an ATC in guide mode with sling release (already set up on their anchor). The camper pulled sling slightly and counselor eased over edge, saying “you can go faster than that.” Kid obliged and opened it up completely and the counselor plummeted. Rope was ZZZipping thru ATC and I yelled “let go” and lurched towards the kid to push him off the sling. He let go and we both quickly peered over cliff. The instructor was about ~8ft off the deck, looking up w Fear of god in eyes, and scraped and battered. I belayed him back up and they packed their stuff and left. 

Holy mother of God...I don't EVER let clients lower me, let alone in that scenario!  Yeesh!!!

Ben Silverwrote:

This got me curious about how much weight a gear loop could actually hold. Turns out, not the weight of a 17-year-old female.

http://publications.americanalpineclub.org/articles/13200807002/Fall-on-RockImproper-Use-of-Harness-Tied-into-Gear-Loop-Inadequate-Protection-Inadequate-Belay-Inexperienced-Texas-Reimers-Ranch-County-Park-Dead-Cats-Wall

The harness here had gear loops that could hold 5 kg. Not kN, kg.

Some can fortunately hold more than that.

I have seen a girl belay someone with a gri-gri clipped into her gear loop. It was cold, the girl was wearing a large puffy, and we were packing up next to them, so weren’t paying close attention to what was going on, and didn’t see anything unusual. Until the climber asked for a take at the anchors, and the girl yelped as the harness rotated on her and spin her slightly sideways. The gear loop held, the climber immediately unweighted the rope by grabbing the jugs on the route, my partner still had his harness on, so he quickly took over belay, nobody was hurt.

It was a case of stronger, (fortunately light weight), well experienced, but inattentive climber taking a newbie out, handing her a gri-gri with minimal instructions, and not double-checking her setup that was obscured by his oversized puffy that he gallantly lended to the girl. I think the harness was also slightly oversized, and probably not her own. But all is well that ends well.

I’m not even sure that it was the SKETCHIEST thing I’ve seen... I’m having a hard time picking one!

myself

Watching zombie peeps walk around, head down in phone, under and through climbers cause they finding MP routes.  One guy ran into my belayer.  

In Joshua Tree, a woman was rapping down with no rappel backup and with each hand separately on either strand of the rope, so that if she let go with either hand she would have dropped all the way to the ground. When she made it down we explained why this was not the best of ideas, but she said her partner taught her to do it that way, and didn’t seem to get why it would be an issue

Saw a dude leading a closely-bolted sport route at Smith Rock placing Screamers instead of quickdraws for the first two bolts. He explained to me that there is a lot of force if you whip on the first two bolts because of the higher fall factor. I asked him if he would worry that when the screamers extend he would deck. He said he would.

Mother was belaying father on toprope. Toddler was playing nearby. Mother is standing about 10 ft back from the wall at the edge of a 6 ft deep ditch. Father takes a fall, and the mother comes flying into the wall. As this happens, the toddler is also suddenly swept off her feet, and crashes into the wall face first with the mother (toddler was not wearing a helmet). The mother then lowers herself down to the bottom of the ditch, and as she does that, the toddler comes down with her and smacks the ground hard.

Turns out the mother had clipped the toddler to her belay loop. This happened at Red Rock of course.

Norman Pelakwrote:

In Joshua Tree, a woman was rapping down with no rappel backup and with each hand separately on either strand of the rope, so that if she let go with either hand she would have dropped all the way to the ground. When she made it down we explained why this was not the best of ideas, but she said her partner taught her to do it that way, and didn’t seem to get why it would be an issue

Two hands makes redundancy bro

Me Leading the first pitch of The Last Gentleman when it was about an inch thick and completely delaminated.  Looked, felt and sounded horrible....  

W Kwrote:

Mother was belaying father on toprope. Toddler was playing nearby. Mother is standing about 10 ft back from the wall at the edge of a 6 ft deep ditch. Father takes a fall, and the mother comes flying into the wall. As this happens, the toddler is also suddenly swept off her feet, and crashes into the wall face first with the mother (toddler was not wearing a helmet). The mother then lowers herself down to the bottom of the ditch, and as she does that, the toddler comes down with her and smacks the ground hard.

Turns out the mother had clipped the toddler to her belay loop. This happened at Red Rock of course.

My god that sounds horrible to witness

W Kwrote:

Mother was belaying father on toprope. Toddler was playing nearby. Mother is standing about 10 ft back from the wall at the edge of a 6 ft deep ditch. Father takes a fall, and the mother comes flying into the wall. As this happens, the toddler is also suddenly swept off her feet, and crashes into the wall face first with the mother (toddler was not wearing a helmet). The mother then lowers herself down to the bottom of the ditch, and as she does that, the toddler comes down with her and smacks the ground hard.

Turns out the mother had clipped the toddler to her belay loop. This happened at Red Rock of course.

i actually LOL'd

Matt Swrote:

My god that sounds horrible to witness

It's burned into my mind, yeah. The parents were freaking out hard. Can't imagine what it must feel like to have potentially traumatically injured or almost killed your own child

The toddler was conscious afterwards and they took off immediately, hopefully to get her to a doctor

W Kwrote:

It's burned into my mind, yeah. The parents were freaking out hard. Can't imagine what it must feel like to have potentially traumatically injured or almost killed your own child

The toddler was conscious afterwards and they took off immediately, hopefully to get her to a doctor

Kids are pretty "bendy", I'm sure the baby was fine.

I fell off a chest high counter strapped into a baby chair when i was about 1yo. im fine besides the big dent.

Robert Barneswrote:

Two hands makes redundancy bro

Two hands x two ropes = quadruple redundancy, very safe!

Tradibanwrote:

Kids are pretty "bendy", I'm sure the baby was fine.

What way do u bend ur kids when they deck twice?

W Kwrote:

What way do u bend ur kids when they deck twice?

I dunno, I'm not stupid enough to clip them to my harness.   

I was at the anchors of a route in Red Rock and this guy in flip flops says "hey can I hop on your rope?" He had a harness on but had scrambled up some 5th class terrain nearby to take photos of his friend and couldn't get back down. I told him to hang on while I extended some quickdraws to my PAS to safely get him over to the anchor, but instead he just grabs a good pillar hold and swings over free solo style. Since the anchor was out of site my friends were pretty shocked when some rando comes down the rope first!

W Kwrote:

Mother was belaying father on toprope. Toddler was playing nearby. Mother is standing about 10 ft back from the wall at the edge of a 6 ft deep ditch. Father takes a fall, and the mother comes flying into the wall. As this happens, the toddler is also suddenly swept off her feet, and crashes into the wall face first with the mother (toddler was not wearing a helmet). The mother then lowers herself down to the bottom of the ditch, and as she does that, the toddler comes down with her and smacks the ground hard.

Turns out the mother had clipped the toddler to her belay loop. This happened at Red Rock of course.

Jesus christ this one might take the cake!