Gymclimber mag - Auto Belay related lawsuit

Wonder if it was a snagged nose on the main loop or if this guy's harness has a broken gear loop right now... rooting for the gym on this one for sure. 

This saddens me to no end. I hope the "climber" gives into pressure to drop this or obviously the case is dismissed. When I think of a tight-knit, caring community with genuinely good people, the first thing I think of is the people at my local climbing gym. And this guy is putting one through the ringer because of a mistake he made.

If you are reading this Michael, I hope you quickly recover from your injuries, and just as quickly drop the lawsuit. If you don't and somehow you win, may the fact that you are too cowardly to accept personal responsibility weigh upon your conscience as you go through each day enjoying your million dollars. Each time you make a purchase with your heap of money, remember where it came from: you putting a well-meaning local business owner through hardship...one who first made climbing accessible to the masses - to YOU - by introducing the first climbing gym. 

And to Mr. Johnston, good on you for not agreeing to settle. 

The problem is that these knuckleheads, and the lawyers who love them, want to go for the chance of a big payout.  No matter how small the chance or legitimacy of their cause, or how they screw every legit climber in terms of added costs and pain in the ass hoops to jump through just to protect the lowest common denominator from Darwin

Let’s just do some quick math...very roughly about 5 million climbers and 600ish gyms in the country.  Also a rough injury rate of 1 per 5000 hrs of gym climbing (most are bouldering injuries)    It’s safe to say someone who can’t work an auto belay is in the bottom 0.1% of gym goers.

Is it practical or even possible to make the world safe for more than 99.9% of the population? or hold the 99.9 hostage to the costs and procedures necessary to cater to the incompetencies of the lowest percentages?

My vote is for those identified as outside of the lowest 3 sigma from the average idiot, must wear blaze orange clothing on a daily basis so everyone knows to watch out for them...as they present a danger not only to themselves but to others.  

Kip Kasper wrote:

A climbing gym that gives absolutely no instruction on how to use an auto belay would be negligent. A climbing gym that makes users watch an instructional video, get checked off by a staff member, sign a waiver acknowledging the risks involved, and puts up signs explain how to use the auto belay and someone still manages to fuck it up and sues, that is a frivolous lawsuit. Hope that this guy does not win. 

A friend of mine recently started climbing. A brand-new not-yet-belay-certified newbie. She said to me yesterday, “you need to show me how to use an autobelay!” I was confused, bc she had JUST watched a gym orientation video. That clearly explains the autobelay, and instructs the viewer to go to the gym staff with any further questions, if they are at all unsure.

So, I know that it’s in the video. And I know she had watched it. Or, at least, dutifully sat in front of the video screen while it played. Yet this lady, not-exactly-unintelligent, had absolutely no recollection of watching that part of the video, and had no clue how to use an autobelay... that was kinda disconcerting. Also, I’m continually surprised at things apparently-intelligent people can’t figure out without help. I mean, it great that she asked me for help... But seriously!!!! (Facepalm!!!)

 also... I’m not the gym staff. I’m not supposed to teach anyone anything in the gym. 

Alpine Corvairs, unsafe at any speed. When we handed out the climbing helmets, they got the orange one. We called climbing helmets "hiking helmets"

'cause anytime we went off trail with big packs, on went the helmets.

Jon Nelson wrote:

Every time I clip into one, I've done this. 1) Clip in. 2) Lean back and fall on the mat. 3) Rest there a moment, scoping out the route...

Never had an auto-belay failure yet. 

I can speak from experience since I fell when I had not clipped into an auto-belay and incurred 4 fractured vertebrae. After analyzing the accident, I realized that one of the dangers of an auto-belay is there is only one thing to do—clip in. If one is distracted, it’s easy to miss that one thing. I decided that to increase the safety of using the auto-belay there needs to be more things to do. Returning to the gym after my recovery, I would sit on the floor and clip in there and then move a foot or so up the wall and fall. At the time of my accident, a route setter in a west coast gym had a serious fall, when she was not clipped into the auto-belay as she was route setting. Since my accident, I’m aware of three more serious accidents locally, one fatal, for not clipping in. All were experienced climbers with years of indoor and outdoor climbing. More details here: 

https://www.mountainproject.com/forum/topic/108350613/autobelay-death-in-texas 

If a gym management does not provide instruction on procedures which minimize the most common reason for auto-belay accidents, I suppose they could be held liable. It’s not just how you clip in, but having a routine to insure that you actually are safely clipped in. 

I never thought of suing the gym. I had retirement income, was a long-time climber and so  suing was not in my thinking, and I had a cordial relationship with the gym owners. I won’t cast aspersions on Vandiver. I don’t know his financial and family situation and how the injury will affect his ability to work. That said, it’s unfortunate for the gym owners and our sport that he is taking this course of action.

rob.calm wrote:

I never thought of suing the gym. I had retirement income, was a long-time climber and so  suing was not in my thinking, and I had a cordial relationship with the gym owners. I won’t cast aspersions on Vandiver. I don’t know his financial and family situation and how the injury will affect his ability to work. That said, it’s unfortunate for the gym owners and our sport that he is taking this course of action.

Accidents happen. Human vigilance is imperfect. The villain here, if there is one, may be 1) poor social safety nets for disability, 2) a lack of comprehensive high-quality universal healthcare and 3) a climate of litigiousness that's further incentivized by miserly for-profit insurance companies. The claims of the plaintiff most likely are generated entirely by his attorneys, and don't represent his actual beliefs.

rob.calm wrote:

After analyzing the accident, I realized that one of the dangers of an auto-belay is there is only one thing to do—clip in. If one is distracted, it’s easy to miss that one thing. 

That's an interesting and counterintuitive conclusion, thanks for sharing - the simpler a critical step, the easier it is to overlook it. Never considered that, I wonder if there's any research to back that up. What if you had to tie into an autobelay the same as a toprope? 

Big Red wrote:

That's an interesting and counterintuitive conclusion, thanks for sharing - the simpler a critical step, the easier it is to overlook it. Never considered that, I wonder if there's any research to back that up. What if you had to tie into an autobelay the same as a toprope? 

It'd be safer because two things would have to change: you'd have to test for it, and you'd need a partner to check your knot. Autobelay allows for safe solo climbing, under the assumption that a person can clearly tell on their own when they are clipped correctly. We don't need to change the nature of the activity because somebody didn't bridge the gap between supervision and common sense. 

rob.calm wrote:

I can speak from experience since I fell when I had not clipped into an auto-belay and incurred 4 fractured vertebrae. After analyzing the accident, I realized that one of the dangers of an auto-belay is there is only one thing to do—clip in. If one is distracted, it’s easy to miss that one thing. I decided that to increase the safety of using the auto-belay there needs to be more things to do. Returning to the gym after my recovery, I would sit on the floor and clip in there and then move a foot or so up the wall and fall. At the time of my accident, a route setter in a west coast gym had a serious fall, when she was not clipped into the auto-belay as she was route setting. Since my accident, I’m aware of three more serious accidents locally, one fatal, for not clipping in. All were experienced climbers with years of indoor and outdoor climbing. More details here: 

https://www.mountainproject.com/forum/topic/108350613/autobelay-death-in-texas 

If a gym management does not provide instruction on procedures which minimize the most common reason for auto-belay accidents, I suppose they could be held liable. It’s not just how you clip in, but having a routine to insure that you actually are safely clipped in. 

I never thought of suing the gym. I had retirement income, was a long-time climber and so  suing was not in my thinking, and I had a cordial relationship with the gym owners. I won’t cast aspersions on Vandiver. I don’t know his financial and family situation and how the injury will affect his ability to work. That said, it’s unfortunate for the gym owners and our sport that he is taking this course of action.

There was also a fatal fall at a gym in St. Louis about 3 years ago. A very experienced climber failed to clip in and let go at the top. I heard about the incident from a good friend of the deceased, but I have not been able to independently verify the fatality. And not to take the thread off-topic, but that same good friend is also a guide. He told me that a lot of accidents happen when climbers get complacent, and that typically happens after 4+ years of climbing. So noobs are terrified of effing up and check and double-check, but as time goes by one becomes too confident.

Big Red wrote:

That's an interesting and counterintuitive conclusion, thanks for sharing - the simpler a critical step, the easier it is to overlook it. Never considered that, I wonder if there's any research to back that up. What if you had to tie into an autobelay the same as a toprope? 

Here's an interesting article on how easy it is to get distracted:

https://www.americanscientist.org/article/dangers-of-divided-attention

Whenever top roping or gym stuff like auto belays, I always have incorporated a second check point after completing my tie in.   I alway do a “sag” onto my rope or belay to test it’s working and soak up a bit of rope stretch.  I don’t think I have ever just tied in and launched up without a pause for final assessment.   That said, I can totally see how someone doing an extended circuit of autobelays could get into such a solo rhythm without any feedback and skip a clip accidentally.   

Maybe they should be lead solo belays.  Flip it upside down and force you to clip.  Might be safer.  And good training for the real thing.  Heck, now that I mention it, I want some anyway.   Anybody ever heard of such a thing at a gym?

Pepe LePoseur wrote:

Whenever top roping or gym stuff like auto belays, I always have incorporated a second check point after completing my tie in.   I alway do a “sag” onto my rope or belay to test it’s working and soak up a bit of rope stretch.  I don’t think I have ever just tied in and launched up without a pause for final assessment.   That said, I can totally see how someone doing an extended circuit of autobelays could get into such a solo rhythm without any feedback and skip a clip accidentally.   

Maybe they should be lead solo belays.  Flip it upside down and force you to clip.  Might be safer.  And good training for the real thing.  Heck, now that I mention it, I want some anyway.   Anybody ever heard of such a thing at a gym?

I've wanted Edelrid to modify the Ohm for lead solo belaying. A buddy of mine can pay out as much slack as he wants when I'm being lowered and it just lowers me at the pace it was designed to do. Kind of fun to think someone could use it for that, if they were a mad man!

GeHo wrote:

Totally agree with you Kip, the coffee was INDEED hot, almost to boiling point and the injury was horrendous. Preventable on McD's part? Absolutely, Preventable on the lady's part? Absolutely.  

Another element often missed is that they were outside of the corporate temp specs and had ill-fitting lids, which were noted by inspections several times prior. That's what made it go into completely negligent behavior on McD's part - they knew they had a dangerous product (much more dangerous than normal hot coffee) and knowlingly served it in a defective container.

Josh Gates wrote:

Another element often missed is that they were outside of the corporate temp specs and had ill-fitting lids, which were noted by inspections several times prior. That's what what it go into completely negligent behavior on McD's part - they knew they had a dangerous product (much more dangerous than normal hot coffee) and knowlingly served it in a defective container.

And supposedly intentionally served it way too hot to drink in order to minimize the number of dine-in customers that ask for a refill, saving $millions.

I sort of see this auto-belay thing much the same way I see setting up a rappel (which in a way, it is). I wouldn't setup a rappel & commit to it without weight-testing it. Weighting a system before committing is (or should) be SOP. Same thing with an auto-belay. I don't use one often (none at the closest gym) but when I do I give it a sharp tug and/or lean back.

Franck Vee wrote:

I sort of see this auto-belay thing much the same way I see setting up a rappel (which in a way, it is). I wouldn't setup a rappel & commit to it without weight-testing it. Weighting a system before committing is (or should) be SOP. Same thing with an auto-belay. I don't use one often (none at the closest gym) but when I do I give it a sharp tug and/or lean back.

How thats not a part of the "safety checks" that gyms require is beyond me. It's so simple and easy to do, and is practically impossible to mess up.

Matthew Jaggers wrote:

I've wanted Edelrid to modify the Ohm for lead solo belaying. A buddy of mine can pay out as much slack as he wants when I'm being lowered and it just lowers me at the pace it was designed to do. Kind of fun to think someone could use it for that, if they were a mad man!

Having access to the belay device is critical in LRS. It would not be a fun time to have the device jam and have no way to lower yourself.

Taylor McKenzie wrote:

Having access to the belay device is critical in LRS. It would not be a fun time to have the device jam and have no way to lower yourself.

For sure, and that thing is prone to jamming.

Gym Climber published an article discussing personal responsibilities in gym setting - https://www.gymclimber.com/the-gumby-guru-injured-its-probably-your-fault 

It has a bit of relevant information regarding the autobelay incident - 

The injured climber declined to speak with me for my article, so I can only guess at his motivations for suing, but Johnston told me the individual’s insurance fully covered his injuries, which he has since recovered from. He had visited Vertical World over two dozen times before the incident and had climbed before that at other gyms, so he wasn’t a complete novice. He knew he messed up. Besides, even a six-year-old at a birthday party can clip into an auto belay. 

I can only assume that he’s bringing charges against the gym simply because he can. He does have a case, based on the auto belay’s manual, as scummy and underhanded as said case is. He saw an opportunity to score big and took it.