The easiest climbing is the most dangerous?

Someone posted elsewhere the sentence "a 5.12 climber falling off a 5.4 ridge?"  I take that to mean that someone is shocked/surprised that someone strong enough to climb 5.12 could possibly crux out and fall on a 5.4.  But I think this misses the point.  When we're super focused, dialed in, trying hard, that's usually not when we have a fatal slip.  It's when we're least expecting it, when our guard is down, that something suddenly gets us.  What's the expression?  "Most accidents happen on the descent?"

Examples:

John Bachar, famous free-soloist, dies on a 5.8.  Derek Hersey was on 5.9 terrain.  Both had soloed much much harder.

Luce Douady, 16 yr old World Cup climber, slipped on an exposed trail with a handrail in 2020. She fell 150 meters and did not survive.

Two local climbers, Dillon Blanksma and Maya Humeau, recently died after slipping off a ledge at the base of a climb (Broadway and Black Wall, respectively).  Thad Friday, a local crusher, fell off the 4th class descent from the Bastille and died last year.

In every case above, these were very competent and experienced climbers on terrain that was trivial for them.  Holds break, a foot slips, you let your guard down for a second.

You've done it too, haven't you?  You grabbed a hold on easy terrain that, if it broke, you would have died? You smeared your foot on a slab that, had your foot slipped, you would have died?  Virtually no one reading this post has always been on a rope in every precarious situation ever.  We all do approaches/descents that have a bit of exposure.  The only difference is that you and I haven't yet been unlucky enough to have something like this happen.

So yes, a 5.12 climber can fall even on easy terrain. You don't want to think about it because it's scary to think that could be you.  

But it could.

It happened to this guy. https://www.rockandice.com/climbing-accidents/squamish-fatality-ken-anderson-top-trad-climber-dies-in-fall/

I feel confident in saying, I've never done it.  People ask me why I place pro like I'm sketched out on shit that I can easily climb.  This is why.  I take nothing for granted and too many people depend on me, my presence and yes, my income for me to be irresponsible and take needless risks while engaging in recreational activity.  Anyone that runs it out because they're confident when they don't have to, really hasn't thought things through to their logical extension.  Holds break sometimes.  When they do, you need to have something holding that line.

Jake Joneswrote:

I feel confident in saying, I've never done it.  People ask me why I place pro like I'm sketched out on shit that I can easily climb.  Holds break sometimes.  When they do, you need to have something holding that line.

Ladder rungs break too.  And people die falling down stairwells.  And I’m sure you’ve been on trails where a bad stumble could have sent you over the edge.  

No one stay completely protected in precarious situations 100% of the time.

Hazard is everywhere and risk is everywhere people are. The only people who are "not at risk" of dying or being injured constantly are those who are ignorant to hazard. Everyone has their own risk tolerance that they are comfortable with and I've found it varies WILDLY, even in "normal" people who do not participate in sports with inherent hazard like we all do.

F Wheelerwrote:

Ladder rungs break too.  And people die falling down stairwells.

Patrick Edlinger, one of the premier rock climbers in history, died falling down a steep flight of stairs.

No one takes a belay on stairs... we are all free soloists when it comes to stairs.

John RBwrote:

Virtually no one reading this post has always been on a rope in every precarious situation ever.  We all do approaches/descents that have a bit of exposure.  The only difference is that you and I haven't yet been unlucky enough to have something like this happen.

So yes, a 5.12 climber can fall even on easy terrain. You don't want to think about it because it's scary to think that could be you.  

But it could.

Totally hear you on this man.  The scariest shit I've had to do in the backcountry came from blowing the approach to a super easy climb.  Carrying a heavy pack on steep terrain, through some rough bushwacking, wondering when I'm going to step on a rattlesnake.  I'm not a 5.12 climber, but there are logistics to everything, and it can go South in a minute when you're getting into a remote area for the first time.

Jake Joneswrote:

It happened to this guy. https://www.rockandice.com/climbing-accidents/squamish-fatality-ken-anderson-top-trad-climber-dies-in-fall/

I feel confident in saying, I've never done it.  People ask me why I place pro like I'm sketched out on shit that I can easily climb.  This is why.  I take nothing for granted and too many people depend on me, my presence and yes, my income for me to be irresponsible and take needless risks while engaging in recreational activity.  Anyone that runs it out because they're confident when they don't have to, really hasn't thought things through to their logical extension.  Holds break sometimes.  When they do, you need to have something holding that line.

Hi Jake, someone else seemed critical of your response up thread, and I am also really curious about how you see this. Are you somehow going out trad climbing and never finding yourself in exposed, unprotected situations? On 4th class sections of approaches or descents? You're never runout on unprotectable 5.4 terrain on the last pitch of a 5.10 route or something? I'm thinking of all the places I climb multipitch routes, and I can't come up with one that doesn't have this potential. Maybe it's possible if you're always cragging somewhere with splitter cracks?

Please don't take this as snarky, as I'm genuinely curious about your views here. I often feel like there is a contingent that believes they can engineer and care-take all the risk out of climbing, and I just don't see it that way. I think of physical ability as the first line of defense in keeping yourself safe, and the idea that you can always be protected (by something other than that physical ability) to be a bit misguided. I take participation in climbing, but trad climbing in particular, to be a tacit acceptance that you may be killed or maimed by something that you could not have protected yourself against.

John RBwrote:

So yes, a 5.12 climber can fall even on easy terrain. You don't want to think about it because it's scary to think that could be you.  

But it could.

I climb 5.13. I fell off the side of a paved road last week. I survived unscathed ... This time. 

Now that you've read this post share it with two other souls in 7 days or John RB will come for you. 

Also I know plenty of 5.12/13 climbers who don't ever get exposure or do sketchy approaches.  They are always out of their gourd when taken to a sport crag that has a less then sporty belay/approach.

Short Fall Seanwrote:

Hi Jake, someone else seemed critical of your response up thread, and I am also really curious about how you see this.

I didn’t mean to come off as critical, more thought provoking.  Maybe he thinks he’s always protected, but I was trying to point out that it likely isn’t really the case.  

Maybe it's possible if you're always cragging somewhere with splitter cracks?

I remember reading Jake’s comments on a Stone Mountain NC thread, which makes me suspect that he’s got some run out slab under his belt…

I think the OP's intended message is that "easy" doesn't = "safe." You can die just as dead falling off of a 5.2 climb as a 5.14. And, in fact, there's an inverse safety factor when it comes to a lot of difficult climbs because most of the 5.12 and up stuff that most people climb is bolted overhanging sport climbs.

The biggest objective hazards for most rock climbers are rockfall, breaking holds, operator error and fatigue. Not how difficult the climb is. 

There is a great forward by John Dill in the forward material of all the yosemite SuperTopo books called Staying Alive, available online here http://dev.supertopo.com/topos/yosemite/stayalive.pdf

One of my favorite lines in it is under the heading "Climbing Unroped":

Remember that your climbing ability has probably been measured on clean, rated routes, not on unpredictable sand and wet moss. Being a 5.11 climber does not mean you can fly.

Also, not that it matters to anything, but Bachar was probably soloing Mr. Kamakaze (5.10a) when he fell.

Ben Horowitzwrote:

Also, not that it matters to anything, but Bachar was probably soloing Mr. Kamakaze (5.10a) when he fell.

Yes, I was about to say something to this effect. He fell on Dike Wall, on a route he had done many times, apparently as a solo routine. 

I still think of him as the brilliant youngster who visited me in Colorado, along with Largo. 

I thought I had heard that he never fully recovered from that accident, his shoulder being impaired.

bryans wrote:

But back to the OP, of course the easiest climbing is the most dangerous, 

Hmm, maybe my point was obvious then?  But I found it counter-intuitive. 

For example, when I watched Free Solo, my hands were sweating when Alex was on the Boulder Problem (insecure V7).  It didn't occur to me that the 5.8 pitches or the raps down East Ledges were more dangerous because he might let his guard down and make a mistake.

Many times the consequences of a fall on an easier route are more severe than on a harder route. Not because you’re paying less attention because of the nature of the route. Many climbs that are under 5.8 have  ledges  on them. so even if they’re  closely bolted, the consequence of a fall is often to hit a ledge. Most of the injuries I have seen are people who have left the gym and are climbing easy, bolted routes outdoors, and don’t understand the consequence of a fall.( and often neither do their belayers)

John RBwrote:

For example, when I watched Free Solo, my hands were sweating when Alex was on the Boulder Problem (insecure V7).  It didn't occur to me that the 5.8 pitches or the raps down East Ledges were more dangerous because he might let his guard down and make a mistake.

Good rule of thumb is not to draw generalized conclusions about human behavior based on people at the outer ends of the bell curve. What Alex was doing was incredibly dangerous. And he could have just as easily died from a bird or a bat popping out of a crack in his face and startling him. But unless you and I are planning to free solo the El Cap Boulder Problem it's kind of beside the point. And, as noted, Alex backed off his first attempt after feeling out of sorts on the 5.11 slab pitch. And he got injured being dropped by Sani. 

Tis better to suffer your slings disintegrating to cause your corpus to critically rupture upon the stone than it is to keep a wear log of all soft goods.

John RBwrote:

Someone posted elsewhere the sentence "a 5.12 climber falling off a 5.4 ridge?"...But I think this misses the point.  When we're super focused, dialed in, trying hard, that's usually not when we have a fatal slip.

I think it's just basic probability: you do way more of the latter than the former. Even if the chance of mistake is smaller on easier terrain when normalized to time on route/vertical feet gained, your screw-up is more likely to happen on that than on harder terrain.

rebootwrote:

I think it's just basic probability: you do way more of the latter than the former. Even if the chance of mistake is smaller on easier terrain when normalized to time on route/vertical feet gained, your screw-up is more likely to happen on that than on harder terrain.

Maybe, but risk factors do matter.  For example, BASE jumpers spend a lot more time driving their cars than they spend in the air, but the odds of dying are much higher during their flight times.  Maybe the risk isn't high enough with climbing for this to translate over?  Maybe with alpinism it starts to work better...

the takeaway is to keep reminding yourself that you can still die on the easy stuff.  I always try to tell myself "it's not over yet. Focus! " it is not over untill you are safe on the ground.