You are responsible for your partner's knot: controversial?

Of course I'm responsible for their knot, stupid fu#king question, lol.

I haven't read any of the comments.. but that was my instant response.

Yes. You are responsible for your partners knot. As a belayer you share the responsibility of managing your safety system with the climber.

This is not about pointing fingers or assigning blame, it’s about doing your best to make sure everyone goes home in one piece.

If your partner falls, you give a perfect catch, they get injured and can’t walk out do you just leave them there and head back to the car because you aren’t “responsible” for their injuries?  

Training or disabilities withstanding …

If everyone is responsible then no one is responsible. And for the act of tying a knot, there is not a reason why one person can’t be 100% responsible for its’ correctness.

I don’t think of “responsibility” as “thou shalt tie that tie-in knot as though completely alone.”  Circumstances might drive one to ask for a second check.

When it is the case that I could have checked, and the accident happens? Sure. With a lot of empathy and sincerity, I’d likely say, “I’m sorry I did not catch your mistake, buddy.”

Unsure if I’d feel comfortable climbing with someone who felt otherwise. And it’d likely limit the kind and / or amount of climbing we’d do together. Still, it is their choice to decide they want that as a given.

Once while TR belaying, I pulled the rope from a climbers harness about 30’ up a climb in the Creek. I didn’t think “not my responsibility” when it happened. Luckily he down climbed, but I know if he had gotten hurt I sure would have felt bad about it. Partner checks are critical, even when soloing. BUT, ultimately we have to be responsible for our own systems. Sometimes the partner check gets missed, now what? If we can’t do our own check and validate our own safety how the hell can we commit to anything?  

Humans create safety protocols because we know it’s in our nature to fck up constantly. If we are always in the habit of checking, we have a slightly better chance of not making mistakes. Ultimately though when climbing we each have to be the final safety police for ourselves. 

Kevin Stricker wrote:

Once while TR belaying, I pulled the rope from a climbers harness about 30’ up a climb in the Creek. I didn’t think “not my responsibility” when it happened. Luckily he down climbed, but I know if he had gotten hurt I sure would have felt bad about it. Partner checks are critical, even when soloing. BUT, ultimately we have to be responsible for our own systems. Sometimes the partner check gets missed, now what? If we can’t do our own check and validate our own safety how the hell can we commit to anything?  

Humans create safety protocols because we know it’s in our nature to fck up constantly. If we are always in the habit of checking, we have a slightly better chance of not making mistakes. Ultimately though when climbing we each have to be the final safety police for ourselves. 

Kevin, while overall I agree with your position, I am confused by this bit: "partner checks are critical, even when soloing". Could you please explain how one does that? Self-double/triple checking when soloing, sure, but how does one 'partner check' when alone?

As others have mentioned, the word 'responsible' --a word that has multiple meanings---in this context does create difficulties---some semantic, some potentially legal. While I think that it is a very good idea to check one's partner's knots and highly recommended to do so, unless that partner is inexperienced or has other limitations, I don't think that you are 'responsible' to do so.

I feel that the only time one is actually responsible for their partners tie in knot is if you are either a paid guide or  mentoring new climbers. I think partner checks are good but not a legal responsibility. Buck  I will gladly do knott checks with you but think about your ultimatum for a moment. Given your line of work have you  not ever worked with an operator that did not follow the book by the letter yet you would 100% trust them with your life when the chips are down?

One thing I do to check myself, aside from knot inspection, is to give a quick yank up on the rope to test the knot and confirm that it at least holds that force. I might be a bit OCD here.

While I don't think there's legal responsibility, I do know that I'd feel terrible if my partner got hurt or died due to something that I could have inspected, but didn't. In order to avoid feeling terrible, I do inspect their knots (and request to do so). Although, sometimes things are moving quickly and I have definitely forgotten to inspect at times. I could imagine that if someone found this type of constant checking to be annoying that I wouldn't be able to climb with them. To me, it's just a normal and expected part of the teamwork.

With rgold's bowline, I think I can tell from a visual inspection that it's correct, but I mostly climb with other figure-eighters. I still think it's very helpful to verbally confirm that we've each checked ourselves at every step along the way (before starting up, when reaching the rap station, before starting to rap, etc).

I do wonder if I would recognize the bowline if it were somehow tied in a failure mode. There was recently some discussion of a figure-eight failure mode. Would you recognize that just from looking at it?

probably not without  a really close and personal inspection. I think its more important to be methodical and test everything yourself. especially weighting rappels before you unclip from the anchor. and the tug  thing. I absolutly ask for a tug check from anyone belaying me with a gri gri to be certain it's not threaded bas akwards.  certainly when I climb with old hardmen/women that have funky tie in's I dont have the nerve to question them about what the heck is it that you have been tying in with for the last 50 years.  perhaps that is precisely the kind of complacency that leads to accidents but it is also human nature to not question known professionals about how they do things  unless they are really scareing the shit out of you. Then you have to step up and speak up because just because someone is well known/ famous does not mean they cant make a mistake. It does take a certain amount of courage to question them though. 

Carey De Luca wrote:

I'm pretty sure the Lynn Hill incident was from her cleaning the route. No way to get a double check from a partner when one is at the top of a route and belayer is below them.

Lynn's account starts at 13:30 in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IE9_oAPRTsE&ab_channel=HannahMorrisBouldering

apogee wrote:

The trend of shifting one's personal responsibility towards others is truly disturbing.

Wait until you hear about belaying, you're going to be furious!

Kyle Tarry wrote:

Wait until you hear about belaying, you're going to be furious!

Not the same thing.

Kyle Tarry wrote:

Wait until you hear about belaying, you're going to be furious!

Pffft.  That’s what a GriGri is for. 

Chad Miller wrote:

Pffft.  That’s what a GriGri is for. 

Just trust the tech?!?    

Bill Lawry wrote:

Just trust the tech?!?    

You just trust your rope so ….   

Chad Miller wrote:

You just trust your rope so ….   

Sorry.  I just haven't abdicated my belay responsibilities to  my belay device. Totally your choice to do so.

Peace.

Bill Lawry wrote:

Sorry.  I just haven't abdicated my belay responsibilities to  my belay device. Totally your choice to do so.

Peace.

I’ve never used a Gri Gri. Just like you’ve never learned to identify sarcasm.    

So if I fail on my sick prahj, does this now mean I can blame that on my belayer, too?

apogee wrote:

So if I fail on my sick prahj, does this now mean I can blame that on my belayer, too?

No. Blame the grigri that short-roped you.

Chad Miller wrote:

I’ve never used a Gri Gri. Just like you’ve never learned to identify sarcasm.    

It's all good, Chad.

Sep M wrote:

I think this is one that virtue ethics solves for us. Imagine two identical climbing partners. One believes they are responsible for your knot, the other does not. Which is the safer, and thus better, partner? That is the partner we should strive to be.

Also, what is this nonsense about responsibility as a limited resource? Two people can each be 100% responsible for the same thing. That’s what redundancy means.

Eloquently put, and after waffling back and forth on this question, I believe this settles it in my mind.