Half Dome's Snake Dike is being retrobolted - get involved!

There is a precedent for this situation, but it was not adhered to. Back in the 60's Tom Geraghty did a route in Tuolumne with a similar name,  the Dikes Route on Pywiack. He was scared shitless by the exposure and only placed one bolt. With his blessings, 2-3 more bolts were added, but they were not enough to alter the exciting dicey nature of the route. It is harder technically than the Snake Dike. (I am pretty sure he did the climb in Kronhoffers, not modern sticky rubber shoes). The route is not that long, and if a lot of bolts had been added, it would have ruined it. Based upon that precedent, adding maybe 3 bolts per pitch would have been all right for Snake Dike, but not so many. Bachar-Yerian is five pitches, and only has a total of 13 bolts total. 

Interesting story. I never met Tom Gerughty. I did know Dave Meeks pretty well. They definitely didn’t climb it in sticky rubber shoes. It was another 15 years before the first Boreal Fires were available. Something like Kronhofers likely yes. Or Cortina’s, or Spiders. 

dave hill wrote:

Crest Jewel is what you are holding up as 'safe'? Did that thing get retrobolted since I climbed it in the 90s?! I remember a lot of loooong runouts on rock much less featured than snake dike! Ha, my memory must be slippihg...

Notes say I did Crest Jewel in 2008. I don’t know if it was ever retro-bolted but I remember it having so many bolts I got irritated clipping them and skipped a bunch because it was interfering with my hike. 

Don’t buy this guys guide books.  Contact sites that sell them and share your ethical concerns.  Places like How Not To have published videos praising him and his guide books, let your disdain be known.  Erik has a long history of this luny bolt crusader insanity.  His adding of a bolt ladder in the middle of The Great Slab Route that bypasses key parts of the route and leaving a bunch of tat in the process was my final straw, and that was over 15 years ago.

nobody can talk sense into him, and nobody will.  Defund him and shame any shop that sells his books.

Erik is an ass

So is the notion that old timey runout disliked by its FA needs to be kept in an argon chamber

I'm not sure what to think

This defacement of a classic route is completely unacceptable. I have called Erik twice to give him my take on this rape of half dome.  He is out of hand and completely blowing it. I have just come onto this thread after a 9 day ascent of Atlantic Ocean wall and have not read everything here, but I can tell you that the locals are outraged and ready to try to fix his damage.  Erik Sloan is a rogue and a vandal, and I wish there was a way to talk some sense into him.  

Danger and risk are part of what make rock climbing the soulful and introspective physical and mental grapple that it is.  Some routes are there for those who are ready. Options include getting somebody else to lead it, hiring a guide from YMS, or hiking on to the next route.  There is no argument that is worthy for desecrating such a big time classic.

Daniel Shively wrote:

Later research published in journals like Psychology of Sport and Exercise explicitly noted that the Byrnes meta-analysis laid the groundwork for general sex differences, but that specific analyses of extreme sports—like rock climbing—had to be conducted in subsequent, independent studies. Those later studies have shown that while men generally report higher risk-taking in climbing, the actual behaviors are heavily moderated by a climber's individual self-efficacy (confidence in their own skill) rather than gender alone. [, 2, 3, 4]

ma’am, seems like further studies don’t jive with your assumption. 

Daniel, it's not clear what source you are quoting, but your rebuttal does not appear to rebut. The quote you gave has nothing to do with population-level effects and disproportionate impact. It confirms that "the Brynes meta-analysis laid the groundwork for general sex differences" and "men generally report higher risk-taking in climbing." As I noted in my original post, there is variation with individual women either because those individuals are natural outliers or because they deliberately work to increase their comfort with risk, i.e. "individual self-efficacy".

But thank you for the "ma'am". It's not necessary, but it's not wrong. 

Phil Bert wrote:

What do you mean?? This guy needs to be in prison.

It always shocks me when climbers are quick to suggest  prison as a solution. I get what you're saying, but dang, there's probably an easier, softer way 

Siobhán Straver wrote:

This was thoughtfully written and I will say that although I didn’t see the relevance of your original statement to the snake dike issue, you’ve at least explained your point here well, and I personally appreciate that you put thought into this side of things at all.

It feels to me personally that although it’s kind to consider that male climbers as a group are more pro risk, it’s still something that is possible for a female climber to have power over. Because with routes that are known as risky one can make an evaluation whether to take that risk based on one’s own appetite. So it feels like the community don’t need to make the call on behalf of the women by making things deliberately safer, because those with lesser risk appetites can just make the call for themselves.
Meanwhile height based safety issues are harder to navigate, because with routes bolted for taller climbers- or even reachy crucial gear placements, you don’t know how reachy things are until you’re on it, and possibly find yourself in a more dangerous position than expected. So this is where a greater awareness by the community is useful, lest bolters or graders accidentally put the short climbers in unexpected danger.

I suppose the difference feels like with snake dike everyone knew they were in danger, not just one group. One group may be less inclined to take on the danger, but their power hasn’t been taken away because they can still consciously make that choice. And can over time become more risk tolerant and work up to doing the scary climb- but only if it still exists. Meanwhile you can’t become taller over time, so one has to instead hope for safety based accommodations from others, even if just a heads up in the topo.

I don’t know, I can’t speak for all women, that’s just my initial thoughts on the difference, but your point is an interesting one that I’ll probably ponder. At any rate thanks for putting thought to these topics, you’re no doubt an aid to the less represented in many other conversations so thanks for thinking that way.  

Hi Siobhán. Thanks for your thoughtful reply. Absolutely agreed that individual women can and will evaluate risk and individual women have the power to make the call for themselves, as you say. You make great points about how height is not changeable in the same way that skills and comfort are buildable. True!

The thing is, the community is making a choice at this moment whether or not to keep the climb essentially X rated. It's officially "R" but there's no question that 100' runouts are potentially deadly, and the alternate, unprotected start is/was also potentially deadly if you slip and fall. I lost a friend just last year to a 20-foot ground fall. He was an experienced friend and mentor of mine who got a little too complacent in a very low risk / very high consequence situation. Not a runout, but a ledge scramble.

So the community is making the choice to keep the easiest technical climb on Half Dome a potentially deadly experience, even though it has bolts. That is dumb and gate-keepery in my opinion. If you're going to bolt a thing, it should be bolted to not be deadly. Humans have already decided to alter the rock with bolts. Death fall potential seems like a pretty logical place to draw the line, and yet we're not doing it. Why? To honor the FA party, who, btw, said there should be more bolts. And making this choice has population-level effects that fall most heavily on people who logically evaluate the risk vs. reward and decide it's not worth it, who just happen to be women.

Note that using language like "they're not up to it" or "they don't have the skills" is loaded language. Honnold certainly has the skills to solo 5.12, yet every time he does it, we all know he's taking his life into his hands because shit happens up there that you're not expecting. Bodies get cramps. Sudden rain or snow happens. Wildlife is wild. You decide to trust the wrong marginal foot that one time. Whatever. There are certainly entirely compentent easy slab climbers who decide not to do Snake Dike because of the risk. 

But it's the community deciding what the risk is (bolt placement), not the rock itself. So it's the community saying, hey, if you want to do this beautiful line that is the most accessible 5th class route up this amazing formation, you'd better be willing to risk death, and pussies be warned. Pun intended because it perhaps helps expose some of the subconscious sexism of assuming that lower tolerance for risk is a bad thing, an unmanly thing, a shameful thing.

It's also loaded language to talk about "dumbing down the climb", as others frame it. I'd say it's smart and considerate of all climbers to make bolt placement decisions for the express purpose of reducing the risk of death. It's weird that this is apparently a controversial take.

Anyway. I've been on this journey for about 25 years now as a woman who climbs. There is an inherent and often unthinking male bias in a lot of climbing because men have been the bulk of the modern climbing pioneers and men are doing most of the work of bolting, rebolting, writing guidebooks, and running climbing organizations. (I'm sure there are many reasons for that; I'm not saying women are deliberately excluded. Any woman can pick up a drill and put up a route, and there are many wonderful women in leadership in climbing orgs.) And look, it's just true and the natural order of things that the people doing the work are the people calling the shots. I've done a little bit of rebolting and it is damn hard physical labor to pull bolts, to say nothing of schlepping the extra gear into the backcountry. I respect that greatly. I am glad there are people willing to do it. I usually defer to their judgment. 

But in this case where there's an opening to rethink the bolting on a classic route, I think it's worth calling out the population-level impacts of trying to preserve the poor choices of a previous generation. The feelings folks have about preserving an original journey or facing the challenge of runouts are all thoughtful and valid, but let's acknowledge that our community decisions in the safety arena have impacts that are not gender neutral. It's not my only point, but it is an important one.

I appreciate you saying you'll ponder my points. Thanks for reading, and solidarity to you, Siobhán. Please know not all of the above is specifically a reply to you, just my own collected ponderings.

L Kap wrote:

Daniel, it's not clear what source you are quoting, but your rebuttal does not appear to rebut. The quote you gave has nothing to do with population-level effects and disproportionate impact. It confirms that "the Brynes meta-analysis laid the groundwork for general sex differences" and "men generally report higher risk-taking in climbing." As I noted in my original post, there is variation with individual women either because those individuals are natural outliers or because they deliberately work to increase their comfort with risk, i.e. "individual self-efficacy".

But thank you for the "ma'am". It's not necessary, but it's not wrong. 

Why not celebrate the individual women who are the outliers?  It’s interesting how stats never actually prove anything (those darn outliers) but are often used to justify further expectations of homogenous behavior. Doesn’t removing risk disproportionately impact climbers who seek risk and severity in climbs? 

For me, the outliers are what make climbing and life interesting. If all climbs presented the same psychological challenges, climbing would just become a weird, low-intensity  form of exercise in a semi-natural setting. 

Ps. Sorry to read about your friend. I too have lost friends to climbing accidents. 

L Kap wrote:

Daniel, it's not clear what source you are quoting, but your rebuttal does not appear to rebut. The quote you gave has nothing to do with population-level effects and disproportionate impact. It confirms that "the Brynes meta-analysis laid the groundwork for general sex differences" and "men generally report higher risk-taking in climbing." As I noted in my original post, there is variation with individual women either because those individuals are natural outliers or because they deliberately work to increase their comfort with risk, i.e. "individual self-efficacy".

But thank you for the "ma'am". It's not necessary, but it's not wrong. 

When I get home, and have a computer to type on, I want to respond to a theme running through this thread about runouts being risky. As a very risk averse woman climber, who learned to climb in Yosemite, my perspective is that FALLING is risky. When I’m in my comfort and skill zone, climbing feels like a walking meditation, not like a risk. Will expand on this when I can. 

In the rogue state the community is in right now, I believe all new bolts will be chopped, probably like most of you believe.  The anti-bolters are not going to try en masse stop that from happening.  The pro-bolters are at a disadvantage in this rogue state.  Snake Dike will for now go back to its' original fixed protection scheme - or continue in a cycle of install/remove destruction.

But imagine if Sloan had gone the path involving the community.  He'd put up his draft plan and reasons.  People like L Kap would have contributed their thought-out reasons for new bolts which Sloan hadn't considered, with suggestions against some new ones and for other new ones. Others - inclined or not inclined - would likewise contribute.  And then a small set of pro-bolt folks could have taken all that input, made the hard compromises, and drawn up a topo with current bolts plus new bolts, and listed the applicable reason(s) under each bolt.  And then we'd have a pro-bolt proposal for Snake Dike with the greatest chance of overall acceptance, ready for a vote.  Just a rough process - lots more to consider.

I suspect I would still be on the "no new bolts" side.  But if something like that passed and new bolts were added, I'd do what I could to strongly resist chopping by still-rogue anti-bolters.

Daniel Shively wrote:

Why not celebrate the individual women who are the outliers?  It’s interesting how stats never actually prove anything (those darn outliers) but are often used to justify further expectations of homogenous behavior. Doesn’t removing risk disproportionately impact climbers who seek risk and severity in climbs? 

For me, the outliers are what make climbing and life interesting. If all climbs presented the same psychological challenges, climbing would just become a weird, low-intensity  form of exercise in a semi-natural setting. 

Ps. Sorry to read about your friend. I too have lost friends to climbing accidents. 

 Among his tribe 

  share.google/3PfZDxZynSeDjDskf

Also makes me think of this " when the going gets tough from the get go, go man go. Oh no not another mutha f*cka gotta go now".

L Kap wrote:

So the community is making the choice to keep the easiest technical climb on Half Dome a potentially deadly experience, even though it has bolts. That is dumb and gate-keepery in my opinion. If you're going to bolt a thing, it should be bolted to not be deadly. Humans have already decided to alter the rock with bolts. Death fall potential seems like a pretty logical place to draw the line, and yet we're not doing it. Why? To honor the FA party, who, btw, said there should be more bolts. And making this choice has population-level effects that fall most heavily on people who logically evaluate the risk vs. reward and decide it's not worth it, who just happen to be women.

Note that using language like "they're not up to it" or "they don't have the skills" is loaded language. Honnold certainly has the skills to solo 5.12, yet every time he does it, we all know he's taking his life into his hands because shit happens up there that you're not expecting. Bodies get cramps. Sudden rain or snow happens. Wildlife is wild. You decide to trust the wrong marginal foot that one time. Whatever. There are certainly entirely compentent easy slab climbers who decide not to do Snake Dike because of the risk. 

But it's the community deciding what the risk is (bolt placement), not the rock itself. So it's the community saying, hey, if you want to do this beautiful line that is the most accessible 5th class route up this amazing formation, you'd better be willing to risk death, and pussies be warned. Pun intended because it perhaps helps expose some of the subconscious sexism of assuming that lower tolerance for risk is a bad thing, an unmanly thing, a shameful thing.

It's also loaded language to talk about "dumbing down the climb", as others frame it. I'd say it's smart and considerate of all climbers to make bolt placement decisions for the express purpose of reducing the risk of death. It's weird that this is apparently a controversial take.

Anyway. I've been on this journey for about 25 years now as a woman who climbs. There is an inherent and often unthinking male bias in a lot of climbing because men have been the bulk of the modern climbing pioneers and men are doing most of the work of bolting, rebolting, writing guidebooks, and running climbing organizations. (I'm sure there are many reasons for that; I'm not saying women are deliberately excluded. Any woman can pick up a drill and put up a route, and there are many wonderful women in leadership in climbing orgs.) And look, it's just true and the natural order of things that the people doing the work are the people calling the shots. I've done a little bit of rebolting and it is damn hard physical labor to pull bolts, to say nothing of schlepping the extra gear into the backcountry. I respect that greatly. I am glad there are people willing to do it. I usually defer to their judgment. 

But in this case where there's an opening to rethink the bolting on a classic route, I think it's worth calling out the population-level impacts of trying to preserve the poor choices of a previous generation. The feelings folks have about preserving an original journey or facing the challenge of runouts are all thoughtful and valid, but let's acknowledge that our community decisions in the safety arena have impacts that are not gender neutral. It's not my only point, but it is an important one.

I appreciate you saying you'll ponder my points. Thanks for reading, and solidarity to you, Siobhán. Please know not all of the above is specifically a reply to you, just my own collected ponderings.

Following the logic you presented, wouldn't it be safest and smartest to manufacturer holds as well? 

The safest and smartest thing for someone who doesn't like run out slabs, is probably to stay off of them. Pick climbs that feel safe to you. 

Sometimes people have to realize what they simply are not capable of doing (yet) . I can't do (ever) the Bachar Yerian. But nothing is stopping me from toproping it or doing the neighboring well protected routes instead.

Get someone else to lead SD for you (many options). The real egotists are the ones that cannot face their very modest limitations and refuse to do anything about it despite all the alternatives (guide? get some friends?). Instead, others have to accommodate them and destroy a historical route because they just can't face their (presently) limited ability. So many have gone up there with trepidation and have immeasurable stoke afterwards after rising to the challenge.

Don't insist you have a right to bring SD Down to your very low level. Thousands of trouble-free accents belie your need.

Safety is a personal choice, not a communal one. Jus’sayn! 

Why did'nt Sloan go to Beck and ask, "How many bolts would you add?  Where?"

Any route can be transformed into a closely spaced low risk jaunt. The status of Snake Dike as a test piece for mental stamina and exposure tolerance is well established. The argument that bolts should be added because someone may slip and be injured or die is a false concern for the local community. The community should protect the essence of a historical climb that is still being done by thousands without injury or death. Fear itself, as witnessed by the parade on the cables, is to be faced and controlled if your desire is to reach the top. As we know, the rate of death and injury from the cables route is significant. How is that on-going tragedy being addressed: permits and education. Education concerning the essence of going up and not retreating when facing conditions of storms, paralyzing fear, crowds and peer pressure.  A semi-sterilized tale of please follow these guidelines. What are the entrance requirements to enter the cables beyond winning the lottery? If you can you are allowed. The gate is not closed when storms develop. The gate is not closed when your footwear and gloves are inadequate. Your choice to go up does not require any experience beyond you walked this far. Your fate is in your hands, the nature of the route is well published. Oh, and helicopter rescue is often available, staff will attempt to reach you, conditions dependent. The infrastructure to reach the base of the cables is being improved and hardened to accommodate normal Summer-season crowds per the master plans. Your bragging rights are tinged with the sweat, blood and charred flesh of those who went before you. If your fear of the body bags and occupational therapists exceeds your desire to summit you can still blindly hike Clouds Rest in the same weather. The hike to Falls Overlook with its wobbly railing is not denied you other than by fear. Hikers are injured, medically retired and lost forever on the Upper Falls Trail (or slightly off trail) because of poor preparation, conditioning, knowledge, and experience. The spur trail to the lower falls overlook has been improved yet the railing is still small and mostly a reminder of how few inches away death is lurking. If you did fall you will likely land in one of the most common injury laden areas of the "Park": the base of waterfalls. Rescuers arrive, carry-outs are accomplished, helicopters land in the meadows, ambulance sirens wail. More hikers have a tale to tell: "I was there, it was sad, I survived." To pave and improve, to harden and direct, to try and fail; no one is denied their fate or fame. Adding bolts to Snake Dike does not reduce the risk to climbers who can, only climbers who almost can will be impacted. Maintaining the historic climbs for those who can, as 60 years of records show, has not produced the carnage of the cables, popular hikes, pools and falling rock on the roads. Keep Snake Dike alive.

This post keeps getting messed up - trying to fix it.
Okay, I think it's fixed now. 

Boreal Strut wrote:

Following the logic you presented, wouldn't it be safest and smartest to manufacturer holds as well?

No, it is not logical to think that supporting bolting that protects against death falls means that you also support manufacturing holds. This is an exaggeration fallacy and straw man argument. Literally no one is advocating for manufacturing holds or chipping holds on Snake Dike.

Boreal Strut: the safest and smartest thing for someone who doesn't like run out slabs, is probably to stay off of them. Pick climbs that feel safe to you.

I agree with these statements in isolation, though probably not your position overall. I support spicy bolting on SD. I advocate for bolt spacing to protect against reasonably foreseeable X-rated fall potential. That's all. I'm disappointed that this is such a controversial take among my peers.  

Daniel Shively wrote:

Why not celebrate the individual women who are the outliers?  It’s interesting how stats never actually prove anything (those darn outliers) but are often used to justify further expectations of homogenous behavior. 

Doesn’t removing risk disproportionately impact climbers who seek risk and severity in climbs?

We do celebrate women (and men) who are outliers. The stats do show population level effects. Nobody is expecting homogenous behavior. I keep referencing Honnold. He and other soloists are proof that a climber's ability to take on risk on any route is not dependent on the equipment of the route. In contrast, refusing to safely equip a bolted route is exclusionary.

Daniel Shively: For me, the outliers are what make climbing and life interesting. If all climbs presented the same psychological challenges, climbing would just become a weird, low-intensity  form of exercise in a semi-natural setting.

I'm not advocating for sport bolting or grid bolting everything. I agree that different climbs should and do present different psychological (and physical) challenges. I'm only advocating that if you're going to bolt -- and certainly not all routes need to be bolted -- do it with an eye toward at least minimally protecting life safety. That should be the floor. If the FA doesn't do it for whatever reason, the community can decide to do it. 

History can be preserved and honored in writing, in film, in stories passed among climbers, in legend, even in song if you are inspired and awesome. We can make it a new tradition to carefully document and describe on MP the bolt path taken by the FA party, if the original bolt path is altered. If you want to replicate the FA's historic journey, then learn about it and replicate it, or use your own judgment to run it out. That's not dependent on making every single subsequent climber of that route do the same.

Daniel Shively: Ps. Sorry to read about your friend. I too have lost friends to climbing accidents.

Thank you, and I'm truly sorry to hear that. 

Brad Young wrote:

So L Kap has nonsensical views.

But a wicked sense of humor.

I've seen worse combinations.

Appreciate the compliment but I haven't been particularly funny in this thread. I'm guessing that since this is MP and trolling is a tradition here, maybe you think I was joking/lying about being a woman. Hate to disappoint a fan, but what you see on my profile is what you get. 

Andrew Richardson wrote:

I probably have a higher tolerance for risky climbing than average, yet I’ve never called any kind of rescue. I would wager that perfectly “safe” routes done by perfectly “safe” climbers see a majority of the YOSAR calls. I have several friends of friends who have YOSAR’d off stuff like Royal Arches, yet don’t personally know anybody who got helicoptered off the B-Y.

That's fair and maybe true about the majority of calls to YOSAR. I don't know what the stats are. I have a friend who was on Tuolumne SAR for a season and they did get a fair number of calls for things like tourists who wandered too far up the base of a dome and couldn't get down. I am mostly concerned in this case with SAR needing to do body recovery, which is devastating for everyone involved regardless of frequency. Thus my advocacy for bolting to protect X-rated fall potential, especially on a moderate classic that is the single most accessible technical route on Half Dome. I don't know Bachar-Yerian and I'm pretty sure I will never climb it, so I won't comment on that.

Ben S wrote:

Erik is an ass

So is the notion that old timey runout disliked by its FA needs to be kept in an argon chamber

Best succinct take.

Another point, though I don't recall which comment sparked it...protecting against death falls has very little to do with climber competence. I think we all know that or else we'd all solo anything that's well below our limit. Example: Emily Harrington is one of the most accomplished climbers of her generation, male or female. She's a 5.14 climber. She still nearly died when her foot slipped on a 10C pitch. Those of us who protect even climbs that are easy for us understand that we are protecting against the unlikely but real random mishaps that can occur at any grade.

The OP who is also the perp has asked the community to get involved. There is going to be a lot of involvement. Perhaps not the involvement they want but none-the-less involvement. 

In the last month there have now been two high profile activities in Yosemite both perpetrated by people who I believe have similar personality traits. Both of their activities have reportedly had an illegal aspect to them. Both perps have a need that they must continuously feed. My tactic has been to try and cut off the feeding of that need by contacting gear mfg and retailers with my concerns. I would suggest people start doing the same. Personally written, well articulated letters with factual details can make a difference (not always). At this point both perps should be and must be shunned by the climbing community.