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crow
Mar 15, 2004, 2:13 AM
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So whenever I tell someone that climbing is safer than driving a car they look at me like a weirdo. I get more feared for my life when I'm in the car driving to the crag than when I'm actually climbing. What's the stat, like thousands of people die in car crashes each year. How many climbers die?
This is obviously skewed because a lot less people climb. So I was just wondering if anyone had any stats on percentage of climbers dieing per year? I know this is really grim but my guess is that it's still a hell of a lot lower than the percentage of people who die in car crashes.Sorry if I depressed anybody.
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curt
Mar 15, 2004, 3:07 AM
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First of all, you need to define what you mean by "climbing" here. If you mean rock climbing, you are most likely correct that climbing is safer than driving. Lester Germer once calculated that he was 7 times more likely to die driving from New Jersey to the Gunks to climb, than he was likely to die climbing there. Oddly enough, Germer died climbing in the Gunks--albeit from a heart attack.
However, if you define attempting the summit of K2 as your definition of "climbing" driving is clearly safer than climbing--since not half of all drivers die driving.
Curt
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crow
Mar 15, 2004, 6:01 AM
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I'M TLAKING about your average day at the crag to moderate aline climbing. Does that work better?
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drkodos
Mar 15, 2004, 6:08 AM
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In reply to: First of all, you need to define what you mean by "climbing" here. If you mean rock climbing, you are most likely correct that climbing is safer than driving. Lester Germer once calculated that he was 7 times more likely to die driving from New Jersey to the Gunks to climb, than he was likely to die climbing there. Oddly enough, Germer died climbing in the Gunks--albeit from a heart attack. However, if you define attempting the summit of K2 as your definition of "climbing" driving is clearly safer than climbing--since not half of all drivers die driving. Curt
I think the word ironic is even more applicable than the word oddly, in this case. :wink:
It think that driving is more dangerous than climbing. On a per incident basis, the odds of being injured in an auto accident are 6 to 10 times greater than being injured climbing.
The odds of a car accident leading to death are greater in rural areas than urban.
All kinds of great stats out there....is any one an actuary?
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overlord
Mar 15, 2004, 8:52 AM
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In reply to: I'M TLAKING about your average day at the crag to moderate aline climbing. Does that work better?
yes. i can remeber one death of a trad climber in slo in the last 5 years. the guy took a factor 2 20m swing with hes head onto a ledge. a flake with all hes pro and holds gave.
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zorg
Mar 15, 2004, 9:43 AM
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I got some figures for indoor climbing in the netherlands. The number of accidents were WAY lower than for many other sports (football, hockey, etc etc).
Obviously, for properly comparing climbing and car driving, you would need an accident-rate, i.e. the number of accidents divided by the number of climbers/people driving a car (and by the average hours per person climbing/driving per year??), which I think is very hard to come by...
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shock
Mar 15, 2004, 11:50 AM
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I only remember hearing of one climber killed in ireland in the last 10 years compared to couple of hundred motorists a year killed. even factoring the proportionality of climbers to motorists, climbinggs safer.
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majid_sabet
Mar 16, 2004, 4:30 AM
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Read the Accident report by American Alpine Club which is published every year near spring for $12, however not all accident gets reported to AAC.
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jt512
Mar 16, 2004, 4:44 AM
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In reply to: All kinds of great stats out there....is any one an actuary?
Lot's of people are actuaries, but I'll bet damn few actuaries are climbers.
-Jay
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