The victim landed on his back, suffering severe internal injuries as well as significant trauma to the back of his head.

The two were very cold by the time they repelled (getting late) and were probably slightly hypothermic-- fuzzy thinking might have been a contributing factor.

The climb's not over 'til you touch the ground, knot the ends of your ropes everyone, please

Climber was almost down
By Vanessa Miller, Camera Staff Writer
January 28, 2006

The setting sun and dropping temperatures prompted James Harr and his climbing partner to quit ascending a cliff in Eldorado Canyon State Park on Thursday evening, just before the accident that ended Harr's life.

Officials at the Rocky Mountain Rescue Group said the pair had reached the final leg of a descent down the cliff's face, and Harr's partner was on the ground, when something went wrong.

Harr, 25, of Boulder, fell about 20 feet and struck the ground, back first, said Steve Chappell, assistant leader for the rescue group. Harr died at the scene from multiple injuries, the Boulder County Coroner's Office reported Friday.

Officials at the county Sheriff's Office said Harr's injuries included head wounds and that he wasn't wearing a helmet.

"There are situations where even a helmet won't help you," Chappell said. "But you want to always wear one."

Harr's death was an accident, according to the coroner. Officials are investigating what caused him to fall.

The pair had ascended three to four pitches up a cliff along the state park's Rincon Route on Thursday afternoon, Chappell said. One pitch is typically the length of an average climbing rope.

They were headed down for the day.

"They were on the last rappel," he said.

Chappell didn't know Harr's climbing skill level, "but what they were doing requires some training."

The climbing partner ran to the state park office to report the accident, and the Rocky Mountain Rescue Group was one of several agencies to respond. Group volunteers spent more than an hour lowering Harr about 1,200 feet over rocky terrain to the canyon's main road, Chappell said.

According to the Rocky Mountain Rescue Group's most recent activity report, rescuers responded to 26 rock-climbing accidents in 2004.

Hello all. My name is Steve Mills and I was the belayer and good friend of of the late James Harr. Here is what happened: we reached the third belay and decided, after much deliberation and attempted route-finding, to forego the last pitch on account of the weather and rap down. We lowered down to the second belay, and then down to the anchors atop Thunderbolt, a short 11d to the right of Rincon. These anchors are about forty feet off the ground. We both reached these anchors and were very excited to be almost back to earth. It was very cold and windy and we were not adequately clothed. James tied a bight in the rope and hooked it to his harness so that both ends of the rope would not fall to the ground when he pulled it from the previous rappel. I took one end of the rope, fed it through the o-rings and tied in. he put me on belay and lowered me down. What happened at this point is still not entirely clear to me, but it certainly involved James tying into the bight on his harness, or to some middle point on the rope, instead of tying in to the OTHER END. Consequently, when I pulled through the slack and had him tight, we were only working with a very small portion of the rope. I saw a pile of rope to the left of me, and felt the tension in the line. I asked James two times if everything looked right to him and he said to go ahead and lower. I began lowering, and about halfway down to the ground the rope zipped through my hand and through the grigri, leaving James twenty feet to fall. He landed on his back and head. If he had been tied into the other end of the rope there is no way that I could have had him taught AND have the rope run through the grigri. James and I had a brief but wonderful climbing partnership. His last words were "Wow, we have amazing chemistry," which was entirely true. We are both experienced climbers - I trusted him and he trusted me and were were always very safe. But somewhere amidst the excitement of reaching the ground after an hour and a half descent and the discomfort of the cold and wind, we lost some of our circumspection; he made an error and I in turn made an error by not noticing it. And he lost his life because of it. May you rest in peace James: you will never be forgotten; you shall continue to inspire me and all others that knew you, as of course you always have.

Regardless of whether the climber being lowered tied into the middle of the rope or the end of the rope, it is still the responsibility of the climber doing the lowering to determine if there is enough rope to safely make the lower.