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philbox
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Mar 12, 2003, 6:25 AM
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Not so much a gear failure as placement error. Many of you may have seen the thread over on Injuries and accidents forum about the tragic non helmet climbing accident http://www.rockclimbing.com/...iewtopic.php?t=27497 A pic is also available for viewing of the green Alien which was the second piece that pulled http://www.rockclimbing.com/...n=Show&PhotoID=11828 A larger scale pic of the green Alien that was the second piece that pulled is also available for viewing http://www.pbase.com/...t_frog_buttress_8303 This last link will take you into a gallery that will indicate how high up the climber was when she rested on the black Alien which subsequently pulled. The black Alien is also displayed on the gallery.
Please feel free to post your comments and opinions here on this forum rather than in Injuries and accidents, we`ll keep that forum for well wishing and sentiment.
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easysteve
Mar 12, 2003, 6:31 AM
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How is she doing anyway? I never bothered to look at any other topics.
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philbox
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Mar 12, 2003, 6:34 AM
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Mate still critical but fortunately stable. Under heavy sedation and in a coma which they will bring her out of in a few days. It is all a waiting game now. Thank you everybody for your concern, it is indeed heartening for the family at this difficult time.
...Phil...
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ricardol
Mar 12, 2003, 7:13 AM
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i have no skills to judge what may have happened by just looking at a picture ..
the lobes look offset -- is that an offset alien? -- or is that the damage that occurred when it pulled?
-- ricardo
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apollodorus
Mar 12, 2003, 7:22 AM
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Do you know if that Green Alien was placed in a horizontal crack? From the photos, it looks like the stem rotated with respect to the cams. The trigger cables slipped until they bottomed out on the crimps. Further rotation of the stem would have caused the outer cams to be retracted.
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twrock
Mar 12, 2003, 8:14 AM
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(Having been involved in a similar rescue of a climbing accident victim, the original accident report and this thread do bring back some scary memories. My heart goes out to all who are feeling the fear and pain of this tragedy.)
As apollodorus has suggested, the condition of the cam might indicate a horizontal placement. This would be very helpful to know. It's hard to know if this incident is the cause of all the scratches, but if so, the side we are looking at here appears to have been down if the placement was horizontal. It would also be helpful to see the other side of the cam for signs of damage. I've noticed in some of my horizontal placements that if I'm not careful the "upper" cams contact the rock first and allow the lower cams to expand further, causing an uneven placement.
I can only speculate that the cam was a little too small for the placement or that it walked to a wider spot. When the cam was weighted, the two widest cams inverted allowing the cam to slide out. This may have been exacerbated by the steel "head" of the cam levering over the edge, but I can't see any scrape marks on the steel like are visible on the copper sleeve and cable plate. In any case, it is frightening to think about.
(edit: Oops, just noticed Phil's post in the original thread. Seems all this has been suggested already. But I would still be interested as to whether or not it was a horizontal placement and how that may or may not have contributed to its failure.)
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serra_da_leba
Mar 12, 2003, 5:02 PM
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I am fairly new to trad climbing. Nevertheless, from reading the accident report I couldn't help thinking that 2 placements in 20 meters (60 or so feet) of climbing sounds pretty runout. Is this route that thin for placement or could it have taken more protection up to the point that the piece the climber rested on dislodged?
I know this kind of question can seem as targeting the climber's judgement and it's absolutely not fair to her. I apologize. It's just question that has been nagging me seen I read the report.
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ricardol
Mar 12, 2003, 5:46 PM
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i believe the report said that there was 3 placements, the 3rd one held, but was too low to arrest her fall... (and the pictures prove that since the rope was still up on the cliff) ..
... still 3 placements in 60' is a bit runout -- then again it depends on how comfortable you are at that level .. i know that i've ran out placements on 5.6 ground up to 15' .. (of course i was on the 3rd pitch of a route -- but still a 30' fall possible) ...
-- ricardo
In reply to: I am fairly new to trad climbing. Nevertheless, from reading the accident report I couldn't help thinking that 2 placements in 20 meters (60 or so feet) of climbing sounds pretty runout. Is this route that thin for placement or could it have taken more protection up to the point that the piece the climber rested on dislodged? I know this kind of question can seem as targeting the climber's judgement and it's absolutely not fair to her. I apologize. It's just question that has been nagging me seen I read the report. |
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onemistakebigpancake
Mar 12, 2003, 6:03 PM
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now that you have a detailed picture of the cam, why not contact CCH and ask them directly for an "expert opinion"? They may give you an answer you disagree with, but it could be a start of a informative discussion.
just my two pennies worth.
My best wishes and thoughts to Miss B. and her family.
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philbox
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Mar 12, 2003, 8:39 PM
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In all there were at least 6 placements to reach where she rested on her gear, this includes the 2 that pulled. I believe that both the pieces that pulled were in vertical placements. The nature of pretty much all the cracks at Frog is vertical columnar volcanic rhyolite. The columns are chrystalline i/e they are hexagonal vertical columns. Often the cracks can flare either outwards or towards the back. They can also be dead straight and not flare.
We believe that the green Alien was placed in a vertical flaring towards the back placement. No quickdraw appears to have been placed on the Alien thus increasing the possibility of the cam walking in as rope jiggles the stem of the cam. These cracks are usually fairly smooth sided so that means that natural weathering that could create shallow pockets in the sides of the crack has invariably not occured. When placing cams I am looking for these features to place my cams in to minimise walk. Even better I would search out a bottoming crack or a chockstone to seat the cam up against.
As we learn more about this climber we are finding out that perhaps she may not have had enough gear to protect this climb as well as it could have been protected and a degree of inexperience could well have contributed to the accident. That coupled with the lack of a helmet and lots of other tiny contributing factors lead to her plummet.
This climb is relatively easy and is climbed via a series of cracks that lead over some ledges and then one hits the deep v groove slot that is the crux of the climb. There is ample opportunity for protecting both passively and actively but the easy nature of the climb leads one to minimise pro placements.
Please feel free to continue the suppositions and postulations as this is a great teaching tool for those out there who are just getting into trad leading.
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serra_da_leba
Mar 12, 2003, 9:28 PM
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philbox
Thanks for added detail.
This approach is indeed a great teaching tool.
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wlderdude
Mar 12, 2003, 11:50 PM
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From what I can see, it does look as though the cam lobes inverted. Notice that the ends of the outer cam lobes have slight rounded mushrooms on them, different from the scrapes on the trigger assembly. Cam stops might have made a difference, but who's to say.
My best guess is that the cam was placed fairly deep into the rack, so it was not obvious that the unit was under camed. When she put ther weight on the unit, the unit likely shifted, and the unit worked its way into a completely undercamed position until just the corners of the bottom lobes were engaged into the rock, then the lobes inverted. Since it was a lie back, there was probabaly a force pushing sideways on the cam, which means it was drug out of the crack sideways as the cam lobes disengaged from the rock, and thus the sides are scraped up.
If you swing at all on a cam, especially when weighted, it will try to move into postions where it can expand. A quick draw would have done little to prevented this. I had this happen to me once, but it was on a Metolius cam with milled cam stops, so the lobes did not invert. I decided not to rest on cams after that.
Thank you for sharing this information with us. These kinds of stories can improve safety for everyone if we can learn from them.
I hope she recovers well.
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graniteboy
Mar 13, 2003, 6:09 AM
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I had a friend who died a few years back on an easy climb called "olive Oil" down in red rocks. ... It was a weird situation; she was ON the belay ledge, and had placed a piece or 2 for the anchor. then she fell. about 40+ feet, and died later. Nobody knows what exactly happenned...but it seems likely she made a simple screw up...and it cost her her life. I would suspect that the Miss B scenario involved protection which was placed a little less than adequately, then she hung on that pro....
Not to diss Miss B, but that's the usual thing. Human error. We all make errors, once in awhile.
Good luck to Miss B.
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jt512
Mar 13, 2003, 6:52 AM
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Did she fall on the black Alien or just weight it. If it pulled while statically weighted, it was likely a bad placement.
-Jay
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rocmonkey
Mar 13, 2003, 7:02 AM
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Goes to show that placement can be more important than the actual brand of gear you buy. :idea:
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climbs2much
Mar 13, 2003, 7:39 AM
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I have a question that I feel is relavent. It goes to answer why she fell in the first place. I am still inexperienced with my placements so let some one with more experience answer this.
The black alien was what she placed and then rested on. The range of this cam is .33-.54 inchs and is the smallest cam made by CCH. That only gives you .21 inches or 5.33 mm of range over which the cam is intended to operate. If you look at one of these cams in a crack it is very difficult to see if the cam is with in this range of operation. These cams can be placed with more trust in granite or other types of rock with parrallel sided cracks. In volcanic rock, which tends to lack parrallel sided even cracks, it would be hard to see if it was properly set. When I have looked in to buying some aliens I was told that the black alien was not well suited to free climbing because of this reason. (I live in a primarily volcanic rock area.) Could the initial fall have come from weighting a barely camed black alien, which promptly inverted? The moral of which would be dont trust very small cams in certain types of rock.
Let the people who clip less bolts than me say what they think.
Jason
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ricardol
Mar 13, 2003, 8:34 AM
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small gear is hard for beggining leaders to use -- i definately know this since i am a beginning leader and every time i make a placement that is smaller than a .5 camalot, it makes me think ...
.. i detest making placements in the .2 to .1 range .. and would not want to weigh those placements ... (though i've made the placemtns and climbed above then inte past!) .. thoroughly thinking to myself "The Leader MUST not fall, The Leader MUST not fall!" ..
.. phil : is there someone working on investigating the cause of this accident? --
-- ricardo
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philbox
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Mar 13, 2003, 8:54 PM
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From what little evidence we have from the eye witness it seems that she did fall a short distance onto the Black Alien. As she was in a tight v groove slot she was a little out of sight. She would have taken a kinda spoogey slow fall at this point as she slimed her way down the v groove slot so I don`t think the Black Alien was totally shock loaded.
It`s pretty much devolved to me to investigate the causes of this accident, there is no official investigation. Those most closely involved as first responders to the scene have been following up as much as we can and staying in contact with the family.
I believe that climbs2much hit the nail on the head. The cam was simply too small for the placement.
I climb with a partner who climbs way harder than me and I have given him belays on really thin cracks on this same cliff where the black Alien is key to safely getting to the top. He has taken numerous falls onto the black Alien. The rock at this cliff is sound, the gear is good so the only other option is that the placement was bad on both of these cams that blew.
...Phil...
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elvislegs
Mar 13, 2003, 9:09 PM
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In which case the lesson would be to watch those with more experience, clean for them, practice on the ground and on TR a TON before leading on gear. Best wishes to miss B and family. -Sean
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melekzek
Mar 13, 2003, 9:11 PM
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This is one of the scariest things with the small size cams for me, I cannot tell whether they are really good, or I need go to the smaller/larger size or just place again to get a better fit.
Similar thing happens with the asimetric friends, once I place one of them, it does not stick, I replace again, again, again, it drives me crazy, larger one doesnt fit, smaller one is err.... small, this is the one but does not stick, and finally it sticks.... Weird...
I feel confident with the nuts, or hexes, but small cams scare me, because I cannot tell about solidity of the placement (yet)....
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philbox
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Mar 13, 2003, 9:34 PM
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Oh yeah one thing I have learnt about small cams is that they must be set. Give them a really strong and sharp tug down to set them in place, whack a long quickdraw on it and leave it alone. On the Black I try to almost overcam it. I have heard of axle distortion in a really big fall on the black which can result in an otherwise good placement blowing.
The lesson that is coming out loud and clear is that specialist gear such as small cams require a degree of experience to not blow it. Now of course we have zero cams which I wouldn`t recommend to anyone but the very expert climber or aid climber.
Of course any gear can be placed badly so expert tuition in a safe environment is key to gaining experience in placeing gear well.
...Phil...
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melekzek
Mar 13, 2003, 9:41 PM
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/quote I have heard of axle distortion in a really big fall on the black which can result in an otherwise good placement blowing /unqoute
I guess that is what happened to the cam in question, it doesnt seem to have inverted but rather distorted to me (?)
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number7
Mar 13, 2003, 9:43 PM
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What I am wondering is why there was little passive protection if the climb was realatively easy? Cams were designed for speed and we all know there is nothing like a good bomber placement with passive pro.
I am a pretty new leader myself, so I have little room for suggestion except that the ledges on the climb gave ample opportunity to build a nice, bomber, redundant placement of pro. I try doubling up at every opportunity as long as I don't jepardize my peices for the climb. As belayers, we might suggest this to our leaders as well.
All that aside, I want to wish only the very best for the injured climber and her family and friends. Also, thank you for the thourough updates. It benefits us all. Thank you RC.com
One more thing:
A) Wear your brain bucket.
B) Protect early and often.
C) Check, and then double check.
D) Have fun and be safe.
PEACE! M
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dsafanda
Mar 13, 2003, 10:03 PM
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In reply to: What I am wondering is why there was little passive protection if the climb was realatively easy? Cams were designed for speed...
Who told you "cams were designed for speed"?
I'm under the impression that Ray Jardine developed Friends as a way to protect the parallel sided cracks of Yosemite that can sometimes be tricky to protect with only passive pro. To this day most crack climbers I know routinely trust their lives to camming devices as well as passive pro. There are plenty of placements that are in fact much better suited to a cam than a nut. It has nothing to do with whether the climb is easy or difficult or whether you're moving slow or fast. It depends entirely on the individual placement.
I think it's a bit short sighted to suggest that as a general rule of thumb passive pro should be used instead of active pro. That notion will surely get you in just as much trouble as a dependency on cams will.
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philbox
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Mar 13, 2003, 10:22 PM
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This particular climb has many passive pro opportunities as well as great cam placement opportunities. The fact is that the climber went up with insufficient cams but did have a reasonable selection of nuts. We are all wondering why she didn`t take the passive option in the places that mattered.
Of course any speculation on our part now does little to bring her back to perfect health but this discussion is aimed at getting leaders particularly new leaders to think about their pro placements and what could happen in the event of a fall. What is the worst that could happen is constantly in the back of my mind and if I come up with a reassuring answer I carry on with the climb and I climb more confidently in the knowledge that my gear will hold.
If I cannot answer the niggling suspicions in the back of my mind as to my pro placements I will back them up with more and then reassured I will them carry on.
The trick here though is to build up a solid knowledge base of pro placement so that you know that you know that your gear is good and not just guessing.
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