Video of fall

I saw this on Will Gadd's site. vimeo.com/20549603

There are threads on this on SuperTopo and rc.com, but was curious as to what the community here would have to say...

Go to 09:30 if you want to skip the foreplay.

i just jumped ahead randomly in the video, saw the guy climbing what appeared to be a harder section of the climb above a ramp he could easily have placed a screw from, and thought "why didn't he just place a screw to protect that section." then, he fell.

note to self: don't skip good opportunities to place pro even if the terrain above looks to be within my ability.

Here is a non sugarcoated analysis from Will Gadd. I am stunned that the guy did not have his harness double backed. Yowza...

gravsports.blogspot.com/201…

The thing that scares me was how they handled him once he fell.

If I saw that happening immediately would have thought the guy would have a spinal injury. I can't believe they lowered him head-first into the ground and let him flop around for a little bit.

If the guy did have a spinal injury I can only assume that he would have paralyzed himself right there because his partners had no real first aid sense.

Crazy video.

What is the proper way to lower someone if there is a possible serious injury?

Aside from using the belay device incorrectly, not double backing his harness, not standing in an area clear of icefall, not placing enough pro, not considering the effects of a fall while placing pro, not clipping into his tool when he's pumped trying to place a screw, being over pumped on lead in the first place, trusting wobbly sticks, and apparently having bad footwork, I'm surprised that he didn't get stabbed by his tools. I'm no expert on ice. I've only top roped less than ten routes. Am I wrong in my decision to go with leash-less tools based on the risk of being stabbed in a fall? I understand that falling is unacceptable in the first place, but it definitely can happen.

Seeing those tools swing around his face while he was falling was terrifying. He could have easily been impaled. Being able to pitch the tools away during a fall is nice if you can avoid the death grip response. Leashes seem to be more trouble than they're worth IMO.

jmac wrote:What is the proper way to lower someone if there is a possible serious injury?

If you think that there could be a spinal injury then it is best to stabilize the head and neck before moving anyone anywhere. Being half way up a pitch of ice (or rock for that matter) creates a lot of difficulty. Ideally the belayer would hold and then tie off the device and maybe even escape the belay. Someone would climb up (on belay) and anchor in next to the climber (not always possible) and/or rappel down to the climber (again, not always possible) and create a makeshift neck brace (difficult in the field). Obviously they would asses injuries and do any first aid before fitting a brace. If someone is bleeding out or not breathing then those problems take precedent over stabilizing the neck. It doesn't matter how paralyzed someone might be if they bleed to death, but a good paramedic or WFR (which I am not, btw) will be able to handle both problems a lot of the time. Once the injured party is ready (for lack of a better word) then they would be lowered. If need be, the rescuer could rap with him, be lowered next to him, or rig any number of more complicated systems that are better left explained by someone other than myself.

In this case the least they could have done was lowered him slower and had a few people run up to him and support his head, neck and shoulders as soon as they could reach him. They also should have IMMEDIATELY stabilized him when he got to the ground, then lied him down on his back and given him a full examination. I'm not really sure if that happened or not after the doc. showed up.

Anyways, I'm not even an ice climber and I could go on and on about what should have been done but thankfully the guy is OK and hopefully everyone involved will learn something (a lot) from the incident.

There's actually a fair amount of limitation to patient care even at a high cert level due to the terrain position and backcountry setting. You can die just as well from neurogenic as from other types of life threats, so I'd argue some of Ryan's thoughts and that there is little that can be done without a more organized rescue effort; simply being a medic or doc is education, but we're not in a clinical setting here.

There are two basic positions you want on the wall, sitting in a vertical in-line or flat supine in a litter. Other positions introduce a lever. Buddy rescue is difficult to stabilize a spinal injury and work systems on the wall without introducing a lever on the injury.

In this case, the lowering had terrain that was friendly and I'd be looking to getting the airway in a position to work on. So waiting for a buddy to rap down and knock crap on the fallen climber in a defenseless position is not the better move; neither is hastily lead climbing to where you risk injury to another climber (usually hell bent on soloing and being the next dead hero). Unless the system just won't allow for access to the flat ground, the best thing is just the simple lower from the belayer, solved everything the vertical problem offered.

I probably wouldn't have had that final roll he did, although you could argue he probably cleared his own c-spine at that point. Really, if the climber has the capacity to make his own decisions, he can do what he wants. I don't really have a problem with this.

A person will usually tell you of a motor deficiency, unless pain frequency from another injury takes over or altered mental status exhibits. There was a fall I think in Eldo over a year or two ago where people jumped on the climber and immobilized, altered mental status was the red flag and organized rescue evac using full body immobilization was the better alternative.

I don't see a lack of mental capacity here. The greater life threat was probably time into a head injury where increased intra-cranial pressure can introduce problems. If the climber wasn't indicating a deficiency and was mobile; the decision to walk out and get to the ER much faster given where they were probably ended up being what they wanted and better served the situation.

This video should reinforce why falling on terrain like this is not an option.

FYI, one of the belayers is an ER doctor. Granted ER doctors specialty comes in after stabilization but I have known several and they do rotate on ambulances as interns. That is more medical knowledge than you are likely to have in most climbing situations anyway.

Title of video should instead be "FAIL: from Glory to Disgrace"

Wowza Pucka!

Scary stuff and a miracle that the guy ended up pseudo-OK.

Anyway, I think Will Gadd is on point in that the major criticism is the mentality and competence that the climbers went into the climb having. The C-spine bit is secondary.

Up until the bit where they let him go ass over tea kettle on the lower, I'd say that lowering him that way was probably the best option. First aid training hammers home the "maintain c-spine before you do anything else" mentality. In practice, that is often harder said than done. On-site medical care is about doing the best you can with what you've got. To stabilize him for the lower, it would involve someone soloing or roping up and leading to get to him, which violates the real first rule of first aid, "don't double the incident by putting your backside in harms way."

Evan

Good to see lots of useful discussion about this journal entry. Use it to make yourselves better climbers; better people.

It's really hard to follow Rule #1 when the post is about someone who takes a massive whipper on ice with a harness that's not double-backed and the belayer is using the belay device completely incorrectly. I mean, it's mind-blowing really.

This post isn't going to make me a "better person." It will probably make me a worse person because I have lost a little faith in the common sense of the average person.

Rob Gordon wrote: I have lost a little faith in the common sense of the average person.

This is a common occurrence around age 30 in all aspects of life.

He's lucky and hopefully will learn a lot from this experience.

I'll never feel bad about sewing an ice climb again.

Some good conversation on the other side of the pond: ukclimbing.com/forums/t.php…

Some guy takes a whip on ice and they make a full-production movie about it? I don't get it.

Anyway, after reading Will's reply, I feel that even though I feel somewhat comfortable on ice, I need a lot more time on TR before I start leading again. This was a good lesson...for me at least. YMMV.

Okay Jeffery, your attitude about our discussion not being as "elevated" as that of the UK Climbing site is so off base. You don't realize that the mistakes your friends made are so incomprehensible to the average climber with any intellect. They show such wanton abandon, it's shocking. Maybe they should take up flying planes, buy one at the plane store, ask the guys at the plane store how to fly it, then proceed to teach themselves. No need to even read the manual on how the safety gear works.

You want discussion? 100% you out filming your friends is probably what caused your friend to take that massive whipper. With the camera rolling and his bravado on the line, he let himself get in too deep. Why do you think there are so many fall videos?

And sure, injuries and death will always be inherent to our sport, but they should be limited to accident. Hell even a free soloist who dies at least understands the risk he's taking. Your friends didn't even know the risks they were taking.

So honestly, take your promotion of your horribly titled film somewhere else. And your completely ignorant condescension with it.

Mark Nelson wrote: I probably wouldn't have had that final roll he did, although you could argue he probably cleared his own c-spine at that point. Really, if the climber has the capacity to make his own decisions, he can do what he wants. I don't really have a problem with this. A person will usually tell you of a motor deficiency, unless pain frequency from another injury takes over or altered mental status exhibits. The greater life threat was probably time into a head injury where increased intra-cranial pressure can introduce problems. If the climber wasn't indicating a deficiency and was mobile; the decision to walk out and get to the ER much faster given where they were probably ended up being what they wanted and better served the situation. This video should reinforce why falling on terrain like this is not an option.

The video didn't really show the assessment/first aid very well, so it's hard to really comment too much, but I agree; airway first. Also agree on the final roll. I don't disagree with what the ER doc did in rolling him, but someone should have kept C-spine stabilization the entire time, never letting go until the hospital.

In regards to ruling out the C-spine injury, I do not believe you can rely just on mental status/capacity. Even if the victim is alert and oriented without any apparent neurological deficits, that doesn't rule out any C-spine instability. Of course hindsight is 20/20. Looking at the slow motion (or even live action) of the fall, the guy had multiple hard impacts. There could still be a fractured or displaced vertebrae that once a victim moves, could really become problematic. It was kind of scary to see the guy's head bobbing in the car ride to the hospital.

Also hard to say which is more dangerous: C-spine vs intracranial bleed. If the C-spine injury is high up, movement may cause paralysis and cause inability to breathe which can be immediate, whereas most intracranial bleeds have a little time before it becomes problematic or intervention is necessary.

The guy is lucky.