Boulder Canyon accident

20 kN wrote:Many top climbers have died from stupid mistakes that they thought could only happen in a gym with some noob partner.

Is this really true? Not trying to bust balls, but I can't think of any examples of "top climbers" dying from "stupid mistakes", unless you want to count pre-meditated free-soloing as a "stupid mistake" (fair enough).

Tony B wrote:A good hard acid trip can really burn down the ego and put life in perspective.

I have tears in the corners of my eyes..... I am laughing so hard.

Jake Jones wrote:I wonder if most of these people saying "don't say shit, Darwin's Law, blah blah" have ever seen a really gruesome scene right in front of them. It's quite a thing to see another human gurgling blood and gasping for breath, writhing in obvious agony and groaning gutteral sounds, or screaming violently and uncontrollably. If I see something that could cause injury or death, I'll say something. Most fuckups in climbing can cause injury or death. I would rather some tool punch me in my face for wounding his pride than see something awful and have to scrape someone off the ground. And by all means, if I'm backclipped, belaying wrong, anchoring wrong- whatever, please say something. I will be grateful.

+1 I too am always grateful for feedback and will definitely give it if I see something "bad" being done.

Monomaniac wrote: Is this really true? Not trying to bust balls, but I can't think of any examples of "top climbers" dying from "stupid mistakes", unless you want to count pre-meditated free-soloing as a "stupid mistake" (fair enough).

I don't really want to support his point, but Todd Skinner's death comes to mind with a worn out harness being the cause. Michael Reardons death also seemed kind of silly since he basically got washed out to sea while standing at the base of a climb.

Ya, I had considered Todd's accident, but that strikes me more as bad luck than a "stupid mistake". I guess it will come down to symantics as far as what is a "stupid mistake" and who is a "top climber". No doubt Todd was a top climber, but my idea of "stupid mistake" is failing to finish tying your knot (LH), forgetting to double back a harness, forgetting to clip both plates of the GriGri into your locking biner, etc. In other words, absent-minded mistakes.

This thread is what is wrong with boulder. A guy fucking DIED! What do you people do (BigJuggs, other boulder idots)... Turn this into a thread about YOURSELF and how much smarter you are then other climbers! This is absolutely atrocious and makes me sick. This guy probably knew what he was doing and made a mistake. It only takes a fraction of a second to go from good to bad. WTF is wrong with you guys!

To the parties involved, I truely feel for you. I hope for the best for your families and my heart goes out to everyone involved with something so unfortunate as these accidents.

Be safe, use good judgement, have an open mind, and climb on!

BigJuggsjohnson wrote: blah blah blah... I'm so special!

Please Just STOP!

Buff Johnson wrote:Experienced & educated people lose situational awareness as much as anyone else.

Do they? Again, not trying to bust balls, just looking for some facts. In my experience beginners are so overwhelmed by the situation (the view, all the shiny gear, ropes going every which way, exposure) that they are constantly forgetting basic things like keeping the brake hand on the brake end of the rope.

I find that experienced people have the basic stuff down pat after tens of thousands of repetitions.

Randy W. wrote:This thread is what is wrong with boulder. A guy fucking DIED! What do you people do (BigJuggs, McMahon, other boulder idots)...

Not sure what you were looking for here, this is not a memorial. I think "McMahon" just wanted to understand what happened here, nothing novel for a climbing site.

Is it not ok to spray about how much smarter you are but ok to spray about how much more sensitive your are instead?

Rick Blair wrote: Not sure what you were looking for here, this is not a memorial. I think "McMahon" just wanted to understand what happened here, nothing novel for a climbing site. Is it not ok to spray about how much smarter you are but ok to spray about how much more sensitive your are instead?

What is there to understand? That was resolved on page one. Stop beating the horse ya know. Or just restart one of the many threads about people being inexperienced.

I'll edit out McMahon, but come on... three pages of beating this topic shows a little lack of respect in my opinion.

Monomaniac wrote: I find that experienced people have the basic stuff down pat after tens of thousands of repetitions.

Anecdotally I can say that most gear failure accidents I have personally talked to people about have been 5.11+ trad climbers who got sloppy on something like a 5.8. This cuts a lot of different ways.

OK harness loop worn out gave out in rappel....

Monomaniac wrote: Do they? Again, not trying to bust balls, just looking for some facts. In my experience beginners are so overwhelmed by the situation (the view, all the shiny gear, ropes going every which way, exposure) that they are constantly forgetting basic things like keeping the brake hand on the brake end of the rope. I find that experienced people have the basic stuff down pat after tens of thousands of repetitions.

I agree with your point for the most part, but if you go out to a place like the Jailhouse in CA (or apparently Rifle as 20kN stated on the last page) you will find a lot of experienced climbers that spend a lot of time using gri-gris without their hand on the brake rope. If you bring this up to these folks, you will get this type of dumb@ss response:

fair weather climber wrote: lol, when the gri-gri came out it was known as a hands free belay device. then a bunch of safety nuts got all anal on it and tried to ruin it for everyone....Did you tell the guy at Rifle that testing gear and safety are your hobbies?

...or some other variation on "I climb hard and have been doing 'X' for 10 years, so STFU noob." Obviously this rarely leads to a bad accident (mostly by dumb luck if you ask me), but when stuff does happen, it goes very badly.

Though my own personal experiences don't constitute a large enough sample set to be gospel, I have personally watched experienced climbers come close to killing someone on more than one occasion. My last experience was watching a guy with 10+ years of experience teaching a new climber how to lead at Owens River Gorge. My partner and I were watching the "teacher" belay the new guy without his hand on the brake rope when the leader fell from about 70 feet up the route. The gri-gri didn't lock and the guy plummeted about 60 feet before the teacher got control of the rope. I thought for sure I was watching someone die. The teacher had a badly burned hand, but instead of accepting responsibility for the accident, he absolved himself by blaming a "slick new skinny rope" for the problem. My point is that accidents probably do happen to experienced folks fairly regularly, but you just don't hear much about it .

Monomaniac wrote:Ya, I had considered Todd's accident, but that strikes me more as bad luck than a "stupid mistake". .

Didn't his harness fail because he hadn't checked it for wear?
If that is true, I would not mark that up to bad luck, but inattention to an important component of the safety system. I feel that is something that experienced climbers should know to do. I would put this in the "stupid mistake" category. I also heard he had new harnesses at home that he had gotten for free from sponsors, adding to the "stupidity" of the mistake. If I got free harnesses, I would not continue to use "ol' trusty."

To respond to Darren and Mono, I remember talking to a good friend of Todd's a couple of years ago who claimed Todd and his partner had discussed the poor condition of Todd's belay loop some days prior to the accident and Todd responded that he had a new one on the way.... Definitely not calling it a stupid mistake, but far from "bad luck" IMO.

Also, to comment on your original statement Mono- Jim Ratz, while certainly not a "top climber" in terms of media exposure/fame, was no doubt someone who spend a TON of time on the rock and was a professional mountain guide. He rapped off the end of his rope if I remember correctly.

Rick Blair wrote: I have tears in the corners of my eyes..... I am laughing so hard.

Glad to hear I could provide some entertainment.
But I was somewhat serious... here we are on a thread about someone dying and we're getting more chest-puffing than introspection.
It is harder for some people than others to look beyond themselves.

Monomaniac wrote: Is this really true? Not trying to bust balls, but I can't think of any examples of "top climbers" dying from "stupid mistakes", unless you want to count pre-meditated free-soloing as a "stupid mistake" (fair enough).

Well I guess it depends on how you define the term top climber, but many experienced climbers have died that way. A 5.13 climber died in the Red two seasons ago from a pretty silly mistake. A few years back I met a girl in Red Rocks, who rapped off the end of her rope and marginally escaped death. She was also a pretty experienced climber. There are a number of examples where someone died making a mistake he or she knew was dangerous and had known it was dangerous from the start.

fair weather climber wrote: I will bet my personal fortune that the odds of falling to your death while being belayed with an ATC are much higher than falling to your death with a grigri being used with no brakehand, especially when rock fall is involved.

Well, I would disagree. It is pretty hard to measure fatalities in the example, but it is easy to measure injuries. Every person that I know that has decked due to belayer error decked because their partner lost control of the GriGri. Everyone! I have nearly decked twice and both involved belayer error. One was with a GriGri, the other was with a Cinch. One of my ex-partners told me he dropped two of his partners. Both incidents involved a GriGri. I would guess that more people get dropped with a GriGri or Cinch than all other belay devices combined. It really is pandemic. As far as rock fall goes, yes a GriGri is safer, but that is much less of a concern, significantly more climbers deck due to belayer error than due to hitting their partner with rock fall.

When used properly, the GriGri is a safer device than the ATC, however the keyword is properly. From what I have seen, less than 50% of climbers actually use the GriGri properly.

For Randy B.

Get over the I hate Boulder routine. 16 of 67 posts on this thread were from 6 people who list Boulder as their home. I have just reread their posts and short of this one, none were negative. You on the other hand are a negative prick anytime Boulder comes up. And other than whinning in forums you contribute very little to this site.

Do you not like Boulder because people here actually get out and climb?

Piss off,

Prod.

Based on the data (not anecdotal evidence) that I've seen, the vast majority of accidents involve climbers who have 3-5 years of experience. Beginners are gripped by every aspect of the new and scary experience of climbing and are therefore extra careful. "Experienced" climbers, statistically speaking, tend not to make errors that result is serious accidents, probably due to a combination of muscle memory and an appreciation for the stakes involved (either through losing friends or being involved in accidents). There is a sweet spot of increased risk - statistically speaking, again - when there is a gap between comfort level and good risk management habits. One can all but eliminate the risk of catastrophic events by double-checking the basic elements of the system (knot, harness, rope, and belay) and by having a keen, heightened awareness when risk increases (like, for example, traveling in exposed terrain). There is always objective hazard that is beyond our control and why humility is requisite for spending a lot of time in wild places.

Anecdotally, I've seen all kinds of folks from all kind of backgrounds do all kinds of silly, reckless, and downright stupid things.

To the comments about overanalyzing such a tragic accident, I kind of feel that the least we can do to show respect for the loss is to try to learn something from it.

Christopher Barlow wrote:There is a sweet spot of increased risk - statistically speaking, again - when there is a gap between comfort level and good risk management habits.

I never thought about the topic from this perspective, but it is an insightful point. Upon reflection, your statement makes a lot of sense and matches my personal experience quite well. I will make sure to share this thought with my partners.
Thanks Chris.