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Another Accident due to mis-use of the Gri-gri

Jon H · · PC, UT · Joined Nov 2009 · Points: 118

Look, it's very simple. I am willing to bet that every dropped climber was being belayed with a palm-up technique. Sure, they were gripping the climber side of the rope too hard, but they weren't holding the brake strand. Or at least, not holding it with enough force. This is EXACTLY what Petzl is now warning people not to do.

It's quite simple actually:

  • HOLD THE FUCKING BRAKE STRAND PALM DOWN.
  • DON'T LET GO OF THE FUCKING BRAKE STRAND.

How to use a Grigri

Feed rope just like you do with an ATC. If you need to feed rope quickly as for a clip:



And finally, if you feed rope like this, you're an asshole. Your partners should stop climbing with you before they become the next accident I read about here on MP.

How to eventually kill your climbing partner
Paul Merchant · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Jul 2010 · Points: 10

People get dropped due to the grigri being threaded backwards as well so it's not that simple.

Morgan Patterson · · NH · Joined Oct 2009 · Points: 8,945
ChefMattThaner wrote: That's funny, your fail safe for a gri gri is exactly what the normal way to use an ATC. No bells and whistles needed. If you consider that a fail safe why complicate matters for noob when that is all you have to teach them to use an ATC??
Its when shit goes wrong Matt that the Grigri is invaluable...

I have been in at least 1 scenario where my use of a grigri directly saved my partner's life. If we were using an ATC that day, he would be dead or in a wheelchair.

And I never got the whole palm up thing... was always awkward and I thought could lead to mis handling the brake end.
reboot · · . · Joined Jul 2006 · Points: 125

Since I'm in a bad mood, IMO this whole thread is utter BS.

John Byrnes wrote: If you hold the climbers side of the rope hard enough, the Gri-gri will not lock, regardless of whether you have a hold of the brake side. The classic evidence is rope-burn on one or both of the belayer's hands, or gloves. If they have a glove on their left hand, the climber is more likely to hit the deck. Here's an easy experiment: Have your partner climb up something steep and take. Gri-gri's locked, no problem. Now, grab the climbers-strand and pull kinda hard. The Gri-gri will unlock, and the rope will start moving, even though you have a good hold on the brake-strand. Don't believe me? Go try it, and try not to drop your partner.
If the Grigri does not receive enough pull force input relative to the rope friction against the cam (whether from a slow slab fall or you've absorbed it by grabbing the climber's end), the cam will not engage, but at that pull force, it does not take much brake end force to stop the rope.

I.e., the problem was never about grabbing the climber's end of the rope (yes it can burn your hand a little) but that one did not brake the belay end w/ sufficient force. If a Grigri can slip w/ enough belay end brake force, then the cam must have been defeated. And yes both of your hands can burn by just touching a running rope, so it's not evidence that you actually applied sufficient brake force (especially if the brake hand rises above the device).
BigFeet · · Texas · Joined May 2014 · Points: 385

"People get dropped due to the grigri being threaded backwards as well so it's not that simple."

This is why you should always double check yourself and partner. A quick buddy check helps to lower or prevent these types of mishaps from even coming into the equation. Take 60 seconds before you start climbing to make sure everybody is on the same page.

I believe this all boils down to laziness and complacency on both the climber's and belayer's part.

Buff Johnson · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Dec 2005 · Points: 1,145

Climbers gotta send, brah

bearbreeder · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Mar 2009 · Points: 3,065

The most interesting part of grigri usage?

When an ATC use takes their hand off the brake or messes it up ... You can point it out politely and they will usually admit "yeah i fucked up, i wont do it again"

Try doing this to a grigri user, especially one who has years of bad habits ... Pointing it out politely will often earn you a "dude i know how to belay ive been doing it for years like this and someone told me a grigri always works hands free ... I never dropped anyone yet!!!!" (This extends to some MPers who think a grigri is hands free)

Take a close look at the gym and the crag next time and youll see all sorts of fun hands free techniques with the grigri from folks who never learned or forgot about a proper brake hand

bearbreeder · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Mar 2009 · Points: 3,065
Jon H wrote:Look, it's very simple. I am willing to bet that every dropped climber was being belayed with a palm-up technique.
Theres been folks who been dropped or near dropped by folks using the fast feed technique ... All it takes is for the cam to be held down by the thumb a bit too long, and the rope to start zipping through .... A belayer who doesnt train the brake hand may not have the reaction for the hand to come off the device and to the hip with the rope

Which is why petzl recommends it only for fast feeding clips ... But youll see folks use it as default everywhere

You can also get dropped hands free with a "slow fall"

thebmc.co.uk/gri-gri-unmask…

Its possible this might have happened on the recent accident i posted

It all comes down to a SOLID brake hand and being taught that holding the climber strand doesnt do diddly

Same as an ATC
Paul Merchant · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Jul 2010 · Points: 10

Equipment rarely fails, people do. Due to inadequate checks, poor decision making, and lack of knowledge.

Jamie K. · · Unknown Hometown · Joined May 2013 · Points: 238

To the OP,

can you provide details on the following:
Gri-gri version
Rope diameter

I would expect that using rope diameters near the lower limit of the recommended range could contribute to this sort of issue.

Bill M · · Fort Collins, CO · Joined Jun 2010 · Points: 317

I wear gloves more than 95% of the time while belaying. Although I have never lost control while holding a fall or lowering, I would like to think having gloves on would help me get it back under control - this could be just wishful thinking. I am certain I "feel" like I give a more reliable belay wearing gloves.

Tradster · · Phoenix, AZ · Joined Nov 2007 · Points: 0
Paul Merchant wrote:Equipment rarely fails, people do. Due to inadequate checks, poor decision making, and lack of knowledge.
+1. My point exactly.
Jim Titt · · Germany · Joined Nov 2009 · Points: 490
ChefMattThaner wrote:So according to that "statistic" you have a better chance of staying alive with an unconscious belayer using a gri gri than one awake and actively belyaing. Which is just another way to say that the equipment is the complete opposite of intuitive. It also means that asking a "noob" to belay you with the more complicated, more often misused device is insane. The features of the gri gri laugh in the face of human instinct and really simply asking for misuse.
There is nothing intuitive or instinctive about using any belay device, they all require pre-knowledge.
Crispy. · · Chicago · Joined May 2014 · Points: 70
youtube.com/watch?v=KZIpC0Z…

I learned everything I need to know about the use of a gri-gri from this video. Perfect technique!
M Mobley · · Bar Harbor, ME · Joined Mar 2006 · Points: 911
Crispy. wrote:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZIpC0ZwjeA I learned everything I need to know about the use of a gri-gri from this video. Perfect technique!
someone needs to take her clif bars away
Top Rope Hero · · Was Estes Park, now homeless · Joined Jan 2009 · Points: 1,150

Bwha-ha-ha-ha-haaaaaa! OhMyLanta, John. I can’t even believe that after being away for a week that I have to double down on your bullshit.

Before I do, let me make sure I get this right. You’re going to try to maintain your position and take what by your own admission is a third-hand account of an unconfirmed accident involving people you don’t even pretend to know, mix in an obscure, mentioned-in-passing reference about “possible” consequences of poor belay technique, and…

…and you’re still going to lead this one-mad-man crusade to pervert how the world should use one of the safest belay devices in the world? A question of your sanity, or your sobriety, I can’t figure out which.

Look. For you, John, and for the kids scoring at home, I want to make absolutely clear what I’m talking about. My objections have nothing to do with your delivery. Zero. Nada. This is not about how nice you pretend not to be or how effective you think this shout campaign of yours is. My every challenge to your positions is born of the sheer, wrongheaded bucket of ignorance from which your claims are fed.

And yes, John, I certainly noticed your distracting, poorly-disguised ad hominem attacks against me and against others. For my part, I’ve nothing against you as a person—that I know of. My challenge finds its fuel only from what I see as your wrong and reckless claims—that and your crusading insistence on plying the rest of us with your misguided conclusions. Mine is not an argument of style or articulation—I’m just saying you’re flat, dead wrong.

Just so we haven’t forgotten, let’s revisit your original claims (I've added bold, to some), compare them to what I like to call “facts” and a good dose of common sense, and we’ll leave the bitterman, personal attacks aside:

“The grigri makes people complacent.“

Arrrrrrrnnnttt! Wrong. Category error. Complacency lies not in the material world, but in the hearts of those who would abuse it. See? You were already off to a bad start.

“THIS TYPE OF ACCIDENT IS HAPPENING FAR TOO OFTEN.”

In screaming all caps, no less. So OK, Chicken Little. You have evidence to back this claim? Some newspaper links, perhaps? Sherriff’s reports? Citations from the American Alpine Club’s Accidents in North American Mountaineering journal? A catalogue of reports from trusted and notable climbing resources like the AMGA? How about at least some sketchy, third-hand accounts of accidents that happened when you weren’t even around to people you don’t even know? Oh…wait…that IS what you bring to the table…

Look. John. It’s great that you have a pocket full of (unsubstantiated, third-hand) anecdotes. But anecdotes aren’t evidence. Evidence isn’t a data set. And data sets aren’t trends, trends that demand the very kind of robust and absolutist response you here insist on.

No. Stories of the kind you bring us are, by their very nature, localized, individualized, and provide only the most restricted of narratives into any given account. Moreover, any grand, sweeping conclusions we could possibly hope to draw from them are, as we see here, highly vulnerable to whack misinterpretation and reactionary blunder.

Now, again. If all you wanted to do was whine and wail about near mishaps and climbing tragedy, wouldn’t mean much to me. Like I say, I usually let dumb shit go. But you do here persist, your reactionary behavior. Worse, you insist on pushing your reactions onto every one else. Here’s more of your claims; let’s not forget these bombs, which, again, according to you, in your own words, take precedence over maintaining a hand on the brake side of the rope:

“KEEP YOUR OTHER HAND OFF THE CLIMBER’S STRAND.”

Again with the all caps. As if adults were incapable of responding to imperative in only the lower case. Never mind the fact that you still fail to provide any hard evidence for this ground-breaking new directive of yours. (Of yours. Not of the manufacture’s. Not of any nationally or internationally recognized climbing organization. Yours.)

“…train [others] to keep their left hand OFF the climbers [sic] rope except when feeding…”

And now you want us to simply take your word—no real-world evidence needed—and pass that poison on.

“…use only a few fingers to feed…”

Ah…excuse me, what planet are we belaying on? I still don’t even know what this daffodil, dental-floss technique is supposed to look like.

“…never wrap your hand around [the climber’s side of the rope.]”

And there it is. A final, misguided injunction built on misinformation, fed by half-truths, and maintained by a whisper campaign of boogey men.

John? I want again to make sure we are on the same page. I maintain no umbrage here, your delivery or your tone of voice or even you as a person. It’s just that you’re flat, dead wrong. Period. There is simply no evidence here, or anywhere else, that wrapping your hand around the climber’s side of the rope conjures the Great Satan that you’re here preaching against.

Now, there is this:

“Grabbing the climbers-strand will prevent the Gri-gri from locking.“

Here, the bold and the italics are both yours. Ugh!

To the point, I think herein lies your entire, misinformed problem. With this one claim you seem to think you maybe, kinda-sorta, halfsies have a handle on something.

Or not, actually.

Apparently, yes, if misused, the belayer can, it seems, induce failure in a belay device. Surprise, surprise. (Notice: I said “belay device.” Any belay device. )

See? Originally I said that I didn’t know what the fuck you were talking about. I take that back. Because now I think I do. You, John Byrnes, Mountain Project administrator, from what you’ve written, show yourself to have a fundamental misunderstanding of how to safely use a grigri—or really, any belay device for that matter. (Read carefully, I don’t know this for a fact. I’ve never climbed with you. And from how you profess to belay, I never will. All I have to go on is what you claim, and what you claim is whack. Before you get all flustered and throw out insults, read on...)

Here is my point: I have taught belaying before. To dozens and dozens. Possibly hundreds. Both professionally as a rock climbing guide and personally, as someone who travels a great deal and has to rely on the belaying kindness of strangers. And the way I teach it—the way I was taught to teach it—a belayer, regardless of how, regardless of what device she uses, has two and only two primary responsibilities:

1-Maintain control of the brake strand.
2-Maintain an appropriate amount of slack in the system.

That’s it. That’s really all a belayer has to do in order to provide a safe catch, in order to do her job. Doesn’t matter if’n she’s fifteen or fifty. Doesn’t matter if he uses a grigri, uses an ATC, uses a feral, half-rabid, foaming-at-the-mouth goat. Whatever and however the belay is given, so long as control of the brake strand is maintained, and so long as an appropriate amount of slack is out for any given situation, that belay is on.

You, however, contend otherwise. You insist on a different—and as I intend to show, a highly irresponsible—methodology for maintaining a safe and secure belay.

In the first place, you would subvert the importance of maintaining control of the brake strand. Say it’s less important than keeping a hand wrapped around the climber’s strand. Already you’ve got the whole idea wrong. Maintaining control of the brake strand—not even breathing is as important as that. (Note: hyperbole for comic effect.)

Secondly, and far more importantly, you show yourself incapable, in my view, of correctly diagnosing problems in the belay system. Every single instance that you (or for that matter, anyone) talk about rope burns on a belayer’s hands, talk about the rope whipping/sliding/racing through the belay device (any belay device), talk about belayers dropping their lead climbers…

…every time I hear that, I hear just that: belayers dropping their leaders. Belayers failing to maintain control of the brake strand. Belayers failing in what I as a lead climber insist is their primary responsibility.

You see it differently. You would have us manufacture a flawed “mode” in a certain belay device to cover for the fact that a belayer—a flawed and imperfect human—has failed, failed to maintain control of the brake strand. You even go on record saying as much, that you don’t blame any of the belayers. Incredible! As in: There’s no credibility here in this belief! Myself, I can’t think of a more dangerous way to teach climbing! Hey…it wasn’t YOU that dropped me, it was the grigri’s failure mode. Didn’t I mention.

A side note: I’ve tried searching around for this “failure mode” of yours. And I found it to be just that: yours. The only other hit that comes up about it is…is yours. Here on Mountain Project. Only…it’s about an entirely different problem with the grigri that you called it’s “failure mode.” And now you propose switching to call this other thing something entirely different, a “Grab-the-Climber’s-Strand Scenario.” Scratch that—this isn’t a side note. This IS the problem. You’re just making shit up, John.

Or rather, and again, let me say in no uncertain terms here: You demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding of how this belay device functions. Really, by extension, how any belay device functions.

Nothing, John, nothing obviates or excuses a belayer her responsibility to maintain control of the brake strand. No thing. If she were belaying around her hip and she let the brake strand slip, I would say the fault is hers, not her hip. If she were belaying with an ATC and let the brake strand slip, I would say the fault is hers, not the ATC. And if she were belaying with a grigri and let the brake strand slip, I, John, without hesitation, would diagnose the problem here as the belayer’s, for having let the brake strand slip. Period. End of that day. Regardless of whether, for a million whatever reasons, the cam engaged or not.

Why? Because the grigri does revert to a tube-style device when the cam fails to engage. Let me say that again: When a grigri’s cam does not engage, it still imparts enough friction to act as a friction plate. (I myself have actually never seen a cam fail to engage, but the rumors persist…)

I know this, John. How do I know this? I don’t need to put on a lab coat and try all the crazy experiments you keep squawking about. I know this from three things, three things I was doing just last week in Mexico. First, I lower my climbers. Simple! Crank the grigri wide open (cam fully DIS-engaged) and dirt the leader safely to the ground. Can’t do that, John, without enough friction on hand. Friction that could and should be employed if, for whatever fantastical reason, the cam didn’t engage. Second, I repelled with the grigri. Often do. Again, crank the device wide open (again, disengaging the cam) and control descent by maintaining control of the brake strand. Another real-world example of how the cam assist is only that, an assist. (A note: I know that these first two are often done by feathering the cam, a careless and destructive procedure. Do that long enough and you will wear a groove in the cam, defeating its brake assistance.) Finally, though I’ve never done it myself, I’ve been the victim of someone else threading me backwards through the grigri. Long, obvious story short: the backwards threaded grigri still held my fall, still allowed my belayer to lower me, no cam-assist used.

The grigri is NOT an auto-locking device, John. (Your train of thought can pull into no other station of conclusion.) It’s not the climber who engages the cam when she falls; it’s the belayer’s proper control of the brake strand that causes the cam to engage. It’s correctly advertised as a “brake assist” device. The braking (and braking responsibility) is still on the belayer.

You, however, do this mental gymnastics end-around thing and think the problem is in the device. Misdiagnosis, John. You are completely missing the forest of the problem for the trees of your misdiagnosed failure mode thingy. Or something like that.

Just to be tedious and long-winded, let me put this another way: Let’s say the cam doesn’t engage. Let’s say that Zeus himself pissed down from Olympia all the rusting urine needed to freeze shut all the grigri cams ever made, and if a wild pack of Vegas whores greased all the rope channels with what’s left of their spent jars of Vaseline and further, if we lashed all the remaining Aerojet Rocketdyne RS-25 Space Shuttle engines thrusting upwards on the climber’s strand…then….then…

…well OK, in THAT case I do suppose we can excuse the belayer. But John, if a belayer loses control of the brake strand, regardless of whether the grigri’s cam has engaged, then I find that belayer wholly, and 100% at fault. Maintain control of the brake strand. Period. True of a hip belay, true of the ATC, true of the grigri. Your understanding of these incidence are a misdiagnosis of the problem.

The grigri, despite your assurances that it’s just a fail machine waiting to happen, does in fact work just fine without the cam. I say again, if the cam does not engage, for whatever myriad and sundry reasons, a belayer would still have plenty enough friction available to fulfill his principle responsibility, to maintain control of the brake strand. Nothing changes this. Not wrapping your hand around the climber’s strand, not distracting bouldering hotties, not nuthin’.

In other words, if a belayer can’t maintain control of the brake strand with the cam disengaged, there’s really no hope for humankind. If not on a grigri, then not on an ATC, certainly not with a hip belay. We all die.

You claim otherwise. You would excuse or worse, ignore such carelessness in a belayer; I would not. I would never be as irresponsibly forgiving with my belayers. I would, in fact, simply teach them the importance of maintaining control of the brake strand.

To sum it all up: Yes, I do here recognize that folks are saying that occasionally, very occasionally people being belayed with a grigri and being dropped. Sounds piece of shit. But to turn that around and blame a decades-old belay device, to manufacture a back-asswards reason why the machine is failing is simply the ethos of crazytalk.

If the grigri were actually failing, I would of course want to jump on board. But nothing here and nothing I’ve ever heard or seen proves you out, John. That accidents are happening, OK. No argument. None.

But I say again that if you think not grabbing the climber’s strand is in any way the answer that you completely misdiagnose the problem (not a little, completely). More to the point, I say it IS the problem. Why? Because your flat-earthed conclusions are at best misguided and misapplied. I’ll give it to you, you make a lot of noise. Loud, inflammatory remarks do indeed garner attention. And you undoubtedly count on the confusion to disguise your lack of adequate facts. Finally, dressing up your conclusions in bold face and a lot of exclamation points probably wins you the occasional convert, too.

But I’m not buying. Your methods don’t, at all, solve the underlying problem. (Don’t even get me fucking started on your l

If people are dropping their climbers, they’re dropping their climbers. And that’s all I see here: a lack of ability to maintain adequate control of the brake strand. Casually handing out amnesty to belayers and blaming a device instead is, in my estimation, gross negligence. A dangerous way to climb.

Yes, better instruction on how to use any belay device is important. It’s critical. Petzl’s instructions are more than adequate, they perfectly match the functioning and the design of their device; I give those instructions all the time. But your proposals, John, unless you bring something new to the table, are whack and wrongheaded. And I don’t care what titles you hold or how loud your delivery. If you’re gonna just say dumb shit, bash the grigri or whatever…I’ll likely let that go. Just as I said. But if you insist on publicly anointing yourself principle author, licensed to rewrite the fundamentals of how best to use the grigri, I am going to tell people just as loudly that you are flat, dead wrong.

youtube.com/watch?v=kTwo8MW…

No personal offense, my man. Just calling out bullshit when I see it.

~R. Kelly Liggin

M Mobley · · Bar Harbor, ME · Joined Mar 2006 · Points: 911
Top Rope Hero wrote:Bwha-ha-ha-ha-haaaaaa! OhMyLanta, John. I can’t even believe that after being away for a week that I have to double down on your bullshit. Before I do, let me make sure I get this right. You’re going to try to maintain your position and take what by your own admission is a third-hand account of an unconfirmed accident involving people you don’t even pretend to know, mix in an obscure, mentioned-in-passing reference about “possible” consequences of poor belay technique, and… …and you’re still going to lead this one-mad-man crusade to pervert how the world should use one of the safest belay devices in the world? A question of your sanity, or your sobriety, I can’t figure out which. Look. For you, John, and for the kids scoring at home, I want to make absolutely clear what I’m talking about. My objections have nothing to do with your delivery. Zero. Nada. This is not about how nice you pretend not to be or how effective you think this shout campaign of yours is. My every challenge to your positions is born of the sheer, wrongheaded bucket of ignorance from which your claims are fed. And yes, John, I certainly noticed your distracting, poorly-disguised ad hominem attacks against me and against others. For my part, I’ve nothing against you as a person—that I know of. My challenge finds its fuel only from what I see as your wrong and reckless claims—that and your crusading insistence on plying the rest of us with your misguided conclusions. Mine is not an argument of style or articulation—I’m just saying you’re flat, dead wrong. Just so we haven’t forgotten, let’s revisit your original claims (I've added bold, to some), compare them to what I like to call “facts” and a good dose of common sense, and we’ll leave the bitterman, personal attacks aside: “The grigri makes people complacent.“ Arrrrrrrnnnttt! Wrong. Category error. Complacency lies not in the material world, but in the hearts of those who would abuse it. See? You were already off to a bad start. “THIS TYPE OF ACCIDENT IS HAPPENING FAR TOO OFTEN.” In screaming all caps, no less. So OK, Chicken Little. You have evidence to back this claim? Some newspaper links, perhaps? Sherriff’s reports? Citations from the American Alpine Club’s Accidents in North American Mountaineering journal? A catalogue of reports from trusted and notable climbing resources like the AMGA? How about at least some sketchy, third-hand accounts of accidents that happened when you weren’t even around to people you don’t even know? Oh…wait…that IS what you bring to the table… Look. John. It’s great that you have a pocket full of (unsubstantiated, third-hand) anecdotes. But anecdotes aren’t evidence. Evidence isn’t a data set. And data sets aren’t trends, trends that demand the very kind of robust and absolutist response you here insist on. No. Stories of the kind you bring us are, by their very nature, localized, individualized, and provide only the most restricted of narratives into any given account. Moreover, any grand, sweeping conclusions we could possibly hope to draw from them are, as we see here, highly vulnerable to whack misinterpretation and reactionary blunder. Now, again. If all you wanted to do was whine and wail about near mishaps and climbing tragedy, wouldn’t mean much to me. Like I say, I usually let dumb shit go. But you do here persist, your reactionary behavior. Worse, you insist on pushing your reactions onto every one else. Here’s more of your claims; let’s not forget these bombs, which, again, according to you, in your own words, take precedence over maintaining a hand on the brake side of the rope: “KEEP YOUR OTHER HAND OFF THE CLIMBER’S STRAND.” Again with the all caps. As if adults were incapable of responding to imperative in only the lower case. Never mind the fact that you still fail to provide any hard evidence for this ground-breaking new directive of yours. (Of yours. Not of the manufacture’s. Not of any nationally or internationally recognized climbing organization. Yours.) “…train [others] to keep their left hand OFF the climbers [sic] rope except when feeding…” And now you want us to simply take your word—no real-world evidence needed—and pass that poison on. “…use only a few fingers to feed…” Ah…excuse me, what planet are we belaying on? I still don’t even know what this daffodil, dental-floss technique is supposed to look like. “…never wrap your hand around [the climber’s side of the rope.]” And there it is. A final, misguided injunction built on misinformation, fed by half-truths, and maintained by a whisper campaign of boogey men. John? I want again to make sure we are on the same page. I maintain no umbrage here, your delivery or your tone of voice or even you as a person. It’s just that you’re flat, dead wrong. Period. There is simply no evidence here, or anywhere else, that wrapping your hand around the climber’s side of the rope conjures the Great Satan that you’re here preaching against. Now, there is this: “Grabbing the climbers-strand will prevent the Gri-gri from locking.“ Here, the bold and the italics are both yours. Ugh! To the point, I think herein lies your entire, misinformed problem. With this one claim you seem to think you maybe, kinda-sorta, halfsies have a handle on something. Or not, actually. Apparently, yes, if misused, the belayer can, it seems, induce failure in a belay device. Surprise, surprise. (Notice: I said “belay device.” Any belay device. ) See? Originally I said that I didn’t know what the fuck you were talking about. I take that back. Because now I think I do. You, John Byrnes, Mountain Project administrator, from what you’ve written, show yourself to have a fundamental misunderstanding of how to safely use a grigri—or really, any belay device for that matter. (Read carefully, I don’t know this for a fact. I’ve never climbed with you. And from how you profess to belay, I never will. All I have to go on is what you claim, and what you claim is whack. Before you get all flustered and throw out insults, read on...) Here is my point: I have taught belaying before. To dozens and dozens. Possibly hundreds. Both professionally as a rock climbing guide and personally, as someone who travels a great deal and has to rely on the belaying kindness of strangers. And the way I teach it—the way I was taught to teach it—a belayer, regardless of how, regardless of what device she uses, has two and only two primary responsibilities: 1-Maintain control of the brake strand. 2-Maintain an appropriate amount of slack in the system. That’s it. That’s really all a belayer has to do in order to provide a safe catch, in order to do her job. Doesn’t matter if’n she’s fifteen or fifty. Doesn’t matter if he uses a grigri, uses an ATC, uses a feral, half-rabid, foaming-at-the-mouth goat. Whatever and however the belay is given, so long as control of the brake strand is maintained, and so long as an appropriate amount of slack is out for any given situation, that belay is on. You, however, contend otherwise. You insist on a different—and as I intend to show, a highly irresponsible—methodology for maintaining a safe and secure belay. In the first place, you would subvert the importance of maintaining control of the brake strand. Say it’s less important than keeping a hand wrapped around the climber’s strand. Already you’ve got the whole idea wrong. Maintaining control of the brake strand—not even breathing is as important as that. (Note: hyperbole for comic effect.) Secondly, and far more importantly, you show yourself incapable, in my view, of correctly diagnosing problems in the belay system. Every single instance that you (or for that matter, anyone) talk about rope burns on a belayer’s hands, talk about the rope whipping/sliding/racing through the belay device (any belay device), talk about belayers dropping their lead climbers… …every time I hear that, I hear just that: belayers dropping their leaders. Belayers failing to maintain control of the brake strand. Belayers failing in what I as a lead climber insist is their primary responsibility. You see it differently. You would have us manufacture a flawed “mode” in a certain belay device to cover for the fact that a belayer—a flawed and imperfect human—has failed, failed to maintain control of the brake strand. You even go on record saying as much, that you don’t blame any of the belayers. Incredible! As in: There’s no credibility here in this belief! Myself, I can’t think of a more dangerous way to teach climbing! Hey…it wasn’t YOU that dropped me, it was the grigri’s failure mode. Didn’t I mention. A side note: I’ve tried searching around for this “failure mode” of yours. And I found it to be just that: yours. The only other hit that comes up about it is…is yours. Here on Mountain Project. Only…it’s about an entirely different problem with the grigri that you called it’s “failure mode.” And now you propose switching to call this other thing something entirely different, a “Grab-the-Climber’s-Strand Scenario.” Scratch that—this isn’t a side note. This IS the problem. You’re just making shit up, John. Or rather, and again, let me say in no uncertain terms here: You demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding of how this belay device functions. Really, by extension, how any belay device functions. Nothing, John, nothing obviates or excuses a belayer her responsibility to maintain control of the brake strand. No thing. If she were belaying around her hip and she let the brake strand slip, I would say the fault is hers, not her hip. If she were belaying with an ATC and let the brake strand slip, I would say the fault is hers, not the ATC. And if she were belaying with a grigri and let the brake strand slip, I, John, without hesitation, would diagnose the problem here as the belayer’s, for having let the brake strand slip. Period. End of that day. Regardless of whether, for a million whatever reasons, the cam engaged or not. Why? Because the grigri does revert to a tube-style device when the cam fails to engage. Let me say that again: When a grigri’s cam does not engage, it still imparts enough friction to act as a friction plate. (I myself have actually never seen a cam fail to engage, but the rumors persist…) I know this, John. How do I know this? I don’t need to put on a lab coat and try all the crazy experiments you keep squawking about. I know this from three things, three things I was doing just last week in Mexico. First, I lower my climbers. Simple! Crank the grigri wide open (cam fully DIS-engaged) and dirt the leader safely to the ground. Can’t do that, John, without enough friction on hand. Friction that could and should be employed if, for whatever fantastical reason, the cam didn’t engage. Second, I repelled with the grigri. Often do. Again, crank the device wide open (again, disengaging the cam) and control descent by maintaining control of the brake strand. Another real-world example of how the cam assist is only that, an assist. (A note: I know that these first two are often done by feathering the cam, a careless and destructive procedure. Do that long enough and you will wear a groove in the cam, defeating its brake assistance.) Finally, though I’ve never done it myself, I’ve been the victim of someone else threading me backwards through the grigri. Long, obvious story short: the backwards threaded grigri still held my fall, still allowed my belayer to lower me, no cam-assist used. The grigri is NOT an auto-locking device, John. (Your train of thought can pull into no other station of conclusion.) It’s not the climber who engages the cam when she falls; it’s the belayer’s proper control of the brake strand that causes the cam to engage. It’s correctly advertised as a “brake assist” device. The braking (and braking responsibility) is still on the belayer. You, however, do this mental gymnastics end-around thing and think the problem is in the device. Misdiagnosis, John. You are completely missing the forest of the problem for the trees of your misdiagnosed failure mode thingy. Or something like that. Just to be tedious and long-winded, let me put this another way: Let’s say the cam doesn’t engage. Let’s say that Zeus himself pissed down from Olympia all the rusting urine needed to freeze shut all the grigri cams ever made, and if a wild pack of Vegas whores greased all the rope channels with what’s left of their spent jars of Vaseline and further, if we lashed all the remaining Aerojet Rocketdyne RS-25 Space Shuttle engines thrusting upwards on the climber’s strand…then….then… …well OK, in THAT case I do suppose we can excuse the belayer. But John, if a belayer loses control of the brake strand, regardless of whether the grigri’s cam has engaged, then I find that belayer wholly, and 100% at fault. Maintain control of the brake strand. Period. True of a hip belay, true of the ATC, true of the grigri. Your understanding of these incidence are a misdiagnosis of the problem. The grigri, despite your assurances that it’s just a fail machine waiting to happen, does in fact work just fine without the cam. I say again, if the cam does not engage, for whatever myriad and sundry reasons, a belayer would still have plenty enough friction available to fulfill his principle responsibility, to maintain control of the brake strand. Nothing changes this. Not wrapping your hand around the climber’s strand, not distracting bouldering hotties, not nuthin’. In other words, if a belayer can’t maintain control of the brake strand with the cam disengaged, there’s really no hope for humankind. If not on a grigri, then not on an ATC, certainly not with a hip belay. We all die. You claim otherwise. You would excuse or worse, ignore such carelessness in a belayer; I would not. I would never be as irresponsibly forgiving with my belayers. I would, in fact, simply teach them the importance of maintaining control of the brake strand. To sum it all up: Yes, I do here recognize that folks are saying that occasionally, very occasionally people being belayed with a grigri and being dropped. Sounds piece of shit. But to turn that around and blame a decades-old belay device, to manufacture a back-asswards reason why the machine is failing is simply the ethos of crazytalk. If the grigri were actually failing, I would of course want to jump on board. But nothing here and nothing I’ve ever heard or seen proves you out, John. That accidents are happening, OK. No argument. None. But I say again that if you think not grabbing the climber’s strand is in any way the answer that you completely misdiagnose the problem (not a little, completely). More to the point, I say it IS the problem. Why? Because your flat-earthed conclusions are at best misguided and misapplied. I’ll give it to you, you make a lot of noise. Loud, inflammatory remarks do indeed garner attention. And you undoubtedly count on the confusion to disguise your lack of adequate facts. Finally, dressing up your conclusions in bold face and a lot of exclamation points probably wins you the occasional convert, too. But I’m not buying. Your methods don’t, at all, solve the underlying problem. (Don’t even get me fucking started on your l If people are dropping their climbers, they’re dropping their climbers. And that’s all I see here: a lack of ability to maintain adequate control of the brake strand. Casually handing out amnesty to belayers and blaming a device instead is, in my estimation, gross negligence. A dangerous way to climb. Yes, better instruction on how to use any belay device is important. It’s critical. Petzl’s instructions are more than adequate, they perfectly match the functioning and the design of their device; I give those instructions all the time. But your proposals, John, unless you bring something new to the table, are whack and wrongheaded. And I don’t care what titles you hold or how loud your delivery. If you’re gonna just say dumb shit, bash the grigri or whatever…I’ll likely let that go. Just as I said. But if you insist on publicly anointing yourself principle author, licensed to rewrite the fundamentals of how best to use the grigri, I am going to tell people just as loudly that you are flat, dead wrong. youtube.com/watch?v=kTwo8MW… No personal offense, my man. Just calling out bullshit when I see it. ~R. Kelly Liggin
longest post ever on Mtn Proj?

I like grigris too!
rgold · · Poughkeepsie, NY · Joined Feb 2008 · Points: 526
Miike wrote: longest post ever on Mtn Proj?
Looks like it. Too bad he didn't read the thread, since his essential points have already been refuted with explicit evidence from Petzl and the BMC.

But I'm still bummed. I thought I wrote the longest posts.
Top Rope Hero · · Was Estes Park, now homeless · Joined Jan 2009 · Points: 1,150

You can point it out politely and they will usually admit "yeah i fucked up, i wont do it again"

Derek Doucet · · Unknown Hometown · Joined Apr 2010 · Points: 66

I don't know if it's the longest post, but I'd bet the farm it's the longest paragraph...

Guideline #1: Don't be a jerk.

General Climbing
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