Climber Falls near Seattle

[JohnVander]

My buddies climber fell approximately 20'-30' after running out of line repelling. From all reports I had heard the guy was an excellent climber, now he's laid up with a broken pelvis, rib. and bad concussion. Sad thing is that he had access to a 225' rope, but opted for a shorty to save weight, he could have tied a knot too.

 

[M.D. Vaden]

Aside from the common sense to pick a rope longer than one thinks may be the bare bones essential, do you think it would be a good idea to use a laser rangefinder to determine working height?

Or other. That could remove much guessing.

 

[Sparky8370]

Aside from the common sense to pick a rope longer than one thinks may be the bare bones essential, do you think it would be a good idea to use a laser rangefinder to determine working height?

Or other. That could remove much guessing.

I don't know if it would help you guys, but us electricians have pull rope that has foot markers on it. We pull it into pipe runs and either use it to pull the pull rope in or pull the wires with it. I imagine you guys could use it in conjunction with your throw bags if you were looking for length estimates.

 

[clearance]

Glad the guy is going to make it. Some people tie a figure 8 in the end of thier rope, I do sometimes.

 

[Koa Man]

I like to use as short a rope as possible, except when doing palms. A extra long rope gets in the way and I don't like to tie a knot on the end either because on the kinds of trees we have here, it will get stuck in a crotch all the time. I do however, always look to see how much rope I have left before I move. That has worked for me for the past 26 years.

I have also worked with climbers who don't look or tie a knot and had to yell at them that they were going to run out of rope. I have saved more than 1 guy a fall of 10 to 20 ft.

 

[tree md]

Sorry to hear that for the guy. Glad he lived through it.

I nearly rapped off the end of a line once myself. It was back when I was younger and had been climbing for just a couple of years. I had a boss that liked to push everyone on the crew and cuss people out when they weren't moving fast enough for him. He told me to use an old manila laid rope to get up in a tree in the back yard. Cussed me out when I told him I wanted to retrieve my line from a tree in the front so I let him bully me into climbing on it. It was only about 100' of rope and I almost came off the end of it.

The old boss is dead now. Died in an accident on the job.

Never again. After that I never let another boss bully me into doing anything that I thought was unsafe. And I never climbed on another rope other than one of my own personal climbing ropes. I started calling the shots in the trees when I was climbing and if an employer didn't like it I told them I could move on, no problem.