Hypotheticals from a hypocrite
There's a lot of blame at a time like this, there are the classic armchair critics saying that what happened was stupid, like they've never cut a corner or taken a risk. (Quite possible for the TR tough guys out there). We all say 'check your knot', wear a helmet, and all of the rest, and in most cases I'm an advocate of this. I'm also likely to solo across a ledge, unclip my safety to deal with a tangle on my anchor, and not use an autoblock to save a few minutes, and in summer I regularly choose to mitigate the certainty of sunburn rather than the possibility of rockfall.
In this case, the more details that came out, the more I went from "FFS, A simul-rapping accident on a big wall with no knots?" to "I can see a way for this to happen" using a logical train of occurrences and decisions that most pragmatic, and not risk-averse climbers could understand if not agree with.
I've done all of these things, I've seen this behavior of devices, I've made these choices.
This is a purely hypothetical scenario, I have no information beyond that which has been reported. But I came across a best-of story on Reddit in a similar vein about a scuba diving death in a seemingly innocuous scenario, which made me appreciate the style.
It's been a good day, a bunch of pitches up one of the coolest pinnacles around. It was hard climbing, so you brought a grigri, and your partner has an ATC for the rap. To save time rigging and rerigging each rap you've been simul rapping thus far, it's blocky and there are plenty of ledges if you need to build an anchor. you're doing long raps, making the most of the 80 meter rope.
Several pitches in; the big ledge is about 50 meters below, the 80m rope doesn't quite make it, so you stop on a small legde above. Its a 15m rap to the ledge. There's heaps of rope, a large ledge to land on, and we'll stop there to grab some water and food.
You grab a few armfulls of rope, it should be enough to get down and you'll be able to see the ends to check. You throw it off. Damn, it's caught in a shrub, a moment of tugging sees it fully stuck. You're on a grigri, so if the worst comes to it you can lock it off, and your partner can keep going on their end until they're lowering you.
As you descend towards the tangled rope, it still looks like there's enough rope in the shrub to make it to the ledge but it'll be close.
You swing in to a small edge to keep you steady as you untangle the rope, but without your weight on the simul rap, the rope continues to slip through the grigri as you stay stationary. Your partner drops quicker, and you release the brake. The grigri seems to lock, as it always does, you've done this a thousand times.
You untangle the line from the shrub, but as you lift it up over a branch the brake releases. The rope weight wasn't enough to lock the grigri, and now that you've lifted it up, there's nothing holding it at all. you don't even get enough time to process this before you are off the bottom of the rope. It's over.
In this case, the more details that came out, the more I went from "FFS, A simul-rapping accident on a big wall with no knots?" to "I can see a way for this to happen" using a logical train of occurrences and decisions that most pragmatic, and not risk-averse climbers could understand if not agree with.
I've done all of these things, I've seen this behavior of devices, I've made these choices.
This is a purely hypothetical scenario, I have no information beyond that which has been reported. But I came across a best-of story on Reddit in a similar vein about a scuba diving death in a seemingly innocuous scenario, which made me appreciate the style.
It's been a good day, a bunch of pitches up one of the coolest pinnacles around. It was hard climbing, so you brought a grigri, and your partner has an ATC for the rap. To save time rigging and rerigging each rap you've been simul rapping thus far, it's blocky and there are plenty of ledges if you need to build an anchor. you're doing long raps, making the most of the 80 meter rope.
Several pitches in; the big ledge is about 50 meters below, the 80m rope doesn't quite make it, so you stop on a small legde above. Its a 15m rap to the ledge. There's heaps of rope, a large ledge to land on, and we'll stop there to grab some water and food.
You grab a few armfulls of rope, it should be enough to get down and you'll be able to see the ends to check. You throw it off. Damn, it's caught in a shrub, a moment of tugging sees it fully stuck. You're on a grigri, so if the worst comes to it you can lock it off, and your partner can keep going on their end until they're lowering you.
As you descend towards the tangled rope, it still looks like there's enough rope in the shrub to make it to the ledge but it'll be close.
You swing in to a small edge to keep you steady as you untangle the rope, but without your weight on the simul rap, the rope continues to slip through the grigri as you stay stationary. Your partner drops quicker, and you release the brake. The grigri seems to lock, as it always does, you've done this a thousand times.
You untangle the line from the shrub, but as you lift it up over a branch the brake releases. The rope weight wasn't enough to lock the grigri, and now that you've lifted it up, there's nothing holding it at all. you don't even get enough time to process this before you are off the bottom of the rope. It's over.
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