UKC

So who never makes a mistake? Is anyone apart from the Pope infallible? I think not, and I believe it is important that we all approach safety in climbing with a humble mien. We need to make ourselves as knowledgeable as possible about safety issues and how things can go wrong and try to behave in ways which are as fail-safe as possible. On another thread I have been implicitly criticised for admitting that I once made a mistake in unwittingly belaying my second off a gear loop. People have implied that they would never climb with someone like me (which might be understandable for other reasons). One person went as far as to say that he was 100% certain that he would never do that. He probably won’t, but it’s the 100% certain bit that bothers me.
So, in my near-half-century of climbing here are the three more or less serious errors which I can recall at the moment.
1. Belayed partner off a gear loop. As I pointed out on the other thread this was partly explained by the odd juxtaposition of a gear loop right next to the belay loop on that particular harness. Ever since I have always kept my belay device on the belay loop at all times – as far as I know. But of course it is possible I might not have followed my own protocol – no-one’s infallible.
2. Back in 1971 I had a home-made harness. People sometimes did in those days. It was really only a belt made of fluffy car seat belt fabric with loops attached through which the rope was passed and secured with a bowline at the front. I climbed Manchester Buttress at Stanage and on reaching the top the rope cascaded down the crag. I hadn’t tied the bowline. Since then I try really hard not to be interrupted in the middle of tying on.
3. On occasions I have forgotten to do up the sleeve on a screwgate crab which is part of my belay.
4. There may be more which I’ve either forgotten or never even noticed.
It is really important to come clean on one’s errors and fallibility, try to learn from the former and accept the latter while doing our damnedest to reduce both. We should not suggest that we can do better than that. To claim infallibility is only for popes. To err is human. Even guides and instructors are human and I guess most could (but perhaps won’t) confess.
I’d love to hear what others think about these issues and what mistakes they have made and perhaps learned from.

In reply to Rog Wilko:

Don't feel bad, everyone makes mistakes. I'm certainly guilty of number three and now when ever I belay someone, I will automatically check every so often that the screw gates tightened up. A few months ago I was climbing indoors and my friend who I always thought of as the worlds most careful climber ended up have to down climb a route after the rope dropped from his harness because he hadn't tied on,scary. I wasn't belaying him at the time as I would have checked him before he started.

In reply to Rog Wilko:

I watched an experienced climber abseiling and noticed that he had only passed the belt through the buckle twice and it was slowly slipping though. I told him to abseil faster....

In reply to Wsdconst:

Thanks, but I don't feel bad!

In reply to Rog Wilko:


i once forgot to double pass my harness, noticed just before a lower-off. it scared me enough to be a bit paranoid about that kinda thing.... though that paranoia has served me well on a small number of occasions so i guess it worked out for the best.

i would bet a lot of people are guilty of number 3 at some point in their climbing life and they might never know it... another one i have seen is not screwing up a screwgate gate on an anchor.

In reply to Rog Wilko:

.... to arrr is to pirate.

In reply to Rog Wilko:

I've climbed with you in the past and would be happy to do so again.
Nothing i saw would lead me to believe you were a danger

In reply to Rog Wilko:

>

I can confirm that this works.

In reply to WildCamper:

Thanks Tobey. Not that I was seeking approval.....

In reply to Rog Wilko:

I know, I just dont like seeing folk being needlessly pilloried

In reply to Rog Wilko:

I once set off for a bolted but very run out 2 pitch route at the bottom of a big face. My partner convinced me that a single rope would be better than twin halfs. My big mistake was taking his word for it without giving it too much thought. Thankfully I realised my mistake just after setting off to second the first pitch. I got lowered off then had to tie off my partner and return to the car to get another rope so he could get down. Probably not that dangerous but would've been pretty embarrassing to be stuck hanging off a bolt yelling for help because we didn't have enough rope to get down!

In reply to Rog Wilko:
ive definitely not screwed up a carabiner at least once (that i can recall...)

One time built a belay at the top of gardoms unconquerable which consisted of a nut wedged behind what i thought was the protruding tip of a large boulder but never checked (the gear went in solid and held a pull to seat it...) however when deacon seconded up and wanted to lead on the e1 pitch he checked and the boulder moved when he tugged it, turns out the rock was barely larger than a football and hardly wedged in place! taught me a valuable lesson about testing rock quality, especially on belays.

In reply to Greasy Prusiks:


...to moo is bovine.

In reply to Rog Wilko:
One mistake I think I made (to this day I'm still not sure)...

Did King Kong at Wintours in the days when you abbed off - abbed off the bolts at the top of the second pitch - half way down bounced around a bit - or was it a lot - to get the ropes untangled. Got to the big mid crag ledge and clipped into the bolts.

A few seconds later looked at my figure of eight, the screwgate was undone. Had I just automatically undone it without thinking or had I just abseiled with it undone (probably but not sure).

It still gives me the willies thinking that I may have been bouncing around 250' above the ground with an undone screwgate.

Moral, since then if abseiling on a fig 8 I use two screwgates back to back.

In reply to Rog Wilko:


No-one. Everyone makes mistakes. And loads of elite climbers have made critical and well-documented mistakes [that have sometimes, as we all know, sadly and tragically cost them their lives].


I'm very sorry to hear that.

Very good thread, and very good and welcome OP, Rog.

In reply to Rog Wilko:
I dropped by belay plate from the Second pitch of Trespassers Groove on Esk buttress which pissed me off massively as I knew that was £25 burned (tight jock) and I was climbing with a new partner that day and looked like a total cock.
I also arrived at the base of a mixed route on Beinn Eighe having left one of my ice tools at the previous ab station further up the gully. Mercifully the route wasn't in condition so we had to go back up the way we came down.
I think I might have had my partners tool in my skull if our objective had been in good nick!

In reply to Rog Wilko:

Rog,
in this article you will find a catalogue of mistakes by myself and others, I think you might also like the opening bits as they very much point to the fact that we all make mistakes, need to know why, and come up with methods to reduce their occurrence:

http://www.coldmountainkit.com/knowledge/articles/419-65-things-to-do-to-st...

In reply to Rog Wilko:
We all make mistakes, sometimes in ignorance, sometimes through carelessness. In no particular order:

I've lowered off the end of a rope (I say I because it was my fault)
I've nodded off while belaying
Fallen into a rough sea while climbing beyond my ability
Misjudged runner height and decked
Dropped a partner
I don't use screwgates in belays but I've occasionally left the belay plate HMS unlocked
Badly cocked up rushing to switch from ascending a rope to descending it 10 pitches up
Had runners unclip (or did I never clip them?)
Built a belay in rock that subsequently fell apart

It happens. It's the mistakes and near misses I don't know about that worry me more.
jk

In reply to Rog Wilko:

Lead up a pitch on Wrecker's Slab, built a 4-piece belay as 2 pieces + 2 pieces joined with a sling with a knot for clipping in. Knot loop wasn't very big so I clipped the guide plate using the shelf above the knot rather than into the knot (which I do fairly often). Started bringing up the seconds, then realised that I had clipped the plate onto the shelf (just on top of the knot) rather than into the two legs of the sling, so failure of one side could result in the guide plate sliding off the sling... clipped a few extra crabs on to make it safe, but still very silly!

In reply to Rog Wilko:

I once forgot my harness so cobbled a makeshift one out of slings and krabs. Safe enough to belay with but concentrated the mind when leading

In reply to Rog Wilko:

A couple of years ago I was chatting to my belayer whilst tying in, get halfway up the route, pull past an overhang and as I do so one rope goes whistling back down to the bottom. Look down and the other is only a half threaded knot. Luckily I was then on a reasonable enough ledge to make that one secure. I must have tied in hundreds of times and I guess I hadn't realised how on autopilot I was.

I'm now pretty good about double checking every time before setting off! I'd actually seen someone at windgather a few years before have their rope fall off half way up and his mates were throwing the rope back up. As I was climbing the adjacent route I was wondering how the hell you could be enough of a muppet to let that happen...

In reply to Rog Wilko:

A few down the years - most of them long ago!

1) Abseiling off Pickering Pinnacle (Dovedale) - not very far down to the col behind the pinnacle so threw a chunk of rope off and set off down - about 10' off the deck I felt one end of the rope slip through my fingers. I was able to keep hold of the rope above the descender for long enough to get on the rock - the ground was close but the is a bloody big drop either side of the col! Lesson - check the ropes reach!

2) Soloing Chequers Arete (Froggatt) for the 1st time - I had just led it and thought easy-peasy but on the solo the finger-jam didn't feel solid so crossed hands and found myself barn-dooring into space - I grabbed the arete as I went past it - phew, had to go for a calming beer in the Grouse! Lesson - only solo a route when you are solid on it.

3) Bircheff-Williams (Yosemite) set off in the cool of evening and got to where it joins the descent route in pitch black. Abseiled into the complete darkness and took about four hours of terror to get back to the base of the route. Lesson - leave enough time or carry a headtorch!

Plenty more where they came from!

Chris

In reply to Rog Wilko:
Too many to remember!

Here's a yin and yang one for you.

I like prusik wotsits on abseil ropes - they hold the weight of the rope while you thread the belay device and all that good stuff, but what sort of muppet actually lets go of an abseil rope when they're abseiling? Well, that would be me. Abseiling off a big ice route, at an angle to the fall line to get to the next station and an icicle breaks - so I swing, My face is lining up nicely with a big jaggy icicle and so I fend it off with a hand - which would of course be the hand that's doing the work....Fortunately the prusik took the load to such an extent that I didn't fully realise what I'd done until I was on the next stance.

One summer evening at Wintour's Leap, we're running out of daylight on Kangaroo Wall. An abseil retreat is in order, and off we go. My partner is down safely, just me to go. I am wearing shorts and T shirt. The rope ends in a very big patch of nettles. I descend to just above the nettles and see that if I kick off from the rock and let the rope slide, that I'll be able to miss the nettles and land in a nice clearing. Good plan. So, I kick off, and let the rope run The prusik locks and I swing back into the nettles, feet about one foot above the ground, and hanging free. My arms and legs get an Imperial stinging. In the way of these things, I begin to spin. The level of stinging increases to Grand Imperial as I wrestle with the prusik so as to lower myself all the way into into the nettles and walk out.

My partner also did himself a grievous injury - ruptured himself, he did.


I have also - omitted to do up screwgates, placed gear for belays that was worthless on closer inspection, abseiled into sea cliffs without a rope, fallen off soloing when a hold broke (and nearly fallen off soloing in same circumstances), omitted to fasten the ankle strap on step-in crampons, soloed out-of-condition ice routes that I should have left well alone (and only climbed one of them because a big chunk of it fell off behind me), glissaded (some would say fell) down a neve slope in the Alps in Green Flash trainers without an axe, booted critical runners out and presented self with ground falls (several times), descended on the wrong side of the Continental Divide in Canada (that does take some doing). I've set up belays with stupid angles, and ended up over the edge at Stanage as a result. They call it experience, I'm told. I'm still learning!

In reply to David Coley:

I saw this a couple of weeks back. Food for thought.

In reply to Rog Wilko:

You got some pretty condescending replies early on there Rog, but the thread improved as it matured - a bit like ouselves eh?!

I think my worst peccadillo was in the early sevebties when I looked up at the beginner mate who was seconding (3 on a rope) Olympic Slab at Tremadoc and realised that, far from ensuring he was properly tied in, I'd let him attach via a screwgate clipped into a gear loop. Happily I was able to climb up to him and correct it.

Even earlier, in 1965, we were on a stance on a small ledge 40 feet up on Great Close Scar and our 300 feet of No 2 hawser laid nylon rope, not for the first time, got into what the Californians would call a clusterf*ck. Solution - to ease the sorting both untied from the ends, with which we were belayed, and thus neither of us was attached to anything.

More recently one was leading a pitch high on Creag Meagaidh (in the near dark, as usual) when one's harness slipped from one's ample midriff and descended to one's knees! A bit of improvisation saw me drag it up one handed and clip it to the slings round my neck, which at least got it above my knees and enabled movement.
Only a year ago I made the same mistake as Chris above and abbed down a rope one end of which didn't reach the ground.

Nearest of my near death experiences was in the 1995 on my 50th birthday. On about the third ab descending from El Puro at Riglos, I got to 4 feet from the end of doubled 9mm ropes on an ATC, 300 feet above the ground, no prusik, no knot in the rope ends, only to realise that though I was level with the ledge I was in space 6 feet out from the rock, spinning. My grip on that 4 feet of rope became vice like as I began to initialise the swing needed to get a toe on the ledge. It seemed to take HOURS until I managed to get close to the rock and facing the right way, and even then realised my toe couldn't reach so had to swing out again over that sucking void and let a foot of the four feet of rope end out and do it all again. I'll swear as I got onto that ledge and clipped the belay I was sobbing with relief. I vowed then: (1) never to use an ATC again (and swapped it for a Simond Cube the moment I got to a shop). (2) always attach a prusik.

Thanks for the memory Rog - my palms are sweating at the recollection!

In reply to Rog Wilko:

Stupidest: reached top of route, walked round large pinnacle and instead of clipping the rope to the belay krab to make a loop put it straight into sticht plate, took in the foot or so of slack and started belaying second up. Result, the belay loop got larger as he climbed! Realised after a few feet though and was able to change it while the second was in a safe place. Duh.
Most embarrassing: put in runner just below ovehang, found move hard, reached down and put in another just above it but clipped it to the rope below the other one. Result, ground to a halt impaled on the overhang as the two runners knotted. My second had to reach up and unclip one - luckily he's very tall and could do it while still attached to the belay.

In reply to Rog Wilko:

Back in the days of waist belays I took a novice friend out climbing on White Ghyl in the Lakes. I was on the stance taking in but I had a little slack in the system back to the anchors. My friend fell without any warning or calls for tight and the shock load pulled me down a foot or so which caused me to end up head first pointing down the cliff. After a few seconds, which felt like minutes, the rope began to roll down my back as I frantically begged him to get his feet on the rock. This he did just in time and totally unaware of the danger he was in. I ended up holding him with, to all intents and purposes, just the rope twisted around my forearm which by now was dripping with blood.

Al

In reply to Rog Wilko:
doing a warm up v.diff chimney at stanage (no idea why), I set off, all fairly comfortable so about half way up i hadn't bothered putting in gear. Whatever move i was doing I was quite scrunched up for a moment, then went to move up to the ledge, 1 leg moved...the other didn't, tried again.. same thing. Had no idea what was going on with my other leg so had a lot of "f*ck, f*ck, f*ck" being frantically muttered. Sort of gradually bumped and rocked myself up and over sideways onto the ledge and lay on my side for a few seconds, leg still wouldn't move. Had a look and feel round.... my nut key had snagged on the pull loop of my climbing shoes! Since then i've always been very careful about how far my nut key hangs down

In reply to Niall_li:

A few years ago, I had a new rucksack. We were doing Comb Gully in wild weather, snow everywhere. I placed my axes, worked my feet up a bit and tried to stand up straight. Whatever I did, I couldn't get my arms to lock off - the strain was immense, and I sagged back down to a straight armed hang, before trying again to stand up so that I could take an axe out and move up. My struggles became more frantic and my sags back down seemed to be assisted by more than gravity...........



The new rucksack had elastic on the back to carry crampons, and this had snagged on a downward pointing spike on the gully wall behind me...

In reply to Martin Bennett:

That must have been heart-stopping.

Your abseil saga reminds me of when we were cragging at Ailfroide 20 or more years back. We did the long easy pitch up the left side of the big triangular crag overlooking the campsite. We had two 45m ropes in those days and the guidebook said that was enough to descend the abseil piste down the steep wall at the centre of the crag. One of the stages of the ab finished in the middle of nowhere, vertical unclimbable rock, nothing to stand on. Just an ab chain in the middle of the face. I just managed to reach the chain on the rope stretch. Debbie was just containing her hysterics as we struggled not to let go of one of the rope ends. The consequences of possible failure gave me nightmares for some time.

What I learnt from this was (1) always take guidebook assurances with a hefty dose of scepticism and (2) if you can't foresee any problems you ain't looking hard enough.

In reply to Rog Wilko:

Another quality bit of muppetry was once climbing up to an overhang, popping in a bit of gear, clipping the rope and then proceeding hopefully upwards. However very soon after found myself unable to move but unsure as to why. turned out as I climbed up past the gear I had somehow pushed against the krab on the runner which clipped into a gear loop on my harness. Still have no idea how I managed to do that one!

In reply to WildCamper:




Me too. Fancy a day out if the temperature ever gets into double figures Rog?

In reply to Martin Bennett:


That would be good. But I don't expect to be available till middle of May.

In reply to Pbob:


Tie said rope off to bolt and pull single rope out of lower runners then ab as single. but you will have to re-climb again with doubles, or walk around to retrieve you rope.

In reply to Rog Wilko:
Hmm. Generally pretty careful these days - rope-access does that to you. Late 80s though... many shoddy belays. One memorable occasion was doing the Spider at Chudleigh, and belaying off a couple of gorse bushes a fair way back from me, with lots of slapdash slack in the 'system'. In all the confidence and immortal judgement of youth I assumed my second wouldn't fall off. He did. I think it was approximately a thirty foot pendulum. I ended up in a different dimension, a couple of feet over the edge, but still in a seated position. Lowered him to the nearest ledge, where with the adrenaline and all, he promptly untied and soloed the eighty feet to the ground. Still, only one of the gorses pulled.

In reply to Rog Wilko:

Good thread. Rather relieved to see I'm not the only one who has belayed a partner off a gear loop! I tried to blame the cramped stance (Fat Freddie's Cat on Lundy) but of course it was definitely down to inattentiveness.

Martin

In reply to Martin Hore:

It's all coming out!
Seriously, though, when these things happen, we must, as you are doing and as I did, ultimately accept our culpability even while looking for (and finding) extenuating circumstances. We may be thankful we "got away with it", but if we are sensible we will spend some time imagining what could have happened and how we would have felt about killing or seriously injuring someone else. I think only good will come from such a process, unless it causes us to decide to withdraw from the field and give up climbing altogether. I find it's very much the same with driving a car.

In reply to Rog Wilko:

some of mine:

abseiled beyond the end of the ropes on ciseaux pillar becaus i forgot we did a bit of simulclimbing on the way up. happily only fell for one meter into a niche - the rest of the face would have been a 300m direct descent onto the glacier.

abseiled on barmstein with a figure eight which pressed the biner open. only saw it when only the nose was keeping the figure eight. no prusik, so 60m of fall potential.

probably quite a few that i did not even notice.

In reply to Rog Wilko:

Possibly because I enjoy soloing, highballing and scrambling so much, I've made a number of bad decisions about when to rope up...

Me and a mate on our first winter route together, No. 2 Gully on the Ben. Get to start of route, harnesses on, rope still in mate's bag. Look up: it's barely any steeper than the approach, let's just solo it! All goes smoothly until about 10m from top, where we come face to face with a slobbering mass of ice and snow rearing above us and muttering threateningly. Discussion ensues. This must be what mountaineers refer to as a "cornice." Hmm, probably time to extract rope and tie on. Unhelpfully, ground suddenly seems far too steep to attempt such a manoeuvre. Bugger. Finally, I decide to climb out, with our longest sling lark's footed round a fragile icicle, stuck like a tooth in a leer in the middle of its face. Sling is just long enough to enable me to half flop on to top, but pulls me back when I attempt to complete my escape. Hurriedly unclip and make a final inelegant roll to safety. To complete the humiliation, I then have to sheepishly ask the nearest pair of proper winter climbers if I can borrow their rope to throw down and bring my mate up. I'd like to say lesson learned, but...

A few years later with a different victim, at the foot of Idwal Stream, with North Wales enjoying a rare deep freeze. Naturally, it's busy. Two or three other teams are queuing ahead of us, waiting to start the first of the steeper sections. Since this is my young mate's first proper winter climb, I'm intending to pitch this and uncoil the rope. However, it takes about two minutes for me to get bored. My mate's an excellent rock climber, this is very steady ground, what can go wrong - let's just solo it! A little apprehensively, mate agrees. The other teams - perhaps mistakenly thinking that because I'm old I know what I'm doing - generously let us step in. At about half way I decide to style things up a bit with a nifty foot swap. Unfortunately, a tooth in my right crampon gets stuck in my left, leaving me hanging footless from my axes, flailing wildly as I extricate myself. But we make it safely to the top and sit back to enjoy our situation, looking back down the pitch. On the ledge at its foot, something familiar catches my eye. Ah, that would be our rope, which I forgot to pick up and repack. Nothing for it but to ask a team just about to start if they'd mind carrying it up. Luckily, I have plenty of experience of sheepishness on which to draw in such situations!

In reply to Rog Wilko:
Great thread Rog. I'm sure someone out there is a complete arse in their opinion about climbing with you. It's ironic as some of my biggest mistakes have been believing people I'd just met in my old student club, who plain lied about their many inabilities (subsequently they ended up risking their own lives and others).

I've personally forgotten to tighten the odd belay screwgate when distracted or tired. Terrified myself first time rapping into Gogarth on a 8.5mm rope with a belay device that was too slick and no prussic backup. Climbed too many routes in bad nick. Climbed loose routes I really knew were stupid to climb. Inadvertantly onsighted a bold E2 solo as I found I couldn't reverse safely when checking the start out and another one as when I got to the top of a boulder problem start I was too scared to jump off.

Th "Staying Alive" article by John Dill, on Yosemite accidents shows that too many good climbers make silly serious mistakes (and gives lessons we can all learn). Sadly the old yosar link redirects to the home page but a search gives a supertopo based pdf.

In reply to Offwidth:



I've never really suffered much with this, but I have always tended to be sceptical about people I don't know. I like to think I have a sensitive bullsh!t sensor. I have discovered, as it seems have you, that a lot of blokes (and it always is blokes) have a horror of being the novice with very little experience and will describe themselves in a way which disguises their status. These are people you don't want to find yourself with on a mountain multi-pitch or ice-climb on your first outing together, which I can only remember happening to me once.


But somehow you're still here. Well done.