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Dr. Rock
Ice climber
Castle Rock
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Wow, we humans are tougher than we think.
Speedy recovery will be yours since your in shape.
No capping til the last person gets out of the hospital, thats the rule, right?
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dee ee
Mountain climber
citizen of planet Earth
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Best and speedy recovery to Trevor and Claire, that was a horrendous accident. We are so relieved to hear that a full recovery is expected. The hail and rain storm must have been incredible as well. The entire area showed signs of massive runoff with piles of hail still in place around the base on Sunday afternoon.
Evans family.
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Rhodo-Router
Gym climber
Otto, NC
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What a nightmare. It's a good thing Tevor has, as you said, 'a strong lead head"...sounds like he used it to break his fall!
Best of luck in your recovery,
Rob
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Jaybro
Social climber
wuz real!
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Yikes, scary story. Glad they seem to be on the way back to normal. Thanks to those who helped them out, any one of us might need your help down the road.
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Lost Arrow
Trad climber
The North Ridge of the San Fernando
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From what I recall the belay has bomber pro and the pitch above is rather tricky from a protection standpoint.
Juan
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Again, hopes for a speedy recovery to Trevor and Claire,
and for the wonderful news of the prognosis.
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graham
Social climber
Ventura, California
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Holly Shit!
And then to be battered by Hail…
Glad all survived, I wish you all a speedy recovery.
Mike
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Anastasia
climber
Not there
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I am glad they survived and wish them a quick recovery. Holy sheemister, makes me rethink about the half ass belay anchors I have set up over the years.
AF
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goodwill
Trad climber
Los Angeles, CA
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Wow! I'm glad to hear they're both still alive! Best wishes for a speedy recovery to both of them.
I don't want to hijack this thread, but the silver lining in any accident is the opportunity for all of us to learn from it. I agree with the points that Clint mentioned, but I have a few more to add.
1) To me, the biggest lesson here is what John Long calls the "Jesus nut": the most important piece of pro the leader places on any pitch after pitch 1 is the first piece. The last line of defense against the whole team falling to their deaths (which almost happened here) is the anchor, and that defense will only really be tested in the case of a factor 2 fall. The last line of defense against a factor 2 fall is the first piece of pro the leader places. Place it early, and make it bomber. In this case, that piece failed. If it hadn't, the whole accident would probably have been avoided. It sounds like he may not have had many options, but I think it's a good lesson nonetheless.
2) The other obvious lesson here is simply, "Build bomber anchors." The anchor in this case, having only two pieces, sounds less than optimal, but perhaps they thought it was "good enough". Most of us have probably never had an anchor actually tested by a factor 2 fall, so we don't really know if our "good enough" anchors are good enough or not. Don't assume. Build 'em safe. Furthermore, if you can see (or have heard or read) that the next pitch might be hard to protect, then based on point #1 above, that's all the more reason to build your belay anchor extra bomber. In this case, they did the opposite.
3) Finally, after thinking in detail about the scenario Llama described, it seems to me the only way this could have happened is if Claire were belaying Trevor "redirected"*. Llama, can you verify this with Claire?
If so, perhaps this is further evidence that using a redirected belay to belay a leader is a Bad Idea. I'm often surprised by how many people seem to advocate belaying this way, or simply do so because they haven't thought about it. As far as I know, many (most? all?) of the real experts strongly advise against it, because it significantly increases (roughly doubles) the forces on the anchor in exactly this scenario.
Will
* redirected - belay device attached to belayer's harness, but rope goes from there through anchor, then on to climber, as opposed to "indirect" (same, except rope does not go through anchor) or "direct" (belay device is attached directly to anchor instead of to belayer; not usually used to belay a leader)
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JuanGrande
Trad climber
Oceanside
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wow, lucky climbers!!! I wonder if the lost art of nut placement played a role in this epic. Cams are not the end-all some climbers treat them as. Back in the day we carried plenty of nuts and a few "Friends", nuts were relatively cheap and light, "Friends" were a luxury. You can often set a nut firmly, cams are more likely to twist.
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graham
Social climber
Ventura, California
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The “Jesus Nut”, that’s good for this. FYI That’s what they call the Nut that holds on a helicopter’s rotor blades. Little highjack…
Don’t agree with the redirected belay being a bad idea. But you do need more than one good anchor.
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Double D
climber
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My prayers go out to both of them for a full and speedy recovery. They are blessed to be alive and as well as they are, no doubt.
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shutupandclimb
climber
Palm Desert Ca.
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Good Luck and best wishes to Claire and Trevor. I would like to know more about this Redirected issue.
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Ola Girl
Trad climber
Thousand Oaks, CA
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I wish Trevor and Claire a speedy and full recovery!
I wanted to share an anchor rating system someone taught me in an anchor building class. This system should be used to evaluate every anchor you build:
Every anchor should have a score of at least 10. You assign a score (up to 5) to each piece based on how bomber you think it is (or not). The only things that can ever be a 5 are slinging a big giant boulder or a big giant tree. Bolts can never be a 5 because, unless you drilled it in the rock yourself, you never know how bomber it is. Bottom line - you'll almost always need 3 pieces.
I thought it was kind of a neat way to look at it...no one had ever explained it to me like this before.
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Ksolem
Trad climber
Monrovia, Ca
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That anchor rating system sounds ok, but if I put two slings around the same giant sequoia can I call it a ten?
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Ghost
climber
A long way from where I started
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First, best wishes for Trevor and Claire.
The only things that can ever be a 5 are slinging a big giant boulder or a big giant tree.
Three weeks ago I saw a giant boulder slide off a ledge when one of us bumped a small dead tree that was lying across it. The boulder was exactly the kind you're talking about -- in fact if it had been any bigger it would have been too big to get slings around.
Which is not to say that a slung boulder can't make a fine anchor, just that any system that assigns absolute values to belay anchors is itself suspect.
D
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crøtch
climber
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Both climbers are lucky to be alive. Best wishes for a speedy and complete recovery.
WRT anchor failure, I would suspect that there wasn't a true F2 fall involved. If so, the belayer wouldn't have stayed on the ledge. I've got to think that it was the impact of the climber hitting the belayer, transmitted to the anchor through the tie-in that caused the complete anchor failure.
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GDavis
Trad climber
SoCal
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Wow, luck sure shined, in a weird sort of way. Glad to see they both are alive and ticking, if not a little beat up because of it!
Trevor from Nomad actually is up in the meadows now in the store. Just got back from doing some jibbity up there with the homey.
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NDS
climber
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I am so glad to hear that Trevor is going to be ok - I saw the fall and am honestly pretty surprised. I was up there with my husband and a couple friends who helped out in getting them down and then went back up for Claire. We haven't been able to stop thinking about it, analyzing it and wondering if he made it since it happened, so thank you so much for the update.
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