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maculated
Trad climber
Danville, CA
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Aug 20, 2003 - 07:56pm PT
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My bad
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Pastrami
Trad climber
Somewhere on this Planet
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Aug 20, 2003 - 08:14pm PT
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It seems to me that the rate of accidents is higher in Canada: considering that Canada's population is ~32 mil, versus ~285 mil in USA, I would say that these charts show that there are more accidents per capita in Canada. But the benchmark would be accidents per total number of climbers. I suspect that would show that Canadian rate is even higher (more climbers in the USA)...
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Demented
climber
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Aug 20, 2003 - 11:02pm PT
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How about you older-but-still honed climbers?
Solo like you used to? Me no. I climb lots, but like it safer these days.
Werner? Solo as much, but just on somewhat easier terrain? Or..
And Sketchy? You used to hein the Reggae Route on Fairview lots. That still part of the circuit?
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Ammon McNeely
Big Wall climber
Bay Area
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Aug 21, 2003 - 06:33am PT
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looking sketchy there... wrote:
"I've always thought that (in general) an "onsight" is not having been on the route before, no beta, no pre-inspection, but certainly knowing the name, grade and location of the route and relying on what you can suss out from the ground."
I agree with this statement.
Werner: Thanks for the story. I've always liked to read your input. Maybe you SHOULD write a book about this subject (and more). I know I would buy it.
I also agree with DMT about onsight free-soloing being, not exactly the smartest endeavor.... though I wouldn't exactly call it a fool's game.
I was climbing with my brother and a few friends at Tahquitz a few years ago. They were putting up ropes on Fred and Human Fright and I was kinda bouldering/soloing around. I got pretty high off the ground and saw this corner. I kinda thought it was the Trough but it looked a little harder than 5.0. So, I climbed this corner and summited after four or five pitches. Too fun, I thought.
I ran down back to the base and talked my brother and a friend into taking a stroll up the corner, I had climbed.
"Come on it's easy", I said.
"Well... what is it", they asked?
We looked it up in the guide book and it ended up being Angel's Fright, 5.5.
"NIIIICE!!!"
We all headed up, laughing and passing each other as we climbed. Near the top of the route it started to rain. The clouds came from out of nowhere. We scrambled like madmen and at the last second decided to try a different topout (because the book rated it easier), than the one I had just done.
We all went left instead of going out right (a 5.6 variation). The last part was a slab rated 5.4 that felt like 5.10, in the downpour. My buddy got stuck on a manzanita tree and held on for dear life while hurricane winds whipped over the top of us.
My brother and I hunkered down underneath an overhanging boulder for about twenty minutes. We were scared for our friends life, not knowing if he went for it... or is still hanging on to the tree.
It finally settled down and we jumped to action. We heard some voices on top and we ran to the summit to see if they were climbers and had a rope we could borrow. They graciously lent us the rope and we got our buddy to the top a half an hour later.
Not exactly the smartest thing I've ever done......... but one hell of an adventure.
Cheers, Ammon
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Demented
climber
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Aug 21, 2003 - 07:37am PT
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Ammon,
I think the guidebook used to say that slab move was considered 5.6 or 5.7. Low angle but slick. Always felt interesting to solo past it's lone bolt on this blankness 400' off the deck... also always figured in the far back of my mind if ya pitch you could grab that tree as you whipped past?
check this link for a kewl photo of the slab Ammon is talkin' about
http://www.socalhotclimbs.com/hyper/htahquitz/tp1/Dscf0008.html
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looking sketchy there...
Social climber
Latitute 33
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Aug 21, 2003 - 11:33am PT
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Demented: "And Sketchy? You used to hein the Reggae Route on Fairview lots. That still part of the circuit?"
Like Mr. Milktoast, I have 2 kids, have aged and do not solo (well, at least not very much, and usually only something I have wired). Actually the Regular Route was an onsight that I did in tandem with another climber (maybe it doesn't count?).
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WBraun
climber
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Aug 21, 2003 - 11:53am PT
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Ammon
No, I don't solo as much as I used to, because I most always have a partner now "Merry". Also all those years I did, there where many times I wondered if I was going to be alive at the end of the day. It's very serious stuff, Derk example on the Steck, and requires your climbing skills always at their topmost. Ammon as for writing a book, I flunked english in school and I type at snail pace with two fingers hunting for the letters on the keyboard. Dingus Milktoast, you can mistype my name or anything anytime I'm not fazed....life is too short for petty things. One other note Kauk on-sight free soloed the North Buttress of Middle Cath. rock and Yabo later too...
Love you all...Werner
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Southern Man
climber
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Aug 21, 2003 - 03:19pm PT
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My purely unscientific survey of climbing accidents that I have either witnessed or gave aid to after the fact (N=5 and admittaly a small number), indicates that soloing accounts for 1 (male), rapelling accident 2 (one female and one male), pulled pro. and cratered 2 (no helmet in both cases, one female and one male). In the soloing accident the soloist was wearing a helmet. Oddly enough the solo accident occurred this past June at the Church Bowl. My son's and I had shared a belay ledge with the guy earlier in the day and he was cautious and conscientious (double checking his knots, backing up his rappel device, etc.) But after his friend left in the late afternoon he decided to solo church bowl lieback and fell from about 50 feet up, landing on the ledge near the base and twisting/compound fracturing his right foot.
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Matt
Trad climber
SF Bay Area
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Aug 21, 2003 - 04:48pm PT
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He probably should have been wearing the helmet on his foot- woulda both protected his poor foot from that fracture and maybe caused him to peel a bit lower down, being that helmet friction is nothing to write home about...
Speaking of soloing and rappelling accidents and Church Bowl:
I was trying to get familiar w/ a silent partner, thinking i could use it on the sketchy parts of longer climbs that I was not quite willing to climb alone, and i took it out on Pole Position to check it out- the thing kept allowing the rope to run through to a back-up knot before catching me, because I was not accelerating fast enough (on staged slab falls where the rope was clipped over my head to begin with) and I couldn't figure out what the problem was- if I had done something wrong or whatever.
At one point, another party was rapping from above, and this one curious guy started talking to me about what my silly slabby solo falling activities were all about. At that point I was kind of in the tree at the botton of the route which I had used as my anchor, with my feet against the wall, and this guy slows down and slides over to chat w/ me about the device, etc. Well, the next thing you know, the guy rapped right off the end of his rope, at super slow motion speed- because he was talking to me, sitting there in this tree... He had actually stopped and weighted his feet some, so when he lost the rope he just reached out ane we kind of grabbed eachother and had one of those "oh shit" moments, then he just smiled and said, "that woulda sucked..."
btw- I have a barely ever used silent partner that some aspiring solo aid climber could pick up real cheap...
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Karl Baba
Trad climber
Yosemite, Ca
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Aug 21, 2003 - 09:24pm PT
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I used to solo a lot when I had a management job in Yosemite and it was hard to find partners on short notice or for limited parts of the day. Now I have lots of partners so I'm not as hard up to get climbing at any cost.
Still, when my girlfriend and I go to Josh, I still like to make a round of my favorite climbs solo while she stretches. Every once in awhile I up the ante and solo some new ones when I fiigure I know a climb well enough to add it to the list.
In the soloing I've done, it's onsight soloing that has resulted in the most near-death experiences.
Werner's Vendetta onsight reminded me of my own epic on the Direct on Washington Column. Here's the short version..
Peace
karl
++++++++++++++++++
I was in girlfriend angst mode and decided to onsight free-solo the
Direct route on Washington Column. Over a dozen pitches of cracks and
chimneys, the direct route (in the goldline rope days) used to be one of
the most popular routes in the Valley. I figured, "How bad could it be.?"
Anyway it was smooth sailing for a while, although the rock kept
deteriorating in quality and route-finding was a stress. There is no topo
published for the route, and there were a million cracks up there with pin
scars or slings to distract one from the true path. That's what happened.
I found myself climbing a couple of dicey 5.8 pitches on ball-bearing
rotten granite only to find myself 75 feet to the left of the key chimney
with no further progress possible. I could downclimb the pitches that had
already strained my bowel control or find an alternative. I saw that I
was about 35 feet above a small sandy ledge that led over to the chimney.
The wall below was steep and blank except for a half-inch foot hold with a
very small flake above it extending for a foot or two.
I had a little gear, a couple of runners, and a 2 inch swami just
incase I needed to hang or cheat, so I took off the swami and tied it to
the runners and attached it all to an RP Brass nut that was none too big.
I prayed, repented, and did feverish incantations; then I placed the Rp in
a crack and hand-over-handed down the webbing to its end, which was still
22 feet over the ledge.
I stood on the foothold and started whipping the
webbing wildly back and forth, up and down until miraculously the RP came
out the crack and I had the webbing back! I put the RP in the small flake
in front of me and lowered myself to the end of the webbing again. My feet
were still 10 feet above the target ledge! I was hanging at the end of
some 2 inch webbing dangling from an RP on a blank wall so my options were limited.
I took aim and reminded myself not to fall off the ledge 750
feet off the deck and went flying. I made it with ankles intact! The
Crux chimney pitch after that seemed so clean and secure, I felt like I
was finally getting a break!
I soloed the route again after enough years had passed to make me
forget that I was never going back. It was better that time, but only
because it was so scary the first time.
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Matt
Trad climber
SF Bay Area
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Aug 26, 2003 - 02:39pm PT
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"after enough years had passed to make me
forget that I was never going back"
=)
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Ben Rumsen
Mountain climber
Sacramento, CA
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Aug 26, 2003 - 04:24pm PT
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" Oddly enough the solo accident occurred this past June at the Church Bowl. My son's and I had shared a belay ledge with the guy earlier in the day and he was cautious and conscientious (double checking his knots, backing up his rappel device, etc.) But after his friend left in the late afternoon he decided to solo church bowl lieback and fell from about 50 feet up, landing on the ledge near the base and twisting/compound fracturing his right foot. " -
That was a friend of mine named John. His leg got broken pretty bad. I lost my taste for soloing after watching someone fall 200' off Lost Horse Wall and slam into a Yucca plant, although I do solo class 4+ mountaineering type stuff on occasion ( like last week ).
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James
Gym climber
City by the Bay
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Aug 28, 2003 - 05:03pm PT
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-melissa
who cares how far Dean potter can piss? I wanna be able to beat Shaggy!
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crotch
climber
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Aug 28, 2003 - 06:40pm PT
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About the final slab on the Northwest side of Tahquitz, Demented wrote"
"I think the guidebook used to say that slab move was considered 5.6 or 5.7. Low angle but slick. Always felt interesting to solo past it's lone bolt on this blankness 400' off the deck... also always figured in the far back of my mind if ya pitch you could grab that tree as you whipped past? "
Lots of climbs converge at that point. Does anyone know the history of when that bolt was placed, and by whom???
Thanks,
Crotch
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Jason Seaver
Trad climber
Estes Park, CO
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Aug 29, 2003 - 12:15am PT
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With so much volatile sh#t being said, why doesn't anyone post their real name? Forgive my newness to the game, but it seems like "Valentine's Day in 3rd grade" to write passionate comments with an alias as a signature. I understand that many of you are being sarcastic, occupying your abundant freetime with cyber-sh#t-talking, but some of you are serious. Including your actual name would seem like a simple way to remove yourself from the larger percentage of spray-artists.....
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David
Trad climber
San Rafael, CA
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Aug 29, 2003 - 12:00pm PT
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fyi. Most(not all) of the people who spoke up on this thread used their real names and real email addresses. Just click on a name to see.
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Jason Seaver
Trad climber
Estes Park, CO
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Aug 29, 2003 - 07:06pm PT
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Not only are you missing the point but you are also wrong. I had in fact figured out that you can click on the person's "name" and be given their "personal information". Most of them (in the literal sense) do not provide their real names. And a real e-mail address is hardly an indication of who they are. The point is that if you're going to step up and spit venom you oughta have the sac to not wear a mask.
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David
Trad climber
San Rafael, CA
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Aug 29, 2003 - 07:14pm PT
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"venom"?
Guess you're new to this forum. This is a very civil discussion by ST standards.
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yo
Sport climber
Fresno, CA
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Aug 29, 2003 - 07:38pm PT
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F*#kin right it's civil. Wait til Donnie and Satan show up.
A real name or a fake name or a fake real name is all the same to me--just a name on a screen. Spouting off online under whatever name takes no courage. Unless you post your SSN, too! Now that takes serious balls!
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Satan
Social climber
South Central LA ( HELL )
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Aug 29, 2003 - 07:44pm PT
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Yo, you rang? Where's that little homo Donnie? I'll drive a 2" bong up his ass and leave him clipped to a bolt some where from his A1 " buttplug "!
How was that?
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