I've had my share of unplanned "events." In no particular order, a sampling: frostbite, snowblindness, setting off an avalanche, two severed bicep tendons, several climbing falls, etc. etc. Don't get the idea I'm a backcountry train wreck, those are all spaced out over a couple of decades.
But the most recent, and frankly disturbing, close call happened just a few years ago. I like doing remote 5th class stuff. I'd spent about a year visiting one huge formation near Utah, getting up it might have been a first known ascent(?). Here's the public trip report posted by a later climber:
https://www.listsofjohn.com/tr?Id=4723&pkid=6168
Anyway, I finally figured out 2 possible routes up, both with significant hazards. One weekend I found a willing partner and picked what I thought to be the most promising line, off we went. The crux proved to be an awkward high step, but after that it went easily enough. We topped out and began the descent. Our ascent route had been up a v-slot, a natural funnel for rocks dislodged by a rap line. I wasn't keen to rap down that, so we opted for a solid tree as an anchor. The problem was the rap route was now going over a huge overhang and really significant air. Basically coming over the top of a natural sandstone amphitheater. Seemed like a gazillion feet off the deck, but our twin 60m ropes hit the ground with a few feet to spare. But that ground? Yikes, lots of sharply toothed rocks, angling up to the sky. Incisors, not molars.
My partner likes a fireman's belay from the bottom, so I went first. Down to the edge, then that inelegant move to pass over the lip. A few ways to do it, I usually lower below the lip with feet still on it, then use a hand to brace against hitting the lip when I move my feel lower, fully airborne. Regardless of technique, there comes a point when I have one hand on the brake, the other is busy preventing me from whacking the lip with my head. It was about there when, and I cannot fathom how it happened...I lost control of the brake line. It was hot that day, I had a pack on, maybe slightly sweaty hands? But yes, an absolute error. Before the armchair chorus scolds me about this or that, consider: I've been climbing for a while, have probably done over...a thousand (??) raps, and I'd rigged an autoblock prussik, something I always do when I'm doing a what I call a "blind" rappel. Nonetheless, I was now falling unchecked. But as the skinny cord (I favor 7.7mm twins for adventure climbing, low impact force on the anchors) whipped through my hands, it began to saw through the flesh of my palm, badly. Yes, yes, the autoblock...In the second or two of near freefalling my mind was so intensely focused on regaining control of the brake line that my other hand on the autoblock kept gripping it, preventing it from screeching me to a halt. Down I went, in a blur, the incisors waiting for their meal. I braced for impact.
To this day I have no idea what synapse fired in my brain, but it did, and I let go of the autoblock just in time to have it stop me 20' above the rocks. I was safe, or so I thought. I needed to disengage the autoblock to get to the ground, but the horrific speed of the fall had literally melted the sheath of it onto the sheath of the main rap lines. Now stuck solid. So there I was, 20' off the deck, gently swinging in the wind, out of my partner's earshot far above, glued in place. After I'd calmed a bit I rigged another prussik with a sling, retrieved my climbing knife and
carefully sawed away the melted autoblock, hoping the main lines weren't compromised. They weren't, I dropped onto the new knot. I gingerly lowered myself to the ground with my now raw brake hand, in between two of the nastier rocks. Safe.
I've since considered the irony: I had been planning to use rap gloves, but decided for whatever reason to leave them behind that day. And I had a new locking rap device that I was intrigued to test. I'd also left that behind (fwiw, an Edelrid MicroJul). I now religiously use both.
Lessons, IMO: No matter your experience, if you play with snakes you'll very occasionally still get bitten. A safety system works only so long as your mind remembers to use it. And my own saying for the experienced: Complacency is the big killer. Always try to pretend this is your first day out. Sorry for droning on, stay safe out there.
-Tom
