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Norwegian
Trad climber
dancin on the tip of god's middle finger
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Sep 23, 2014 - 04:25pm PT
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5 or six pieces pulled on me when i
fell rope soloing the old A5 pitch
on glacier point.
a cam hook caught me
after 50 exciting feet
and i touched down to earth
with all the rope stretch
and self-belay bullsh#t.
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tradmanclimbs
Ice climber
Pomfert VT
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Sep 23, 2014 - 04:29pm PT
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3. upside down screamer. prettly long 30ft?
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MH2
climber
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Sep 23, 2014 - 04:35pm PT
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What a coincidence. It is raining and gloomy where I am, too.
I haven't had a piece rip that I remember, probably because there were no serious consequences. I have had a couple flakes break when the piece behind them was loaded, but again no consequences.
I remember a story Mike Warburton told me about a climb in Yosemite where the leader was slinging manzanita, fell, and now you need to visualize a leader sailing down past his belayer with a string of 8 manzanita bushes outlined against the sky on his rope.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Sep 23, 2014 - 05:08pm PT
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MH2, didn't Gordie Smaill rip off about a 150 footer on El Cap? Or was it
on The Chief? Or was it Givler? Lord, save me. Yeah, I've said that, too.
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wbw
Trad climber
'cross the great divide
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Sep 23, 2014 - 07:21pm PT
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Not me, but last fall my partner's tools shear out of the sand and crap on the very last move of a multi pitch mixed route on Quandary Peak. He pulls a nut, then a pin, then a screw and 65 or so feet later is stopped by a stubby. I've probably ripped that many pieces out on an aid fall or two, but I have never in my life witnessed a fall like that where in a a split second my mind simply accepted that this person was going to be severely maimed. Ironically he walked away from it.
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climbski2
Mountain climber
Anchorage AK, Reno NV
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Sep 23, 2014 - 11:32pm PT
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4 pieces about 2/3 of the way up the groove pitch. Stopped at a fixed KB. Great spot for a zipper.. nothing to hit. Very annoying though having to relead that after once putting the best pieces I thought I could find in. It's funny though how much better your placements get after a 25 to 30ish footer.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Sep 24, 2014 - 06:17am PT
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I've tried but I just can't get those bolts to pull out.
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MH2
climber
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Sep 24, 2014 - 07:10am PT
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I think that Gordie Smaill did take a fall near the top of the Nose, but not a long one. He also fell and hit a tree on The Flake (just right of Apron Strings) and broke his leg if I recall. He may have taken a fall or two on Grim Reaper, or not. Something for me to ask Neil Bennett about.
The longest fall in my circle was one on Braille Book where the leader went from 80 feet above to about 100 feet below, according to belayer Bob Johnson, when a rattly nut did not hold. The leader only suffered scalp lacerations while Bob took a while to recover from a knee cap busted when he was pulled against the corner catching the fall.
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Sierra Ledge Rat
Mountain climber
Old and Broken Down in Appalachia
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Sep 24, 2014 - 07:49am PT
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This is rather embarassing...
This story happened on my first ever "real" alpine lead back in the 1970s. I was 16 years old. Huntington Ravine, Mt. Washington.
I led a zig-zagging pitch. The crack ended, I placed a bomber #3 wired stopped and started aid climbing. I did a blind hook move around a corner and - PING! - the hook blew.
Every single piece ripped out during my fall - except the #3 wired stopper.
I stopped only a couple feet off the ground, upside down. I must have falled 50 feet. I am very lucky to have survived my early climbing days.
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Hendo1
Trad climber
Toronto
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Sep 24, 2014 - 08:12am PT
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Two occasions, a single piece each time. The last was in autumn 1997 -- it resulted in a 40-foot fall with the soles of my feet ending up level with the belayer's eyes.
I'm very conservative about placements now. If I don't have confidence in it, I consider downclimbing or bailing. I simply won't continue on bad gear.
I've seen YouTube videos in which guys take whippers with several pieces blowing and they're laughing about it later. I can only scratch my head.
Three years ago a guy I used to climb with here in the Toronto area had a short but devastating fall at Red Rocks and he's now paraplegic. A few pieces of gear would have prevented it.
http://www.mountainproject.com/v/serious-leader-fall-on-dark-shadows-red-rock-canyon-nv/107070646
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mucci
Trad climber
The pitch of Bagalaar above you
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Sep 24, 2014 - 08:12am PT
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Troy Johnson, ripped the whole groove pitch.
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mike m
Trad climber
black hills
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Sep 24, 2014 - 08:37am PT
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On my first time leading El Matador, the classic stem box at Devils Tower, I was climbing in the corner and had not yet stemmed across. I was getting terribly pumped at about 60ft up and was working on putting in a cam. It would not go in right as the crack at the beginning has several spots where it narrows on the edge of the crack and opens up inside. I knew the cam I just place was crap but I couldn't get it out easily so I decided to keep soing to a spot higher up where I could see I could get a better piece in. Well needless to say I popped off a few feet above the bad piece, with a good piece maybe 5 feet below that. The piece pulled and I flew backwards and hit my back on the other side of the box before I landed. It is always amazing how far you fall when all is said and done. I was about 25 feet lower with the "bad" camhanging on the rope at my waist.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Sep 24, 2014 - 08:45am PT
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Why are people posting about their big one or two piece 'rips'?
STFU! WE WANT ZIPPERS YOU WANKEERS!!!!!!
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Patrick
Trad climber
Reno, NV
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Sep 24, 2014 - 03:05pm PT
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In the summer of 1991 I moved to Boulder Colorado. I had climbed up to mid .10 at Seneca and at my home crag the Bellefonte Quarry and a few grades below that at the Gunks between '89 and then. However, I had no experience on Granite.
My second day climbing in Boulder, I got to the top of the Northwest face on Elephant Buttress and set up the belay only to watch every single piece of protection I had placed (all nuts and hexes) zipper out of the route when I pulled the rope somewhat taught against my second who was putting on his shoes. My girlfriend who moved there with me, was watching this and forbade me to climb anymore. We broke up that evening. The guy I was climbing with, whom I met that morning at the Boulder Mountaineer never returned another of my calls. I didn't lead another climb on granite for over a year as I was convinced that was why it had happened and moved to Eldorado Springs.
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Evel
Trad climber
Nedsterdam CO
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Sep 24, 2014 - 03:31pm PT
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my home crag the Bellefonte Quarry
Patrick, who are you? I'm Rick Mix
Oh, I've zippered most of a pitch while aiding.
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Wayno
Big Wall climber
Seattle, WA
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Sep 24, 2014 - 03:34pm PT
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Somewhere below the headwall pitch on the Trip, 1982 or so, about half-way up the pitch, I took a fall and pulled a couple pieces. Fifteen feet or so. I went back up and got about ten feet further and fell again, ripped the same pieces and a few more. I'm ok, but pissed. That was about a thirty-footer. I went back up again and reached my high point. I struggled with a few more placements and finally made it to easier ground. I clipped a broken-off fixed bong in exhaustion and without really testing it very well, I hung to catch my breath. I was looking at the piece as it popped and I sailed backward into space for quite a bit before I ended up dangling in space about ten feet out from the belayer and the third. They looked more spooked than I felt. There was blood and some missing skin but nothing serious. I reassured them that it wasn't really that bad, I was just probably flailing. Had to be about a fifty-footer, but I didn't really count how many pieces ripped.
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snowhazed
Trad climber
Oaksterdam, CA
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Sep 24, 2014 - 06:20pm PT
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Never more than one, and all of those were nuts...
i like cams
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RyanD
climber
Squamish
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Topic Author's Reply - Sep 25, 2014 - 12:59am PT
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Holy smokes, there's been some whoppers here.
RickA's story is nuts.
This resonated with me too.
I love ripping a piece that I was 88.3% sure was good. It's funny that the overriding emotion upon ripping such a piece isn't fear but genuine puzzlement: "huh, that piece blew? well, that's a bit of a surprise"
I have fallen on "only option" cams that I wasn't super psyched on but turned out to be bomber & also have seen seemingly perfect looking placements pop.
But the placement and how it looks isn't always the only factor I have learned.
The tale of how my gear ripped and I hit the ground because I'm dumb:
The time I hit the ground I was with Brownie it was January & he was trying Climb & Punishment, a steep little flake up at Penny Lane that had a piton at the top (Tami probably smashed it in the year I was born :-) about 30' up, before a little face crux pulling out of the flake and over a bulge with slopey crimps and smooth feet. Easier splitter leads to the chains. Anyways, the pin had just been removed by Marc as it had taken it's fair share of abuse & a few others had popped on ppl in town recently like little time bombs.
At this point I had done this climb maybe 20 times including an onsight early in my climbing. #spray I had it pretty sauced i figured and when Brownie was having a time and asked me to hang the rope I did not hesitate. He came down and we pulled the rope, I grabbed a few cams and headed up the flake, checking out his pieces and clipping them as i went past, he only put a few in the initial flake but I didn't mind because I had this thing wired. I got to where the piton was(crux) quickly, moved some gear around, an upward facing Blue wild country Zero & a red C3 to the left a bit to account for the missing Iron, and was checking out how it had made a cool, new, little handhold. I grabbed it and kind of half committed to a method of doing the move off this new hold. It felt weird so I reversed it and tried to just thug thru on muscle memory into my usual sequence, but my feet were out of position from cranking on the new hold. I was boggled and getting flash pump since this was my warm up.
I hung out for a sec then decided I'd just jump off and get back into the proper position to get the feet up, instead of reversing more weird moves. Since the cam was at my knee anyway, I tell Brownie & let go. Next thing I know PINGPINGPING and I was laying in this 4' round, lone patch of snow on a ledge 5' off the ground. It was really fukked up & I was a bit confused but somehow ok? I quickly climbed back up & cleaned the remaining gear & down climbed. Then, we went top roping, for a bit.
It turned out that when the piton was removed the top part of the flake became expanding, a few weeks after my experience I walked by & noticed a smashed up, dinner plate size rock on the ground with chalk & even a bit of rust on it had came off right where my jingus gear had blown up on the cliff. Not sure how it came off in a fall or otherwise but I hope nobody was hurt. Now the climb is a little easier and maybe has better flow thru that section too. Still haven't led it again tho, maybe when it snows hahaha!!
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xtrmecat
Big Wall climber
Kalispell, Montanagonia
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Sep 25, 2014 - 06:28am PT
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Four is my personal best.
Tangerine Trip, the traverse, just before the mid pitch anchor. Tied off two fixed pieces that looked pretty sketch, and the tapered nut I was on was the best I could get with what was left on the rack. With about half a step and six inches to go to a bolt the nut popped, predictably so.
Tom gave me the photo at the bottom of the fall, a little below the roof, all air. Super soft catch, but as stated before, it gives you time to think, which was the worst/best part. Let out a huge wahoo, but didn't stop shaking and being nervous until I made the anchor and decompressed.
I do remember enough time to comprehend the air speed was fast enough to be heard and that I should have stopped by now. Not enough time for conscious thought of "I'm gonna die" though.
I believe my Camelot .4 is still on the rack in perfect shape is what caught the fall, but me being way bigger than my partner pulled him up past the anchor and tight to the rivet that was above him. Oliver got the worst of it.
Burly Bob
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John Christie
Trad climber
Boulder,Colorado
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Sep 25, 2014 - 09:04am PT
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Many years ago, in a quarry near Edinburgh, Scotland I fell off a route at about 50 feet ripping a pin and 3 nuts. I decked it hard on boulders with some rope catch from my first piece, a 2.5 friend that held. It turns out the pin was rusted through...
The pin hit me on the chest and broke skin and I landed on my side on the boulder beach. Apart from a numb left elbow (for a month) and some shock I more or less walked away. The twin morals of the story were (1) NEVER trust old pins, and (2) nuts placed in cracks on whinstone rock lined with calcite are useless for holding a fall.
I went back a year later, rapped down the route pre-placing some bomber gear and lead it no falls.
Ironically the quarry, which was basically a hole in the ground, was subsequently filled in and the route is now buried, presumably for eternity.
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