cap n chris
Well-known member
If people wish to debate fixed aids and safety, please start a separate thread. Moderator comment.
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If people wish to debate fixed aids and safety, please start a separate thread. Moderator comment.
Is it though? Quite recently we had a poster here who was close to being injured using (inappropriately) a zip wire in a mine - but who might well have not gone there if the wire wasn't present.Clearly it is unequivocal that fixed aids improve safety
Good point well made. SI installed by people who know WTF they're doing and with control mechanism(s) in place so that people who are doing their own brain surgery are unlikely to make themselves less intelligent in so doing. This does presume that the users aren't dumbasF though and that's the unknown unknown. If there was a vertical cable on a ViaF would some people just blithely clip into it and leap off? Yes, probably they would.<devil's advocate>
Is it though? Quite recently we had a poster here who was close to being injured using (inappropriately) a zip wire in a mine - but who might well have not gone there if the wire wasn't present.
I think this is the point - someone has to draw the line between Janja Gabaret being able to free climb it wihtout "mortal danger" so it needs no aid, to a blind quadriplegic can't access it so it needs a lift installing. The Question is then who gets to choose where that line is - The discoverers? the local caving council? the club who is maintaining access? the landlord? the man on the clapham omnibus? or the 'you' who can or can't access a particular passage.Good point well made. SI installed by people who know WTF they're doing and with control mechanism(s) in place so that people who are doing their own brain surgery are unlikely to make themselves less intelligent in so doing. This does presume that the users aren't dumbasF though and that's the unknown unknown. If there was a vertical cable on a ViaF would some people just blithely clip into it and leap off? Yes, probably they would.
Not if the lifeline is a dynamic rope, doubled on, say, an 18m pitch and the ladder actually snaps while the caver.is ascending the first 2-3m. Semi static rope would avoid a ground strike though.Ladder and lifeline - with a lifeliner that knows how to life line, a failsafe solution.
You also have the mostly the older elements who think that cause the have always got away with it, they always will.
I except that not every older caver is like this, but I have had many a conversation with, I still body belay cause its never failed, if you cant free climb this climb you shouldn't be down this part of the cave, or I have always free climbed ladders with no lifeline, so I am not going to change now. I would hasten to add that I am not innocent in never done any of the above. especially free climbing ladders, and unless someone has happened to me remove my lifeline at swildons 20, now would never free climb the ladder, even the actual free climb I doubt I would contemplate any more. for the sake of a piece of rope and at the very worse an Italian hitch.Bit of a sweeping generalization!
the stats say you are at the most danger, newbies? young people because they don't necessarily understand the dangers, I was like this, although I understood the dangers but accepted the risk but not the consequences, as they would not happen to me, the oldies because they have always got away with how they have done things."the stats will tell you that the newbies or the oldies are the most at danger"
Oh dear - as a "new oldie" (or should that be "old newbie"?), I'd better check my life insurance
Having been caving for just over a year now and accelerating through the ranks of responsibility in the club (Cardiff) to leading trips and just having done quite a lot of caving already (coming to 100 trips soon!) I think a lot of it has to do with the attitudes we have towards safety. I've done some silly stuff already, descending down a pitch on an Italian hitch, sketchy free climbs, just today I did some solo caving and forgot to bring a spare battery and almost had my light die on me. They all make good stories and all but sometimes it gets the wrong response, a lot of the time it's met with encouragement instead of the appropriate telling off and that sticks with people. I have never lived down the time I ascended cow pot and Babyhagrid found me with my D-ring undone at the top, I felt rubbish at the time being told off after doing an exhausting 10 hour trip but it stuck with me and have never had any of my srt kit not properly done up. We need to be properly bollocking people for doing the dumb stuff instead of just congratulating them, you lived to tell the tale this time but what makes you think you will next time? I think at least within Cardiff though the attitude is good, we enjoy reading old trip reports and commenting how much of a nutcase some of the old cavers are and how we'd never do some of the stuff they did 🤣I except that not every older caver is like this, but I have had many a conversation with, I still body belay cause its never failed, if you cant free climb this climb you shouldn't be down this part of the cave, or I have always free climbed ladders with no lifeline, so I am not going to change now. I would hasten to add that I am not innocent in never done any of the above. especially free climbing ladders, and unless someone has happened to me remove my lifeline at swildons 20, now would never free climb the ladder, even the actual free climb I doubt I would contemplate any more. for the sake of a piece of rope and at the very worse an Italian hitch.
So if you are an older caver like myself, who does think about safety then my sweeping statement above excludes your good selves