Dont cut the rope
New member
A series of unfortunate events
The Saturday of our titan trip started with a regret filled hangover and excitement for titan. We slowly got ready and filed out of the TSG and piled into Rachel’s car to head up to titan. None of us had done titan except Rachel who did it years ago, as such we couldn’t find where to park and so spent about 30 minutes looking. Once we found where to park we got changed and walked across the field towards titan. We were one field over from titan when we realised we didn’t have the key for titan as it was left at the TSG. Rachel volunteered to walk back to and retrieve the key, we found titan and spent the next hour chatting while Zack was making friends with the locals (sheep’s). Upon returning rachel realised she had lost her gloves, which in turn made me realise I didn’t have gloves either. Rachel then rigged the entrance shaft and descended . I agreed to go last as last time me and oli played rock paper scissors for who went last we tempted fate and oli almost ended up braking his arm. Before I descended I found a glove stuck in the entrance lid. I descended quickly and joined oli sat at the bottom of the pitch and after derigging my descender burned my hand on the hot metal. The wait for our turn to descend was as uneventful as the descent to the bottom of titan. We had a buffets worth of snacks and relaxed in a boothy waiting for our turn to ascend titan. I was de rigging so waited till last. I then ascended with the rope to the event horizon and while derigging the rebelay lost my light and it fell to the bottom of titan. Knowing others were doing titan this weekend I decided to leave it and borrowed Rachel’s spare light and finished to de rig titan. I the started to prosuc up the second pitch carrying the rope with me. Just over half way up I tried to move my hand jammer as I’d just done a hundred times and it was stuck. I look down and see the tail from the knot attached to me hand jammer hand gone into my chest jammer and I’d unknowingly weight it. I pushed down on my chest jammer and de weighted it entirely. No luck, I shouted up to Rachel as I realised this is quite a bad situation. Rachel descended down to me from the window and saw the predicament I had gotten into. We tried again and unsuccessfully to open the chest jammer making sure it was fully deweighted. When that failed we cut the end of the tail and tried prying the rope out and pulling on the threads, still no luck. Rachel then ascended back up and tried to haul me. I tried singing and humming and avoided looking down but was violently aware of where I was stuck. The event horizon was 40ish metres beneath me and I could only see that when Rachel looked down as the back up torch wasn’t the brightest but I was glad. After an hour and many bouts of yoga like poses to get blood into my legs. They would go from violently numb to pins and needles and back. It had been around an hour since I first got stuck and I saw Rachel descending to me again. Rachel arrived and said hauling wasn’t going to work. We’d have to cut the rope. Me and Rachel attached our cows tails and I rigged my descender onto the diggers rope which was very fortunately in situ with ours. I then asked for the honour to cut my own rope and to help calm my nerves. I slowly cut my rope very aware that up to abt ten minutes ago this was the only thing holding me. I circled the rope with my Spaffa, impressed with how few strands were required to hold me. The rope was eventually cut and I only dropped about half a foot due to the descender being rigged so far up as was Rachel’s advice. With the chest jammer still stuck I descended to the event horizon planning on having to stay until another one was acquired and given to me. Once I reached the event horizon and clipped into the traverse line and de rigged my descender , I looked down and saw my chest jammer was free again. FREEDOM ! I shouted jammer free up to Rachel which was the first thing in a while that was clearly understood from our echoed shouting. I looked up to see the diggers rope 10 to 15 feet away from me . Then suddenly darkness. The back up light had died and I was in darkness again. I shouted to Rachel light so many times I lost track , while leaning as far out from the traverse line to try grab the diggers rope. A few minutes had past and no luck I was starting to loose hope until the rope suddenly appeared in my hand. I rigged my rope into my jammers and started ascending again, 20 metres off the ground the rope I had attached to me (the one I cut) became tight and stopped me from moving . As the cut rope had no tension it became a massive loop which wrapped round a boulder at the event horizon while I was on the traverse line. I was stuck for the second time. I shouted up to Rachel and due to the exhaustion and our call out coming she responded to ditch it. I climbed up to the window and hadn’t been so grateful to stand on the ground again. I de rigged from the rope and sat very gratefully while Rachel gathered the tackle bags at the bottom of the entrance shaft. Rachel decided due to how close call out was and how tired we were to leave most of the rope there. Rachel lead first up the entrance shaft and I waited at the bottom just glad I could see daylight again. I then slowly started to ascend the entrance shaft. My hand jammer then became stuck again. All I could manage was a strained “f***” I looked down and saw the tail which was frayed was stuck through the front of my chest hammer . And so for the second time grabbed my spatha and started to cut. Luckily this time my chest jammer was free and I ascended to the top and out of titan. We got back to the car and cancelled our call out with less then 20 minutes to spare.
A massive thanks to Rachel who stayed calm and put up with my constant problems. There’s a chance I’d still be there without her 😂
(This was written the week after it happened and the issue that caused was a rare kit related one that has been identified and fixed, feel free to ask questions
)
The Saturday of our titan trip started with a regret filled hangover and excitement for titan. We slowly got ready and filed out of the TSG and piled into Rachel’s car to head up to titan. None of us had done titan except Rachel who did it years ago, as such we couldn’t find where to park and so spent about 30 minutes looking. Once we found where to park we got changed and walked across the field towards titan. We were one field over from titan when we realised we didn’t have the key for titan as it was left at the TSG. Rachel volunteered to walk back to and retrieve the key, we found titan and spent the next hour chatting while Zack was making friends with the locals (sheep’s). Upon returning rachel realised she had lost her gloves, which in turn made me realise I didn’t have gloves either. Rachel then rigged the entrance shaft and descended . I agreed to go last as last time me and oli played rock paper scissors for who went last we tempted fate and oli almost ended up braking his arm. Before I descended I found a glove stuck in the entrance lid. I descended quickly and joined oli sat at the bottom of the pitch and after derigging my descender burned my hand on the hot metal. The wait for our turn to descend was as uneventful as the descent to the bottom of titan. We had a buffets worth of snacks and relaxed in a boothy waiting for our turn to ascend titan. I was de rigging so waited till last. I then ascended with the rope to the event horizon and while derigging the rebelay lost my light and it fell to the bottom of titan. Knowing others were doing titan this weekend I decided to leave it and borrowed Rachel’s spare light and finished to de rig titan. I the started to prosuc up the second pitch carrying the rope with me. Just over half way up I tried to move my hand jammer as I’d just done a hundred times and it was stuck. I look down and see the tail from the knot attached to me hand jammer hand gone into my chest jammer and I’d unknowingly weight it. I pushed down on my chest jammer and de weighted it entirely. No luck, I shouted up to Rachel as I realised this is quite a bad situation. Rachel descended down to me from the window and saw the predicament I had gotten into. We tried again and unsuccessfully to open the chest jammer making sure it was fully deweighted. When that failed we cut the end of the tail and tried prying the rope out and pulling on the threads, still no luck. Rachel then ascended back up and tried to haul me. I tried singing and humming and avoided looking down but was violently aware of where I was stuck. The event horizon was 40ish metres beneath me and I could only see that when Rachel looked down as the back up torch wasn’t the brightest but I was glad. After an hour and many bouts of yoga like poses to get blood into my legs. They would go from violently numb to pins and needles and back. It had been around an hour since I first got stuck and I saw Rachel descending to me again. Rachel arrived and said hauling wasn’t going to work. We’d have to cut the rope. Me and Rachel attached our cows tails and I rigged my descender onto the diggers rope which was very fortunately in situ with ours. I then asked for the honour to cut my own rope and to help calm my nerves. I slowly cut my rope very aware that up to abt ten minutes ago this was the only thing holding me. I circled the rope with my Spaffa, impressed with how few strands were required to hold me. The rope was eventually cut and I only dropped about half a foot due to the descender being rigged so far up as was Rachel’s advice. With the chest jammer still stuck I descended to the event horizon planning on having to stay until another one was acquired and given to me. Once I reached the event horizon and clipped into the traverse line and de rigged my descender , I looked down and saw my chest jammer was free again. FREEDOM ! I shouted jammer free up to Rachel which was the first thing in a while that was clearly understood from our echoed shouting. I looked up to see the diggers rope 10 to 15 feet away from me . Then suddenly darkness. The back up light had died and I was in darkness again. I shouted to Rachel light so many times I lost track , while leaning as far out from the traverse line to try grab the diggers rope. A few minutes had past and no luck I was starting to loose hope until the rope suddenly appeared in my hand. I rigged my rope into my jammers and started ascending again, 20 metres off the ground the rope I had attached to me (the one I cut) became tight and stopped me from moving . As the cut rope had no tension it became a massive loop which wrapped round a boulder at the event horizon while I was on the traverse line. I was stuck for the second time. I shouted up to Rachel and due to the exhaustion and our call out coming she responded to ditch it. I climbed up to the window and hadn’t been so grateful to stand on the ground again. I de rigged from the rope and sat very gratefully while Rachel gathered the tackle bags at the bottom of the entrance shaft. Rachel decided due to how close call out was and how tired we were to leave most of the rope there. Rachel lead first up the entrance shaft and I waited at the bottom just glad I could see daylight again. I then slowly started to ascend the entrance shaft. My hand jammer then became stuck again. All I could manage was a strained “f***” I looked down and saw the tail which was frayed was stuck through the front of my chest hammer . And so for the second time grabbed my spatha and started to cut. Luckily this time my chest jammer was free and I ascended to the top and out of titan. We got back to the car and cancelled our call out with less then 20 minutes to spare.
A massive thanks to Rachel who stayed calm and put up with my constant problems. There’s a chance I’d still be there without her 😂
(This was written the week after it happened and the issue that caused was a rare kit related one that has been identified and fixed, feel free to ask questions
)
