I guess I don’t understand the timeline and relationship of the actors. Or perhaps I do:
You were there, and got relieved – sounds like out of the picture when the tipover event occurred. SAR was there, kinda sorta, but not on top of things. The other team was there, actually, on top of the situation, having just completed the rappel. Your teammates were there, up top, and starting down the rope.
If I have the scenario laid out correctly, you can see why while I respect the SAR people, they are not canyoneers, and they do not operate with all the available information including context. And they should.
I did not leave by choice I was removed from the situation by SAR who also happens to be Law Enforcement. I admit I was on 40 hours of no sleep at the time and was thinking both as a concerned friend and a SAR person. As a friend I wanted to stay, as a SAR member I knew that a civilian had no place in a rescue unless directed to. Knowing that this team is THE team for this canyon and only worked this park ( County SO does the rest of the SAR missions in this county outside of Zion) I did not have much of a choice other then to disobey an order from LE. They did assume that obligation when they removed me from the pools area. As a SAR guy it is always your obligation to keep your subjects safe. We are trained to take control of the subjects, the RP, and the bystanders. anyway this thread is so far off subject it’s silly. I was just trying to answer why we did have a person at the belay and fill in some holes in the story. If your friend has a heart attack and EMS shows up and takes you away you are not obligated to continue CPR
Consider this a de-brief. It is not silly to attempt to uncover the mistakes that underlie this incident, especially mistakes that YOU have difficulty seeing. I am not a SAR person, but I do hold a WFR card and understand some aspects of SAR. SAR protocols work for the situations they are designed for. This was not one of those situations.
I understand. Part of being a SAR person is respecting the command structure, something as a civilian I am under no obligation until arrested. That’s why I am saying you were stuck in-between the two ways of thinking. Your resistance makes me think you are still stuck in-between the two ways of thinking.
You stayed up there until 3 am? Impressive dedication.
(And I can go on (and on, and on) in the same vein. My theory and my point is that you guyz were thinking like SAR persons, not like canyoneers. Mistakes were made in the realm of canyoneering. I theorize the reason this was so is because you guys were not thinking like canyoneers – you were thinking like SAR people and/or like experienced outdoorspersons, or like climbers. But you were in a canyoneering context, and the decision making process comes out somewhat differently. Result = near-miss. Non-fatal due to luck.)
As in any de-brief, I don’t necessarily expect you to agree with me. But I do expect you to honestly try this theory on at least until you understand it.
People often forget that rescue is an emergency. However, to be a rescue, it needs to be identified as a rescue. Generally an overdue party is not considered a rescue situation for a period of time. When does that switch get flipped?
I suspect that no one foresaw a team member inverting on the last rap. As far as I am concerned the female canyoneer who stepped up and provided first a fireman’s belay, and then actually lowered your teammate is a hero for recognizing what needed to be done and then actually doing it.
You could also have simply told the rangers that your place is at the bottom of the rappel in case your team needed anything. Just saying there are always more than one way to look at things. The canyon isn’t over until you are eating carne asada and drinking cerveza at the Bit and Spur as far as I am concerned.
Rescue is an known emergency in a known location, a search is an unknown emergency in an unknown location therefore just as important as a rescue once SAR takes over they take control of the situation until its over, if not it’s called abandonment. they are SEARCH AND RESCUE 25 hours overdue qualifies as a search. On our team if we go on a search and find a subject in good health happy and only one mile from the trailhead we still walk them back to the car and do not leave till they do. When you have people in a dangerous situation and know they have been out in the elements for along time and with no sleep it is still a serious situation and you need to own it. I will give other team props for that and will always be grateful.
It has nothing to do with thinking like a canyoneer it has to do with thinking like a rescue technician. Point is since they took me away from the situation they legally took responsibility of the situation and should have taken the belay. If the other group had not caught the belay and there was an accident I am sure there would have been a huge lawsuit. He also should have walked all three subjects out of the canyon and back to the trailhead. Our team would NEVER leave someone we rescued or found on a search alone in the field, and we do not leave the scene until all subjects and rescue personal are back in command. You have not been found or rescued until you on the way home.
[Observation. Sorry if it is stated directly – my interest is in the debrief, not in shaming, though it may seem otherwise. I am not good at stating things other than bluntly. (nothing personal).]
Tough situation!
I have enormous respect for SAR, but I never, as in NEVER, assume they know what the frak is going on. What I see here is that when this trip became a SAR event, YOU stopped thinking like a canyoneer and started thinking like a SAR team member. YOU had an obligation to provide a bottom belay, and you are not relieved of that obligation when the SAR team shows up. ipso facto, they did not assume that obligation, because they are NOT canyoneers and do not know that providing a bottom belay is standard procedure on that rappel.
My observation is that you, PHXclimber76, are caught between two ways of thinking. Things can get lost between the two ways of thinking.
I was the 4th member of this team and was initially at the bottom of the rappel from 330pm Saturday till 3am Sunday then on and off again till the event happened. I did get the last team out Saturday night to hang our rope so it was there and they did have a way down. I managed to find a spot on the road where I had contact with SAR, on and off again cell service with families of the party, and a direct line of site and radio contact with the top of the 2nd rappel. The plan was once they contacted me by radio or I saw them at the top, to beat them to the bottom of the rappel and give fireman’s belay. I had several conversations with SAR and the Permit office and was told (because I asked) that there were no teams scheduled to come out of the canyon on Sunday as all the permits for Saturday were out other then my friends and all the Sunday permits were for two days. So after seeing someone at the top of the 2nd rappel I assumed it was my friends, notified SAR and headed up the trail where I saw the first person rappelling I tried yelling up to them to see if it was my friends but go no answer. Once she was down she told me she saw my friends at 0800, they were not inured but were not moving also they were not with her group and she didn’t have time to tell me anything else. At this point SAR called me back to Command at the parking lot and said a rescue tech was on the way. when I got down to the lot and was talking to the IC my friends caught up to the group of 5 and started texting me. SAR wanted me to stay down at the trailhead and since there was a rescue tech at the rappel I felt no need to go belay my friends. Thinking that a well rested well trained professional SAR tech would automatically step up and belay a subject of a SAR mission that is known to be 24+ hours overdue, and has spent several hours exposed to the elements while he attempts a rappel that serious, I was more then surprised to hear it was the other party that ended up giving the belay. I know that as a member of a Technical SAR team myself if anyone on our team would have done that there would have been a serious talk with the BOD and the Ops committee, we have removed people from the team for much less then that.
Good job on getting the rope to the bird ledge. If I had come down in the middle of the night I would have really appreciated finding that there, even if you didn’t get out of your hotel bed when I called you upon getting coverage!
With the gear they had they could have easily got one person down the 300′ rappel staying well within the 10-1 maybe even a 15-1 safety ratio and had a true belay with conditional belay on both for over 125′ and a conditional only belay for the last 175′ all without passing a knot.
I agree it isn’t all luck. Luck is part of it however.
Another part is careful team selection. I can’t remember whose hilarious (but scary) story it is about the dog in the dry bag in Heaps, but obviously I wouldn’t want that “team” on my first or 50th trip through Heaps. Another part is collection of the available knowledge. The people I know who successfully do stuff for the first time know everything available about it. If there is a trip report or a beta guide on the internet, they’ve read it. If not, they’ve talked to people who’ve done it. If it hasn’t been done, they’ve done stuff close by and spent hours pouring over maps in the area. Maybe even walked the rim. Maybe they’ve even got a rim team, just in case.
Built in redundancy also matters. Ropes get dropped, or stuck, or core shot all the time. Having more than one rope in a canyon requiring 25ish rappels seems rather prudent to me. Sure, I’d do the subway with one rope, but Heaps? Really? Same reason you don’t use a 300 footer as a working rope. You’re going to need that thing and you want it in excellent condition when you pull it out.
Similar and related experience is also valuable. Somebody who has found his way off dozens of lengthy multi-pitch routes in the mountains in all kinds of weather isn’t going to have trouble stringing together a few rappels from bolts and trees on a mere 500 foot wall.
Fitness is also an issue. The joke is that canyoneers are just fat climbers. But lots of people are referencing exhaustion at the end of Heaps. Maybe if you’re exhausted at the end of Heaps you’re not in good enough shape to do it. I mean, I’m a reasonably fit guy but I actually train before doing to do a canyon like that. You know, lift weights, trail run, hike around with a heavy pack on, do pull-ups etc for several weeks if not months before the trip. I mean, you’ve got a 9 mile hike with a moderately heavy pack before the fun even begins. That’s enough to exhaust Average Joe right there.
Then, of course, going “armed for bear” when you don’t have someone who knows what is there is always helpful, at least psychologically. I know you believe in that principle too, since I saw those stemming pictures with 50 lb packs. You have to be getting into some very tough canyons before finding an obstacle that can’t be easily overcome with 600 feet of rope, half a dozen experienced canyoneers, and the usual assortment of gear. I mean, those obstacles are pretty limited- crazy silos, potholes of doom, massive overhanging drops, a terrible dearth of anchor material etc.
Planning is also important. Fail to plan and you’re planning to fail. People have written down the beta for the final heaps rappels in minute detail. Those of us who succeed at doing that sort of thing efficiently have done those rappels 20 times in our mind before ever getting there. Heck, we’ve probably got a written plan in our pocket but don’t need to pull it out because it has been memorized for two weeks before the trip. Someone in the group never rigged a rappel? Take them out to practice before going. New rappel device? Test it out. Haven’t ascended a rope in a while? Go spend an hour at the local crag.
Contingency planning also matters. Many a bivy could be avoided with a working headlamp. Some first aid stuff and a little medical knowledge. Some extra food and water. Extra sling for the yeahoo who forgot his harness. An alpine start. On a long day, you know you’re going to use the headlamp at one end of the day or the other. I prefer to use it in the morning. Weather looks like it might deteriorate at 5? Get up early enough to be out of the canyon by noon.
It seems to me that a lot of the guys who get in trouble have cut a half dozen corners, then made a half dozen bad decisions, and THEN hit a little bad luck. Avoiding that stuff many times goes back to not cutting the corners in the first place. So don’t cut the corners. And if you don’t even know what the corners to cut are, you’re already in over your head.
Just some random thoughts. Confidence matters, but a large dose of humility also goes a long way. In fact, the more competent you get, the more humble you become when you realize just how many things can go wrong.
It’s really a question of speed versus weight. If you really want to move through that final sequence, I’d recommend doing what we did, but that means carrying a lot of rope. With a 4-6 person group, it’s a great option. But I totally get why a 2-3 man team would not want to carry the 300 through and would rather spend more time messing around on the bird ledge to avoid that.
With our six guys we had someone rappeling on all three raps at once. We used DRT and had a single rope doubled at the top, DRT on two ropes on the second drop, and SRT on the 300 on the final drop. We had two guys on the ground before pulling the first rope. You could do it with even less rope, less effort, and less time using SRT, pull cord(s) and a fiddlestick.
BTW- my least favorite way to descend is being lowered. Ugh.
ratagonia
I guess I don’t understand the timeline and relationship of the actors. Or perhaps I do:
You were there, and got relieved – sounds like out of the picture when the tipover event occurred. SAR was there, kinda sorta, but not on top of things. The other team was there, actually, on top of the situation, having just completed the rappel. Your teammates were there, up top, and starting down the rope.
If I have the scenario laid out correctly, you can see why while I respect the SAR people, they are not canyoneers, and they do not operate with all the available information including context. And they should.
PHXClimber76
I did not leave by choice I was removed from the situation by SAR who also happens to be Law Enforcement. I admit I was on 40 hours of no sleep at the time and was thinking both as a concerned friend and a SAR person. As a friend I wanted to stay, as a SAR member I knew that a civilian had no place in a rescue unless directed to. Knowing that this team is THE team for this canyon and only worked this park ( County SO does the rest of the SAR missions in this county outside of Zion) I did not have much of a choice other then to disobey an order from LE. They did assume that obligation when they removed me from the pools area. As a SAR guy it is always your obligation to keep your subjects safe. We are trained to take control of the subjects, the RP, and the bystanders. anyway this thread is so far off subject it’s silly. I was just trying to answer why we did have a person at the belay and fill in some holes in the story. If your friend has a heart attack and EMS shows up and takes you away you are not obligated to continue CPR
ratagonia
Consider this a de-brief. It is not silly to attempt to uncover the mistakes that underlie this incident, especially mistakes that YOU have difficulty seeing. I am not a SAR person, but I do hold a WFR card and understand some aspects of SAR. SAR protocols work for the situations they are designed for. This was not one of those situations.
I understand. Part of being a SAR person is respecting the command structure, something as a civilian I am under no obligation until arrested. That’s why I am saying you were stuck in-between the two ways of thinking. Your resistance makes me think you are still stuck in-between the two ways of thinking.
You stayed up there until 3 am? Impressive dedication.
(And I can go on (and on, and on) in the same vein. My theory and my point is that you guyz were thinking like SAR persons, not like canyoneers. Mistakes were made in the realm of canyoneering. I theorize the reason this was so is because you guys were not thinking like canyoneers – you were thinking like SAR people and/or like experienced outdoorspersons, or like climbers. But you were in a canyoneering context, and the decision making process comes out somewhat differently. Result = near-miss. Non-fatal due to luck.)
As in any de-brief, I don’t necessarily expect you to agree with me. But I do expect you to honestly try this theory on at least until you understand it.
Tom
spinesnaper
People often forget that rescue is an emergency. However, to be a rescue, it needs to be identified as a rescue. Generally an overdue party is not considered a rescue situation for a period of time. When does that switch get flipped?
I suspect that no one foresaw a team member inverting on the last rap. As far as I am concerned the female canyoneer who stepped up and provided first a fireman’s belay, and then actually lowered your teammate is a hero for recognizing what needed to be done and then actually doing it.
You could also have simply told the rangers that your place is at the bottom of the rappel in case your team needed anything. Just saying there are always more than one way to look at things. The canyon isn’t over until you are eating carne asada and drinking cerveza at the Bit and Spur as far as I am concerned.
PHXClimber76
Rescue is an known emergency in a known location, a search is an unknown emergency in an unknown location therefore just as important as a rescue once SAR takes over they take control of the situation until its over, if not it’s called abandonment. they are SEARCH AND RESCUE 25 hours overdue qualifies as a search. On our team if we go on a search and find a subject in good health happy and only one mile from the trailhead we still walk them back to the car and do not leave till they do. When you have people in a dangerous situation and know they have been out in the elements for along time and with no sleep it is still a serious situation and you need to own it. I will give other team props for that and will always be grateful.
ratagonia
You keep reinforcing my point. Thank you.
Tom
hank moon
There’s always the drive home…
spinesnaper
Possibly the most dangerous aspect of the excursion. Sorry buddy, you’re on your own.
PHXClimber76
It has nothing to do with thinking like a canyoneer it has to do with thinking like a rescue technician. Point is since they took me away from the situation they legally took responsibility of the situation and should have taken the belay. If the other group had not caught the belay and there was an accident I am sure there would have been a huge lawsuit. He also should have walked all three subjects out of the canyon and back to the trailhead. Our team would NEVER leave someone we rescued or found on a search alone in the field, and we do not leave the scene until all subjects and rescue personal are back in command. You have not been found or rescued until you on the way home.
ratagonia
Interesting…
[Observation. Sorry if it is stated directly – my interest is in the debrief, not in shaming, though it may seem otherwise. I am not good at stating things other than bluntly. (nothing personal).]
Tough situation!
I have enormous respect for SAR, but I never, as in NEVER, assume they know what the frak is going on. What I see here is that when this trip became a SAR event, YOU stopped thinking like a canyoneer and started thinking like a SAR team member. YOU had an obligation to provide a bottom belay, and you are not relieved of that obligation when the SAR team shows up. ipso facto, they did not assume that obligation, because they are NOT canyoneers and do not know that providing a bottom belay is standard procedure on that rappel.
My observation is that you, PHXclimber76, are caught between two ways of thinking. Things can get lost between the two ways of thinking.
Tom
spinesnaper
Social media is so great.
One cannot assume that even a very well trained SAR technician will think like a cannoneer. Another important lesson.
PHXClimber76
I was the 4th member of this team and was initially at the bottom of the rappel from 330pm Saturday till 3am Sunday then on and off again till the event happened. I did get the last team out Saturday night to hang our rope so it was there and they did have a way down. I managed to find a spot on the road where I had contact with SAR, on and off again cell service with families of the party, and a direct line of site and radio contact with the top of the 2nd rappel. The plan was once they contacted me by radio or I saw them at the top, to beat them to the bottom of the rappel and give fireman’s belay. I had several conversations with SAR and the Permit office and was told (because I asked) that there were no teams scheduled to come out of the canyon on Sunday as all the permits for Saturday were out other then my friends and all the Sunday permits were for two days. So after seeing someone at the top of the 2nd rappel I assumed it was my friends, notified SAR and headed up the trail where I saw the first person rappelling I tried yelling up to them to see if it was my friends but go no answer. Once she was down she told me she saw my friends at 0800, they were not inured but were not moving also they were not with her group and she didn’t have time to tell me anything else. At this point SAR called me back to Command at the parking lot and said a rescue tech was on the way. when I got down to the lot and was talking to the IC my friends caught up to the group of 5 and started texting me. SAR wanted me to stay down at the trailhead and since there was a rescue tech at the rappel I felt no need to go belay my friends. Thinking that a well rested well trained professional SAR tech would automatically step up and belay a subject of a SAR mission that is known to be 24+ hours overdue, and has spent several hours exposed to the elements while he attempts a rappel that serious, I was more then surprised to hear it was the other party that ended up giving the belay. I know that as a member of a Technical SAR team myself if anyone on our team would have done that there would have been a serious talk with the BOD and the Ops committee, we have removed people from the team for much less then that.
Canyonero
Good job on getting the rope to the bird ledge. If I had come down in the middle of the night I would have really appreciated finding that there, even if you didn’t get out of your hotel bed when I called you upon getting coverage!
PHXClimber76
With the gear they had they could have easily got one person down the 300′ rappel staying well within the 10-1 maybe even a 15-1 safety ratio and had a true belay with conditional belay on both for over 125′ and a conditional only belay for the last 175′ all without passing a knot.
Rapterman
Good posts Canyonero and Boot Boy!
You are Heaps veterans in the best sense.
spinesnaper
That cannoneer whose girlfriend brought a small dog was Dave Black.
hank moon
Great segue for a TBT post!
http://canyoncollective.com/threads/a-sh-y-trip-in-heaps-long-damn-good.8096/
Canyonero
I agree it isn’t all luck. Luck is part of it however.
Another part is careful team selection. I can’t remember whose hilarious (but scary) story it is about the dog in the dry bag in Heaps, but obviously I wouldn’t want that “team” on my first or 50th trip through Heaps. Another part is collection of the available knowledge. The people I know who successfully do stuff for the first time know everything available about it. If there is a trip report or a beta guide on the internet, they’ve read it. If not, they’ve talked to people who’ve done it. If it hasn’t been done, they’ve done stuff close by and spent hours pouring over maps in the area. Maybe even walked the rim. Maybe they’ve even got a rim team, just in case.
Built in redundancy also matters. Ropes get dropped, or stuck, or core shot all the time. Having more than one rope in a canyon requiring 25ish rappels seems rather prudent to me. Sure, I’d do the subway with one rope, but Heaps? Really? Same reason you don’t use a 300 footer as a working rope. You’re going to need that thing and you want it in excellent condition when you pull it out.
Similar and related experience is also valuable. Somebody who has found his way off dozens of lengthy multi-pitch routes in the mountains in all kinds of weather isn’t going to have trouble stringing together a few rappels from bolts and trees on a mere 500 foot wall.
Fitness is also an issue. The joke is that canyoneers are just fat climbers. But lots of people are referencing exhaustion at the end of Heaps. Maybe if you’re exhausted at the end of Heaps you’re not in good enough shape to do it. I mean, I’m a reasonably fit guy but I actually train before doing to do a canyon like that. You know, lift weights, trail run, hike around with a heavy pack on, do pull-ups etc for several weeks if not months before the trip. I mean, you’ve got a 9 mile hike with a moderately heavy pack before the fun even begins. That’s enough to exhaust Average Joe right there.
Then, of course, going “armed for bear” when you don’t have someone who knows what is there is always helpful, at least psychologically. I know you believe in that principle too, since I saw those stemming pictures with 50 lb packs. You have to be getting into some very tough canyons before finding an obstacle that can’t be easily overcome with 600 feet of rope, half a dozen experienced canyoneers, and the usual assortment of gear. I mean, those obstacles are pretty limited- crazy silos, potholes of doom, massive overhanging drops, a terrible dearth of anchor material etc.
Planning is also important. Fail to plan and you’re planning to fail. People have written down the beta for the final heaps rappels in minute detail. Those of us who succeed at doing that sort of thing efficiently have done those rappels 20 times in our mind before ever getting there. Heck, we’ve probably got a written plan in our pocket but don’t need to pull it out because it has been memorized for two weeks before the trip. Someone in the group never rigged a rappel? Take them out to practice before going. New rappel device? Test it out. Haven’t ascended a rope in a while? Go spend an hour at the local crag.
Contingency planning also matters. Many a bivy could be avoided with a working headlamp. Some first aid stuff and a little medical knowledge. Some extra food and water. Extra sling for the yeahoo who forgot his harness. An alpine start. On a long day, you know you’re going to use the headlamp at one end of the day or the other. I prefer to use it in the morning. Weather looks like it might deteriorate at 5? Get up early enough to be out of the canyon by noon.
It seems to me that a lot of the guys who get in trouble have cut a half dozen corners, then made a half dozen bad decisions, and THEN hit a little bad luck. Avoiding that stuff many times goes back to not cutting the corners in the first place. So don’t cut the corners. And if you don’t even know what the corners to cut are, you’re already in over your head.
Just some random thoughts. Confidence matters, but a large dose of humility also goes a long way. In fact, the more competent you get, the more humble you become when you realize just how many things can go wrong.
Canyonero
It’s really a question of speed versus weight. If you really want to move through that final sequence, I’d recommend doing what we did, but that means carrying a lot of rope. With a 4-6 person group, it’s a great option. But I totally get why a 2-3 man team would not want to carry the 300 through and would rather spend more time messing around on the bird ledge to avoid that.
With our six guys we had someone rappeling on all three raps at once. We used DRT and had a single rope doubled at the top, DRT on two ropes on the second drop, and SRT on the 300 on the final drop. We had two guys on the ground before pulling the first rope. You could do it with even less rope, less effort, and less time using SRT, pull cord(s) and a fiddlestick.
BTW- my least favorite way to descend is being lowered. Ugh.