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wierd stuff abseiling 28-Aug-2016 At 6:17:12 PM ChuckNorris

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Strange thing happened to me yesterday that was a bit of an eye opener so thought I'd share.

Was At rosea and for various reasons I had to retreat off Mixed Climb from the first belay (pitch 2 belay in the guide). As I rapped off I had to get a few pieces of gear my seconds couldn't get out on the traverse and in the crack/chimney at the start of the traverse. The way I was positioned on the belay was a bit awkward so when I kicked the ropes off the ledge they all got messed up on a ledge a few meters below. Didn't really think it a big deal as I could easily kick them down as I rapped past.

[as an aside I can really see how someone could accidentally clip into a long tail of an EDK. I didn't but in the awkward position I was in I nearly did so and was thankful for the voice in my head telling me to watch out for that - so thanks to whoever posted that a while ago]

Back to the story - I rapped down to where the ropes got stuck and kicked them off and as they fell there was a bit of a tangle between the tail of the rope that was passing through the gear and the tail that was going to the ground. Once again didn't think it a big deal and rapped down to the tangle to free it. This is where the weird shit happened - I freed the tangle and as all the ropes whizzed down to the ground I could see a bit of a twist in the rope below which quickly tightened into a half hitch of the tail that went to the ground wrapped around the tail that was passing through the gear which promptly jammed against my rap device - and I was literally locked off hanging in my harness barely being able to touch the rock with my toes.

It happened so quickly and I couldn't really stop it as both hands were being used on the rap. I should say it only was an issue as one rope was clipped into gear and the other wasn't - if they were both free hanging they just would have untwisted just like they've done on 1000 raps before. Also I don't think it would have been an issue if the rope clipped to gear was straight below me as I could have kept the twists away from my belay device as I went down and took the gear out. But as the tail end that was clipped to the gear end was heading diagonally down there was something for the twist to purchase against and with gravity the twist purchased pretty hard and pretty fast around the other rope and tight against my belay device.

At the end of the day I was fine - it was daylight and I could see immediately what the issue was and easily fixed it with the tedious task of pulling up 50m of rope with one hand and teeth. However if it was dark or the weather was crap or some other piece of epicness was happening I can see how it could turn bad fast.

Lessons learnt - just to be extra careful to make sure ropes are running clean without twists around each other when one end is still clipped through gear.