11/10/2020

Bird Island

A guy starting the second pitch of this climb, checked a large block and then pulled on it and the whole thing came away from the face, falling down the wall, with pieces breaking off. The guy landed on the ledge at the end of the first pitch, he's was injured, mostly cuts and bruises, although he hit his head and did a lot of damage to his helmet. It was a huge block that came off, it was lucky that his belayer or someone on the ground wasn't seriously injured or killed. It came after a week of fairly solid rain, there were several over smaller rock falls on the same section of wall while we were there. It should probably be checked for safety.

11/10/2020

bird island, second pitch

At the beginning of the second pitch on birds land, between 1st and 2nd bolt, a big rock (around half of a car) was pull down and the climber fell and luckily dodged the major rock but minor injuries were caused by the subsequent loose rocks. He fell around 3-4 meter to a ledge which damaged his helmet but apparently no concussion were observed. The belayer lowered him and rappel himself from anchor of first pitch but realized later that the rope were cut by the falling rock almost all the way through at two spots.

06/01/2019

My partner was leading a route within his skill level on the Androids wall at Horseshoe Quarry, whilst I was belaying. We had been climbing outdoors for under a year by this point, but we had been to the crag 3 times before this incident. Near the end of the climb, my partner moved to place his weight on a foothold. If I recall correctly, this was his second attempt at the route that day. The hold came off entirely, along with a large piece of rock. Since the route had a small ledge, it bounced off the ledge and landed around a metre away from me. Luckily my partner and I were unscathed.

30/08/2018

daffy

as the participant was climbing up, they got scared around the 2nd clip and froze. they ended up slipping and fell, as they fell the rope got caught round their ankle and as the belayer caught them, the rope went tight around the ankle causing a serious break.

10/09/2016

Southern Man

While climbing Southern Man on lead first G/U attempt after failed O/S I clipped below shallow roof and diverted right through the crux moves and then began to move back left. As I approached the ultimate clip I had two good crimps and pulled rope up to clip and did so fine, though tired. Finished the route with no issue though the section described was run-out. . Upon descending I heard from two spectators that while I was pulling rope out to clip the ultimate quickdraw, the one preceding it had unclipped itself. They had kept quiet so as not to worry. Had I fallen off while clipping in this position the fall would have been likely ~10m and left me at least near the first bolt. Luckily I hadn’t known and carried on regardless. They hadn’t noticed it before and didn’t know what caused it.

15/07/2012

Mind Your Head

Horseshoe has never been my first choice of venue after pulling a big block off a route there on my first visit but I found myself there after tagging along with a group of less experienced climbers. After climbing a 6a warm up route I had a go at a 6b I’d never tried, “Mind Your Head”. At the chains I found myself surrounded by disconcertingly loose rock including a terrifying Jenga-esque pillar that you could easily attempt to use to clip from of you didn’t have your wits about you. After lowering off, Iadvised my partner and all others nearby not to climb this route and kept my helmet on until we left. An hour or so later, after we’d moved on to another section of the quarry, I heard a commotion from that area and saw that both a leader and his belayer has blood coming from their heads- the leader had pulled the pillar down and rocks had hit them both. Each was conscious and they were able to get to hospital without calling out emergency services luckily. Thankfully this route was debolted by the BMC as part of work done in 2017 but few, if any, other such venues have received this treatment.

13/06/2009

Bad Boys Ink

On my first day sport climbing I climbed at Horseshoe. After climbing in the most popular areas all day we decided to have a look at the shady wall opposite the main one. Three to four bolts up a pretty poor 6a I pulled hard to get onto a ledge and the whole thing hinged out from the wall, hitting my thigh but narrowly missing my belayer as it hit the deck. Luckily I didn’t have my foot locked into a crack or anything so I only sustained a small cut and some bruising to my leg.