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Incident
This was my friend's first outdoor sport lead. He clipped the first bolt fine, then went on the clip the second bolt but I noticed that he was away to z-clip. So I started telling him not to clip that way, he dropped the rope and then fell. The first bolt took some of the force but somehow the quickdraw unclipped from the bolt and he fell to the ground. Luckily he wasn't too high up yet and the first bolt took some of the force so he was fine. I know rope can unclip from quickdraws if you backclip, but I've never seen a quickdraw able to unclip from the bolt in the wall! Must have been from the attempted z-clip pulling the quickdraw up or something.
Lessons
Make sure people are competent when climbing outdoors. Everyone has to start somewhere though so potentially we could have set up some more safety for him when he was learning until confident (either simultaneously have him on top rope or have bouldering pads down).
Activity
Sport rock climbing
When
Ascending
Injury
No injury
Causes
Clipping mistake
Anonymous?
Yes
Reported By
Participant
Wearing Helmets?
Yes
Rescue Services Involved?
Author
22 May 2019 at 14:36:12
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All reports are self-submitted and have not been edited by the BMC in any way, so please keep an open mind regarding the lessons and causes of each incident or near-miss.