Climbing at Vertical World in Ballard on Tuesday and Thursday mornings as well as Sunday evenings was a part of my usual schedule. Many of us arrived on weekday mornings as soon as the gym opened and got our climbs in prior to the rest of the day unfolding. On this particular Thursday my usual climbing partner was on vacation and so I was using the auto belays.
I have used auto belays all the time and have a very methodical approach to clipping in and double-checking that I am clipped in before climbing. I never boulder climb unclipped, so there is absolutely no circumstance where I would intentionally start heading up a climbing route without protection. On this morning I had already finished one lap with all of the available auto belays and had one route left to go to complete my second full lap.
With everything else going on that day I was in a bit of a hurry, but was having to wait for someone else to finish with that one last route. When it came free I walked straight up and got going. Because this was my last route of the morning I didn't intend to get to the very top but to get most of the way up to the crux and then just auto belay back down. As a result I would be letting go of the wall rather than triple checking the auto belay at the top of the route before heading back down.
It is still absolutely incomprehensible to me that I could have started climbing without clipping in but there's no other explanation. People who were there close by when I fell noticed immediately that the auto belay I should have been using was still clipped to the wall.
Hence, contributing factors to the fall include:
1. sleepiness from all nighters pulled earlier in the week
2. other important pressing items that needed to get taken care of later that day
3. Impatience at having to wait to get started on that last route of the day
4. the decision to climb only a portion of the route
1. sleepiness from all nighters pulled earlier in the week
2. other important pressing items that needed to get taken care of later that day
3. Impatience at having to wait to get started on that last route of the day
4. the decision to climb only a portion of the route
When I imagine that moment when I let go of the wall and realized that I had no protection I still flinch in shear amazement. For crying out loud, how could I have possibly allowed myself to become that distracted?!
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