RRC Archives

and arches doesn't count

Were draws up?

no he was hanging them on the solo.

merrick wrote:i have never heard of an area that has been shut down becuase of soloing. Can you provide an example?

It wouldn't be the soloing - it would be the dying that would close an
area. Lawsuits have a way changing a landowners outlook and it sucks
'cause Gorge area climbers depend on private land.

merrick wrote:...deaths and serious injuries... come from ...natural causes...

Corbin sandstone is hardly bullet proof. It's gonna go at some point.
Then there are the extremely rare stinging insects...



Hey - does he get the FSA?

i was there. scariest shit i've ever seen in my life. honestly, i wonder what the ppl that went to the work (financial and time) to establish that area would think if the 'lode got shut down. i have nothing but respect and friendship for greg (we're still buddies) but i do think his judgement was not the best in this instance. i tried, in vain, to talk him out of it before he did it. i'm glad that he's alive.

[quote="merrick"]i have never heard of an area that has been shut down becuase of soloing. Can you provide an example?

No, but I have heard of TONS that have been closed for pissing off the land owner.

A person has to make his/her choices. A solo is a solo regaurdless. It's not about rules or technicalities. That being said, a person must also be aware of how his/her choices affect others as well.

Each person chooses thier own trail. Leave them to it.

Anyone who has posted negative comments, have you ever soloed a route? (No matter how easy the grade) And if so, ask yourself, what's the fifference. You could just as easily break a hold off of a 5.8 as a 5.13.

Not condoning or criticizing.

HERE is some fodder for some convo on this subject.

But those who free-solo say the practice is no more dangerous than hiking close to precipices:


"It's not necessarily just this wild, crazy, thrill-seeking activity," said Jeff Achey, editor of Climbing Magazine. "It's a natural part of climbing. It's just a way of taking scrambling around in the mountains and putting it into a much different terrain.

"People trust themselves not to trip and fall over their own feet. Climbers are very used to traveling on vertical terrain. It's a no-fall situation, just like looking over the visor of Half Dome. You can't trip and fall. If you do, you die."

Indeed, there are few injuries to free-soloists, said Yosemite climbing program manager and park ranger Mark Fincher, because accidents usually result in death, not injury.

Between 1970 and 1990, a National Park Service study found that 14 climbers were killed and two critically injured while unroped - although none of those accidents involved true free-soloists. Climbers who temporarily unroped on easy
terrain during long, roped climbs accounted for most of the unroped accidents.

There has been only one confirmed death of a free-soloist at Yosemite - Derek Hersey, one of the highest-profile climbers ever to die while free-soloing. While climbing Sentinel Rock in Yosemite Valley in 1993, Hersey plunged several hundred feet to his death.




"Climbing is not overtly competitive, but it certainly is competitive in a lot of ways," Fincher said. "It's not a place, perhaps, to be competitive because people will get killed. It's also seen as more of a spiritual thing. It's a very real experience - a spiritual, inward experience - so people talk about it less. It goes around the parking lot - it gets around - but it doesn't tend to get as publicized in the media as much as other exploits.

again there is a big difference between doing this on public land versus private land and Yosemite rock is granite, not even comparable to sandstone