Founder and consultant at Over The Edge Rescue. Rescuer, instructor, guide, author, designer, and adventurer.
Progress capture testing for a jigger I was about to post an article about the jigger (aka a set of fours) – how to build (and troubleshoot) using a couple of small double pulleys and cord (coming soon). I tried to remember if I had ever tested the progress capture Prusik as this would be […]
Lightweight systems – testing to the next level Once you start testing you is realise there is more testing to do. The testing aimed to push the limits of the belay for the lightweight rescue system. We decided on a 1.5m drop on 3m of rope with a 200kg load. Back in 2017, we did […]
The American Death Triangle in the real world Recently (Feb 2018) I wrote a blog on the forces involved in the American Death Triangle. I questioned if there were some occasions we can use this style of rigging. Note: I would recommend reading this first article before diving into this one: American Death Triangle and […]
Mechanical rescue belay for 10mm rope? Putting two belay devices with assisted braking through their paces We tested rescue belays (belay devices with assisted braking) as they would function as part of a two-rope system for lightweight back-country rescue. Out in the real world of the backcountry, you often don’t have dry clean conditions. So […]
Deploying the rope for a big canyon pitch Using rethrow and out of the bag techniques Over the past few years, we have been descending some bigger canyons. By this I mean the pitch is longer than half the length of your rope, e.g., 30m for a 60m rope. On these big pitches, it can be […]
Have you ever been told never to use the American Death Triangle for 2-point anchor rigging as it has a pulley effect on the anchors and is considered ‘bad’ or is ‘dreaded’? In this article, we will consider the American Death Triangle in more detail and see what’s going on. What sparked my interest was […]
Ice Anchor Testing Fox Glacier Every year, Fox Glacier Guiding takes thousands of people onto the Fox Glacier. As part of their operation, they guide people on hikes around the glacier where they use ice screws for hand lines (safety lines) and for top rope ice climbing where they use a mixture of ice screws […]
Baseline testing for lightweight rope rescue Making sure we have sufficient safety factor for 10mm rope and 7mm cord This article is about getting some hard data to back up a change in practice – using lightweight rope rescue systems. That is going from 11mm to 10mm rope for backcountry rescue and the associated change […]
Let’s lighten the load After a particularly arduous 24hrs underground and 1000m of hauling on a deep cave SAREX(Search And Rescue EXercise) we started our journey towards asking the right questions about lightweight rope rescue. Could we lighten up the backcountry rope rescue gear we use while keeping acceptable safety margins? We knew we had […]
Double fisherman’s vs. overhand rethread Tying Prusik loops with a bend for your Prusik Minding Pulley For tying Prusik loops I have always used the double fisherman’s bend. However, the double fisherman’s is bulky and as a result, never sits quite right on the body of the Prusik Minding Pulley (PMP). I decided to try […]
