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 […]
Pulley versus carabiner efficiency. It’s always a good idea to be prepared for self-rescue when you are out and about climbing, caving, canyoning, or mountaineering. Make sure the gear you have can do the job and you have tried it out. One question that comes up is: Can I use carabiners (to save weight) instead […]
This article has been updated in 2020 with all the bends retested and lots more information on variations including small and large diameters. Check it out: Which bends for joining ropes update – CLICK HERE Which bend for joining ropes? Testing and analysis of flat bends used for rope retrieval As part of writing the Canyoning […]
3-Point Anchor Testing Updated and revised by Grant Prattley, OTE Rescue 2014. Based on original work by SARINZ Trust 2005. We started to research 3-point anchor loading as a result of questions asked by both instructors and students. At the time we could not find any articles or testing on this subject area. To date […]
Rigging Myths and other things rope NZOIA Symposium Paper, Tihoi, October, 2014, by Grant Prattley. At the NZOIA conference at Tihoi we had a bunch of people out for half a day breaking and load testing various components in rope systems and maybe a few myths along the way. Back in the classroom, we discussed […]
Rope Grab Test Report Grant Prattley, Lindsay Main and Andrew Welsh, New Zealand Land Search and Rescue, February 2001. Many rope grab devices are used by the rescue technician for a variety of functions in a rope rescue system. This study focuses on rope grabs used in a slow pull situation as used in a rescue hauling system to […]
Snow Anchor Report Snow anchor testing for a variety of common anchors A report by Don Bogie, 2005. The strength of snow anchors is dependent on a combination of the strength of the snow in compression and shear, the strength of the materials the anchor is made, the strength and placement of the attachment system, and the mode […]
