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When I am abseiling, the rope is initially hard to feed through my braking device - if I take my hands away from the rope, I get stuck in mid-air. However, as I am getting lower, it gradually gets...
Question
rappelling
#2: Attribution notice added
by
System
·
2020-04-17T22:02:43Z (about 4 years ago)
Source: https://outdoors.stackexchange.com/q/10992 License name: CC BY-SA 3.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#1: Initial revision
by
anatolyg
·
2020-04-17T22:02:42Z (about 4 years ago)
<p>When I am abseiling, the rope is initially hard to feed through my braking device - if I take my hands away from the rope, I get stuck in mid-air.</p> <p>However, as I am getting lower, it gradually gets easier, until at some point the rope starts running by itself. Now, if I took my hands away from the rope (thought experiment - imagine I have no backup braking device), I would accelerate down and hit the ground very hard.</p> <p>Why is this so? The rope is vertical, and I don't touch any wall, and yet it somehow matters whether I am situated high or low on the rope.</p> <p>I am abseiling on a static rope, the height is 60 meters. Just to make it clear - the wall is absolutely vertical, and then somewhat overhanging, so the wall doesn't hinder my progress in any way.</p>