Have the climbing signals "take" and "safe" every been confused to the point of an accident?
There is a story I have heard about climbers who confused "take" and "safe" and I am wondering if it has actually happened.
The story goes like this,
The climber is out of sight of the belayer and gets to a hard spot. The climber yells down "TAKE"
"Please pull in as much slack as possible."
However the belayer hears "SAFE" as in ,
"I am at the anchor, please take me off belay."
and so the belayer takes the climber off belay. Then the climber attempts the move and falls and plummets to the ground.
Also the confusion is supposed to be because of the belayer being English/Australian, as the American way of asking to be taken off belay is to yell "OFF BELAY".
This seems plausible, but are there any actual records of this happening?
2 answers
Yes! My friend Wendy was belaying my friend Jake on the classic trad route Cemetery Gates.
I think it was the first pitch. He was around 30m into the pitch and was having a hard time. He'd not moved for a while and shouted down something. Wendy took this to mean safe and started unscrewing the karabiner. The next second he's falling. She makes the catch and all is well, but it was close to disaster.
I was at another crag at the time so I can't give too much detail, but the issue was that he said "take!" and she heard "safe". This is the one and only time I've heard about this happening though.
Additionally, Rock and Ice post details of accidents that happen in the states. Edit: heres an example close to the matter at hand
I've been out climbing at Bosigran on windy days several times and not been able to hear my partner. I think it's USUALLY best just to fall off rather than shout take. Rope tugs can be used to signal an increment to the next phase of the climbing system. I've also used walki talkies, but my friend Joe dropped one in the ocean. Thanks Joe.
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Anecdotal, but this did happen to a climbing partner of mine while they were climbing with someone else. The climber yelled "Take!" while out of sight of the belayer, and heard a reply "OK, you're off belay!" He immediately clipped in directly to the nearest piece of (trad) gear, and, still holding on to the rock, got a second piece in as a backup, also clipped directly to his harness, and then screamed at the belayer to put him back on belay.
Using a clearer instruction than "Safe" is a good start, but not really sufficient, as regardless of what the climber intends to say when they reach the belay/anchor, a belayer could still mishear a climber's call of "Take" as "Safe". I'd suggest it is more important that the belayer always asks for confirmation before taking a climber off belay.
E.g.
"I'm safe!"
"Ok, [climber's name], taking you off belay?"
"Yes, [belayer's name], take me off belay."
"Ok!"
*Belayer only now takes the climber off belay*
"Ok, [climber's name], you are off belay!"
This post was sourced from https://outdoors.stackexchange.com/a/16209. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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