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Accident reporting (Split from BMC pay rope access thread) (Read 3290 times)

DAVETHOMAS90

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It looks as though there was a pretty serious incident at Horseshoe today.

Anyone with any information?

DAVETHOMAS90

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I heard today that this (above) was very sadly a fatality.

https://www.grough.co.uk/magazine/2018/06/10/peak-district-climber-dies-after-fall-at-horseshoe-quarry

I don't have any information on the climber, particularly with respect to experience, but I've heard they hadn't tied in properly, and the rope was left with the knot at the anchors after trying to lower off.

This sort of thing can of course happen at any level of experience, but it's important not to convey anything other than that crags, natural or otherwise, remain hazardous environments.

shark

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Fatalities can happen on indoor walls too

Dave I know your post is nothing other than well intentioned but just to attempt to nip this one in the bud I strongly believe it is not right to discuss the cause of fatalities until after the coroners report. I understand natural curiosity and the superficial public safety argument which have been argued ad nauseum on UKC and wrote an article on this 10 years ago

Thankfully UKB has been free of the sort of unsavoury discussion that takes place every time a serious accident is reported on UKC and personally I’d like to keep it that way.

 :please:

SamT

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danm

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Sadly, I knew the person involved and we should refrain from making assumptions on what happened until the investigation has been completed and the report published.

As an aside, I'm currently involved in a working group looking at the viability of setting up and running an incident reporting system for climbing and mountaineering in the UK. It seems like a simple idea, but there are lots of potential problems to overcome. From the experience of a colleague who has provided expert testimony in many cases, it's quite common for the eventual cause of an accident to be different to that reported initially, even by reliable witnesses such as rescue teams. Their priority is dealing with the casualty, not collecting evidence for an enquiry or for lessons to be learned from.

My feeling is that if we get a system working, the most valuable learning will come from the large number of near misses that form the pyramid on top of which incidents (events which lead to no harm) and accidents (events which lead to harm) sit.

(Feel free to pull this or move to its own thread Shark if desired)

SA Chris

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Condolences.

Interesting Dan, to see how that gets operated. We have an open H&S reporting system at work, and the amount of spurious incidents that get reported is staggering, but it's important that someone has to wade through the dross to get to the useful near-miss stuff.

DAVETHOMAS90

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Hi Dan.

Sorry to hear you knew them.

The intention wasn't to speculate on "cause", but there'd been no feedback on my earlier post, and it seemed appropriate to update.

I think it's important and particularly relevant, given the context of discussion on the other thread. Starting a separate thread/split takes things away from some of the other considerations raised.

Very difficult it may be, but there are concerns here that we shouldn't be afraid of returning to.

 

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