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Hello --

During an expedition to the cave in Mexico, there was an accident on November 19th involving Dave Flannell. I was present during the accident and the rescue efforts that ensued.

For many of us, it was our first time to the Cave, so all of us were rappelling to inspect the landing area and understand the cave's dimensions before making our first jumps which were to come the following day. We were using a Petzl 5-bar Rack on static rope for the 1,200ft rappel.

Dave was approximately 400ft from the bottom of the cave when for reasons unknown to us, his brake hand came off the rope and he was unable to regain control of his descent.

Three team members who were already at the bottom of the cave reached Dave within 30 seconds and resuscitation efforts began. At the top, we went into immediate action by lowering down another one of our team members who is an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician) with all of our emergency medical supplies. He reached the bottom at the 22 minute mark and took over from those who had been performing CPR since the onset of the accident. After 46 minutes, with no sign of recovery, CPR was stopped.

The next 4 hours were spent carefully recovering Dave's body and extracting the remaining team members from the bottom of the cave.

We were not allowed to move Dave from the top of the cave until the Haustecan Indian's priest could bless him with a prayer ceremony. After the ceremony, the Haustecans burned a candle by Dave's side and we remained there in silence until the candle burned out late in the night. The Haustecan's genuine care and respect was very moving.

As a group, all of us have decided to call off the remainder of the expedition out of respect for Dave's family and friends as well as the Haustecan Indians that inhabit the area.

The expedition organizers, along with one of Dave's close friends who is also on this trip, have been working around the clock with the US Embassy to ensure that Dave and all of his belongings reach home safely.

Even though I only knew Dave for a few days, it only took 30 seconds to grow a liking to his smiling face and bubbly personality. We are all saddened by this loss and send deep condolence to Dave's family and friends.

Please understand that I am in a remote place, so if you write to me, it may be a few days before I can reply.

Blue Skies Dave,

Bryan

did dave have any experience prior to this with rapelling or belaying?

To those interested in the tech involved in rappelling into the cave and it's complexity...

This is very serious business. I have climbed big walls for years and had never done such a long rap. It's about 1100 feet of free-air to the bottom.

What is necessary is to start out with very little friction on the rope so as to slide down it without having to hand feed the rope thru the friction device. The reason for this is because as you start the weight of the rope hanging beneath you pulls so hard on the rap device that even a small amount of friction is sufficient to stop your descent. The friction device is adjustable as you go along for this reason. As the weight of the rope beneath you decreases by virtue of your descent you must add friction to remain in control. This is done by holding tighter to the rope below you -or- by adding more friction to the device with which you are sliding down the rope. Adding friction to the device used in this instance is very simple and with care can be done in seconds. I'm sure the parties involved practiced this move prior to getting on the rope.

As I said... this type of rap is pretty unique to the caving world. It is rarely done elsewhere so very few have the experience in our BASE community if they haven't been to the cave.

When I went to the cave with Aerial Extreme I was most impressed with the emhasis they put on safety and proper training. Their rigging is exemplary and done by world class experts in the field.

Jon Stark Cave BASE#69

Was there any form of backup in the rappel system (ie shunt,prussik) ?

My condolences to family and friends.

BSBD

I had no back-up in either form as you suggest. Single point of failure. I think the shunt would have been best. Remember, it's a long rap and things get very hot.

I think a firemans belay on the bottom would also be a good idea. If the rapper loses control the person on the bottom pulls on the rope adding to it's weight and stops the descent.

This is a sad day, Dave was my first jumpmaster.
He taught me alot and was always the first to help new jumpers.

Thank You for posting so we know what happened, and it is nice to know about the respect that was shown for a good man!

He will be missed.

Blue Skies Forever

Why not just use a Petzl Stop or similar device?

I dont think the Petzl Stop is built for rappels longer than a few hundred feet. The details still dont seem too clear. 400ft of rope would still put a lot of friction into the rappel system and an uncontrollable descent seems unlikely unless a component in the system failed or he was carrying gear increasing his weight.

I think a shunt would be the proper piece of gear as it can be held in such a way so as not to be in too much contact with the rope until you let it go. The Stop is not suitable with so much weight below and/or for such a long rap.

The lower brake bars of a rack system can be made long to absorb the heat and to make them easier to shove down against the rope to add friction in a panic. It isn't the most effective move but helps a little. With only 400 feet of rope hanging one could take a wrap around the thigh and have both hands free to fiddle with the gear. Maybe this accident was caused by the person waiting too long to add friction and when he finally decided to he was unable to hold himself still. When I did it I kept things adjusted so as to be able to adjust speed by keeping the rope running over my shoe then I could just push out with my leg to slow down. I do recall that the friction at the bottom was light if you let the rack shift apart.

I agree. Shunt would be better option on this type of rappel.

As jon said, one option is to wrap the rope around your thigh a couple of times if you need to hold yourself in a brake position. The problem with this, as he stated, is that many times there might be far too much rope hanging below you to accomplish this. Therefore you might want to consider keeping a "jumar" attached to your harness in the event that you would like to stop the rappel. You could even use this method in addition to having a shunt.

Very sorry to hear about this.

My condolences.

bigwallmaster

oh. . . . . .and what i mean by using a jumar, is that you could clip it into the rope above your rappel device, as means of stopping your descent.

bigwallmaster

I'm sorry, but I would never have attempted this rappel without a backup, period.A secondary rope with a rope grab would have saved this mans life, even if his main line had somehow broken.

  As I am finally back in the US, and plugged back into the net, I decided to post a message about this tragic accident.
As the group leader and interpreter, I feel very sad to have only known Dave for such a short time. He was amazingly witty and enjoyably to be around. BASE jumping in Mexico I have made many life long friends, and I knew that Dave was going to be one of them . My deepest condolences to all who knew Dave and to his family.
Blue Skies,
Jay Epstein Ramirez

 I have done a few long rappels, so I'll add my 2 cents.
Firstly, it is not uncommon in the caving world to do a long rappel. Advanced cavers do 1000 ft. plus rappels all the time. There has been hundreds of cavers that rappeled the cave before the base people even discovered it, myself included.
It is not safe nor is it recommended (on long rappels) to use the backups that have been described here. The main problem is heat.
The rappel rack gets so hot from friction that it is dangerous to stop. The heat from the rack can and will melt the nylon rope at the place you stop. I have seen ropes where the sheath was almost totally cut by a hot rack. Burnt spots on a rope make it totally unusable.
Using dual ropes, one for a backup, does not work on long rappels. They can get entangled, making it impossible to rappel the full drop.
A person at the bottom to add weight to the rope , if someone loses control, is probably the best backup, however it puts them in harms way if they cannot stop the out of control rappeler.
If you dont open your parachute on a jump you will die, if you lose control of your rack on a long rappel you die. Its as simple as that.
Chris

 

Please enlighten us then with the details of how YOU would have rigged a 1300 ft. free rappel. You give vague examples, but how about getting specific? Name the device, knot, or whatever else you would have used and how it would be configured...
mh

Yah no offense but no shi*. Someone died here - how bout some details on the correct way to do it.

And if you don't open your chute - there is always a 'backup' chute. Seems to me like there has to be a way to do a long rappel (1000ft plus) in a safe manner.

There is. He had the right tools for the job.
Dave's gear did not fail. He was properly trained but for some reason did not perform the rappel as instructed. The right gear for the job was the gear/configuration he was using when he died. This is pretty clearly user error to me.
mh

PMed

Gotcha - I thought perhaps there was another safer methodology to follow on long rappels.

Thanks.

i should get in touch with BR, they forgot to include the 'backup' chute in my base rig

Sorry - let me be CLEAR as ICE. There is a backup chute on a skydiving rig. The reason there isn't a backup chute on a base rig should be obvious, but the reason there isn't one on a base rig doesn't equate to why there can or cannot be a backup system on a rappel. That was my point. Does that make sense now? Your post adds nothing to the knowledge base here. I'm just trying to learn more about long rappels, not argue about freakin symantecs.

Edited - sorry for being an ass, I'm just trying to learn from the situation is all.

My condolences to Dave's family and friends. I didn't know Dave very well, but we had spoken a number of times at BD. Whenever I saw him, he always had a smile on his face. He seemed a happy and kind person. I'm sure he is missed. BSBD Dave.
Additionally, I am responding to this thread to call attention to a few threads going in two separate groups: a couple of threads on the National Speleological Society forum and some discussion on a yahoo e-group known as "iztaxochitla," the latter being a membership-required group in order to read the text of the messages. Further, the iztaxochitla groups messages are all in spanish - I've been running them through babelfish to read them.

Anyway, the NSS group threads may be read here:

NSS Thread 1 - This is a discussion of the drinas accident, accusations, flames, etc.

NSS Thread 2 - this is the more informative/productive of the threads - note that there are currently two pages of discussions for this thread.

Bottom Belay tests on long drops - I only post this thread because it is a link posted within some of the discussion on the NSS threads, but perhaps worth highlighting by itself - may be useful, maybe not... YMMV.

Finally, discussion on the yahoo e-group, iztaxochitla, has lately turned to a few mexican cavers calling for BASE to be banned at the cave. This is the major reason why I post these links - sort of a heads-up-damage-control-warning. I don't speak spanish. I didn't even stay at holiday inn express last night, so I find it difficult to respond to any of these messages. From what I can discern, the mexican cavers want to push the mexican authorities to place drinas into a protected status, which would limit the activities at the cave. As I've stated, I'm only forwarding what I'm reading - and these folks' desires may not even come to pass. Frankly I don't know. But if you want to read the text of these messages, you'll have to join the iztaxochitla group. To do that, you'll need at least a yahoo ID and to subscribe to the group, as the messages cannot be accessed without subscription.

Link to the group:

Iztaxochitla

Don't shoot the messenger. I really don't have a dog in this fight beyond wanting to protect the object from the standpoint of sport/object-preservation.

Gardner

I'd think that BASEhoundSam would be our appropriate spokesman in that forum. Let me see if I can dig up his email and let him know...

Tom,

pm sent.

G

I dont think the Petzl Stop is built for rappels longer than a few hundred feet

This is correct. The STOP is OK for drops of up to 100 m, but this may be modified by variables such as rope brand, age, condition, diameter, and other factors.

For a very long drop, the best device to use is what cavers refer to as a "long rack". Most brake bar racks are about 14" in length. There are no precise standards for what constitutes a "long rack," but I have seen them up to 24" long. The advantage of a long rack is that the friction is highly and continuously variable, even with all 6 bars rigged onto the rope. With shorter racks, one must either start with fewer bars at the top, or keep all bars on and feed the rope manually through the rack until the rope weight eases off. There are advantages and disadvantages to each approach.

The best guess as to the cause of the recent accident is that David's arms/hands became tired from feeding the rope through the rack and he thus lost the ability to control the descent by gripping the free end of the rope. Not being highly experienced in such situations, other control options such a "leg wrap" perhaps did not occur to him.

For what it's worth, I work for Petzl and have done the rappel in question once (on rope, not falling through the air with a chute!). I am not a BASE jumper and am posting here in reponse to an email rec'd by Petzl from a person asking about the suitability of the STOP for a very long drop.

Now that's service.

I sent the email to Petzl at 11:35. By my watch, that's 24 minutes for you to respond.

Thanks!