West Virginia, Nelson Rocks. On April 22 George Farrow, Jerry Frederick, and Beverly Frederick were doing practice climbs on the cliffs. The day was sunny and the rock was dry. They had finished their climbing and decided to rappel down. They had their rope, 150 feet of soft lay, ½ inch nylon, looped about a tree so that it hung double down a sheer 60 foot face to two closely spaced, two foot ledges from which one could traverse to the talus slope at the base of the rock. Directly below the rappel, however, the rock dropped away for another 35 feet, with two or three ledges, before it met the talus.

George had rappelled first and Beverly was to be second, leaving Jerry on the large ledge at the top of the rappel. In her caving work Beverly was used to rappelling on a single line, using a seat rappel system in which the rope passes twice through the D-ring and then either over the shoulder or around the waist. The double rope on this rappel would not pass twice through the D-ring, and as she was wearing only a light wool sweater, she did not wish to pass the rope over her shoulder. At Jerry’s suggestion she decided to try passing the rope once through the D-ring and then about the waist. She was not belayed.

After going over the edge she paused on a small ledge about five feet below the top to adjust her seat sling. On leaning back to continue, she found that she could not hold herself with this system, and she began to fall out of control, clasping the rope above her head. She fell backwards off the bottom ledge, ran off the end of the rope, and tumbled headfirst down the 35 foot drop to the talus, where she rolled some 30 feet before stopping. While falling, she hit her head on several of the ledges. Fortunately she was wearing a standard caving hard hat, and this took most of the impact. Both on the spot and subsequent examinations showed that she had suffered no more than extensive bruises and skin abrasions. The hard hat was badly cracked and its metal caving lamp holder was flattened.

Source: John H. Schelling.

Analysis: (Schelling) I believe that this accident points up two things. First, experimenting with new rappel systems should be done belayed, and on shorter, familiar pitches. Second, a hard hat again proved to be the difference between a luckily harmless accident and an almost certain fatality. Of course, a hard hat cannot do everything, and Beverly should still consider herself very lucky. It might be noted that both the Fredericks having read recent issues of Accidents in North American Mountaineering, had decided, just previous to this incident, to always wear hard hats, with fastened chinstraps, when climbing.