On July 16, Greg Sievers (63) and Rob Meshew (49) climbed a three-pitch route on the lower tier of the Watchtower in order to access Silver Foxes (3 pitches, 5.10a) on the upper tier. Sievers then started up the first pitch of Silver Foxes. The pitch had 11 bolts in 120 feet of climbing, with difficulties up to 5.7. It was well within his ability. At the 10th bolt, he moved right for a no-hands stem rest on a 16-inch by four-inch ledge. There, 15 feet below the belay, the ledge suddenly collapsed.

“I was only able to get half the word ‘falling’ out of my mouth when the first impact caused my body to rotate and go horizontal,” Sievers said. “Accelerating, I began to pendulum to the left. I had a fleeting thought of ‘why wasn’t I stopping’ when my body took a massive impact 40 feet down on a small outside corner. I heard a loud CRACK from inside my back. The snapping was as audible as breaking a dry branch, which I assumed was a rib or two. Everything went black for a few brief seconds, but I did not lose consciousness.”

Meshew was directly below. He was unscathed, despite the hundreds of pounds of rock that rained down around him. Busy dodging rocks, he unfortunately sent Sievers on a long fall. The latter wrote, “In a perfect world the fall would have been about 15 feet. But Rob was scrambling for his life. The sheer quantity of shrapnel coming at him was tremendous: lots of six-inch by one-inch pieces, plus a 200-pound block landed where he’d been standing.” Sievers added, “I don’t know how he avoided injury, but had he been hit, I may have taken a 90-footer all the way to the deck.”

Meshew lowered Sievers to the ledge and they did an assessment of his injuries. Sievers then taped his foot to stabilize it. He belayed Meshew up the pitch to clean the gear and then decided to self-rescue rather than wait for a rescue. Sievers later said, “In hindsight I’m not convinced I made the right choice. An airlift would have likely been faster.”

Sievers made three rappels down the lower tier using a kleimheist backup on the ropes. He was in pain but unaware that his back was broken. Once on the ground, the pair worked their way down the trail. That morning, they had done the 1.5 mile approach hike via the Lava Lake trailhead. Now, with the highway just on the other side of the river, and given his condition, Sievers believed his best option was to catch a ride across the Gallatin River from one of the many active commercial raft outfits. Sievers suggested Meshew descend ahead of him, take his motorcycle home, and return with his truck to collect Sievers. Meshew agreed and departed. Using a dry branch as a crutch, Sievers descended a rugged 400 feet to the climbers’ trail and the Gallatin River. Eventually, a rafter ferried him to the other side of the river. Meshew arrived with the truck. Seven hours after the accident, Sievers was in a Bozeman ER.

Sievers was diagnosed with a broken T-11 vertebra, broken bones in his right ankle, a broken tibia base, and a possible head injury (TBI). In June 2022, Sievers wrote, “I’m looking at a second spinal surgery, and the neurosurgeon said I should give up climbing and skiing since my lumbar group has no discs left and is now bone on bone.”

ANALYSIS

Serious falls often occur on “easy” terrain. It can happen to anyone at any time. With decades of climbing in all genres, Sievers was extremely experienced. He notes with some irony that, “After almost 40 years of climbing, some of it on very sketchy mixed alpine routes, this was my first serious fall—on a [expletive deleted] bolted 5.7 pitch.”

In accidents like this, rock quality frequently comes into play. On Mountain Project, the first pitch of Silver Foxes is called “one of the best moderates in the canyon with amazing face climbing.” Yet as this accident shows, rock quality can never be taken for granted, especially if you leave the most traveled line on a route, as Sievers did.

Finally, Meshew was belaying with a Black Diamond ATC-Guide. While such a device is versatile and adequate, had he been using an assisted-braking device, such as a Grigri, he might have been able to arrest Sievers’ fall sooner while dodging the falling rocks. This might have “...saved me maybe 50 percent of the fall distance,” wrote Sievers. “I remember him showing me his hand—the rope zipping through burned a line in his palm.” (Sources: Greg Sievers, Mountain Project.)