Beware of Daisies!

Last night I went down to Black Diamond to break gear. Yes, that's right I took brand new gear, much of which I don't even own and proceeded to pull and drop it until it failed. (oh, alright, I was mostly just watching the people who were doing it, but it sounds better in the first person) Some very interesting and scary things came up which I wanted to share with everyone who climbs.

Nylon Daisy clipped through the ends, but also short clipped with the same biner, this resulted in total failure as the loops ripped out allowing the biner to just fall off the end and again about 2000lbs or force. Now all you topologists can figure out that yes, there is a way to short clip with one biner so it can't fail, but that can be hard to figure out while on the side of a cliff. The lesson: if you're going to short clip, use a second biner! A bunch of us were pretty horrified to watch our 170lb test load bounce on the concrete floor after this one. It was also pretty cool to see when it's not a real person.

So maybe you knew that already, but I suppose it never hurts to be reminded. Climb safe!

P.S. I skied Green's something today (gully? alley? area? chute?) It's near Meadow Chutes). I'd give the uptrack a solid 8.5 out of 10. The way down only got a 6.5 - too many trees close together for my inability to turn sharply in powder. Something to ponder: How ofen do you like the uphill better than the downhill?