Sometimes the Leader Does Fall

A Look Into the Experiences of Ice Climbers Who Have Fallen on Ice Screws

by Kel Rossiter / Adventure Spirit 

INTRODUCTION

Last winter a climber with Adventure Spirit Rock+Ice+Alpine was asking me about the holding power of ice screws. We discussed the various lab studies that have been done (a list of links to some interesting ones can be found at the bottom of this paper) then he said, “That’s great, but has anyone ever specifically done research into how they actually perform in the field?” He had a point. While the dictum in ice climbing is that “the leader never falls,” in the end, they sometimes do. So presumably there was an ample population from which to sample—but I was unaware of any actual field research done with this population. So, fueled by that question, I decided to explore the topic. The results of this inquiry appear below.

• Ice Screw Survey Paper

Related articles:

Ice Climbing Anchor Strength

Protecting The Ice We Climb