[from Canyons Group] Left a rope on Heaps

[hank moon]

Below is a cross-post from the Yahoo Canyons group.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/canyons/message/65409

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/canyons/message/65410

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/canyons/message/65411

Josh said:

Hey,

I just wanted to make it known that due to some issues off the last rap on heaps, my group had to abandon our ropes fixed on the last rap on heaps canyon the last Friday. It is a red rope and yellow rope. If someone is going through and can take it down that would be awesome.

Thanks
Josh

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Hank said:

Hi Josh

Thanks for letting us know about the hanging ropes and please provide full details when you can. Park authorities are unhappy about danglies at the upper emerald pool, so speedy removal benefits the entire community. Thanks in advance to the rope janitor(s).

hank

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Ram said:

Thanks!
What happened? Tough pull sometimes if certain precautions are not taken. How were conditions?

It is important to the community that the ropes be gotten soon. This is a tourist destination (Upper Emerald Lake) and the park will frown on the eyesore of ropes hanging there. Volunteers for a run through?

[hank moon]

Post from Rich Rudow (Canyons Group):

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/canyons/message/65434

Josh, thanks for the heads up. Hopefully someone can get the rope quickly so the NPS doesn't overreact. A rope was recently left at the final 180' waterfall rappel at Deer Creek in Grand Canyon. The NPS completely (and permanently) closed it to canyoneering. It's not clear how big a factor the rope was to the closure, but it sure didn't help. Ropes had been left in the past too so this was a recurring problem. One of the tribes, who have a religious connection to Deer Creek, had been complaining about canyoning descents. Stuck ropes just reinforced their view of us. Deer Creek, like Emerald pool, is a popular tourist hangout.

A few months back I found myself in the exact situation you described in Heaps - dangling 150' off Emerald Pool with a pull cord snarl and plenty of onlookers wondering how I would get out of that jam. Crap! I was used to applause on that rap, not Ooooo's :) Here's what I ended up doing. I locked off about 10' above the first snarl and undid as much as I could allowing me to rappel further each time. After about 6 rap/lock off sequences I was unable to proceed any further. The pull side consisted of two different ropes. I untied the lower rope and managed to get it untangled so I could drop it to the ground. That cleared enough of the snarl to allow me to get the rest undone and cleared. Dan and Todd then tied the pull rope I dropped to the bottom of the rappel strand and I pull it up to me, retied it to the pull side, then rapped down. The guys on the ground immediately cleared the pull side to keep it from winding around the rappel strand so Kip could rap down without repeating my embarrassing feat.

Here is what I learned - your mileage may vary:

1 - Kip and I pulled the upper rope down while on the bird's perch and just let it fall. We had already secured the upper rope end to pull side. Had we instead stuffed it in a rope bag and then done a toss we would not have had a problem. But we were in a hurry for food after a great day :)

2 - we could see the snarl from the bird's perch. I told Kip that I would just fix it on the way down, rather then pulling the rig up and fixing it on the perch. I was in a hurry for beer (and food) :)

3 - I've done Heaps before and had also done many rappels bigger than Heaps so this really didn't register as a "big deal." Over confidence? Complacency? Both? Probably both! Plus I was looking forward to beer :)

But my view changed when I was hanging 150' off the deck with no way down. The snarl was so bad that I wasn't sure how long I could be hanging there and I started moving my legs and changing my position to keep the circulation going. At one point I thought I might have to jug back up to fix the issue on the perch because I couldn't just hang there forever without some damage. To make matters worse there were 16 people in Heaps that day and we were blocking two other groups from getting down (sorry folks!). Fortunately it was all sorted out in about 20 minutes.

This kind of thing gets you thinking though. Heaps is a very serious place. Plenty of people do it without having an ascending system on their racks. Even less experienced people with marginal skills are looking to bag this canyon. It's all rappelling right? Until it isn't. These big canyons really shouldn't be attempted unless everyone on the descent team has practiced and refined skills. Adding friction, locking off, switching over from rappel to ascend (and back), passing a knot, etc, etc, etc should be in every person's repetoire. Todd stuck his rope at the Emerald Pools rap once. He jugged back up, fix the problem, and then pulled it.

I'm not trying to make light of your situation, but why not jug back up, fix the problem, then come back down? If not right away then how about the next morning? Maybe I'm overly sensitive to this issue, but leaving a rope at Heaps is the worse place in the entire Park. Somebody is sure to complain. A few months back some guys got in jam in Garden Creek in Grand Canyon. To their credit, they quickly sent Todd a note bringing the issue to light so it could be fixed. But they indicated that "they" wouldn't (or couldn't) fix it - had a plane to catch. Todd and I spent a Saturday going through that canyon extracting 600' of rope. Kind of pissed me off actually.

The only saving grace with Heaps is that the canyon sees a lot of traffic so the rope won't be there for long. Glad you guys are safe.

Regards,

Rich

[bkilgrow]

Sorry to here about the ropes. We've had some ill luck in other places, so I know the feeling.

Any luck finding any camera's?

[Kishkumen]

That last rap on Heaps has a little crack where you rap and snags ropes. When you get down there, there isn't anything you can cram into the crack to protect your ropes from being stuck. If someone would pound in just the right size of rock in that crack it would save others a lot of grief.

[hank moon]

That last rap on Heaps has a little crack where you rap and snags ropes. When you get down there, there isn't anything you can cram into the crack to protect your ropes from being stuck. If someone would pound in just the right size of rock in that crack it would save others a lot of grief.

There used to be a little dead tree in there with a beautiful polished rope groove. Wish it was still!