In August of 2020 I took a nearly fatal fall on Mt Louis in Banff National Park. Since then, my technical account of the incident was published by the American Alpine Club in their annual “Accidents” book series. It was also featured on their blog.
Prior to it being published, I wrote a less-technical account of how I remembered that day. It was the start of my healing journey from the trauma of my fall.
I think I’m a safety oriented climber, I continuously assess the present dangerous and do my best to manage the most prevalent risks. I stay up to date with safety standards, I knot the tails of my rope, test my belay device before committing to it, extending my rappel, prioritize redundancy when reasonable, that sort of thing. I have around a decade of experience rock climbing outdoors, and while I would never consider myself to be an expert, I like to think I have a reasonable grasp on mountain safety.
Incident
Alistair Hall and I left the trailhead for a 5am start on Sunday, August 20, 2023. We were attempting the Gmoser Route of Mt Louis in Banff, a 16 pitch 5.9 trad line with bolted anchors. A more challenging option than the standard Kane route, but also a more aesthetically pleasing line.
The 5th pitch, the crux of the route, was an impressive lead by Alistair and a challenging follow. After completing that pitch and one more subsequent we decided to back-off, we weren’t progressing as quickly as we had hoped, and we were both tired from the crux.
Fortunately, the route is rappel bolted. We always knew that bailing was a safe option and we weren’t committed to the up-and-over summit route. I was untroubled about turning around early as it meant we’d be finishing with daylight and I could unwind for the remainder of the weekend, despite missing the summit. I turned on my InReach and messaged my wife Emily that we were backing off at 1:50pm, and we had 6 rappels to complete.
After an uneventful rappel of pitch 5, I connected myself to the anchor with a personal anchor system (PAS), a nylon 120mm sling, girth hitched to my belay loop, with two knots for adjusting length. The belay stance was narrow, so I decided to shorten up my PAS by moving my locking carabiner to a knot closer to my belay loop.
While I don’t recall the specifics, in this case I would typically do the following: stay on rappel, unclip my carabiner from the far loop of my PAS and clip it into a new loop, then clip my carabiner to one of the rap rings and lock it. Finally I took myself off-rappel. This is where I believe I made my crucial error.
In anticipation of the next rappel I continued to manage the rope. I took the pink half-rope and fed it through the rappel rings, tied a knot in the end, coiled the excess material, and set it down on the rock next to me for when Alistair was ready to pull the rope. The narrow belay stance would have had me weighting my PAS while tending to the rope, although I don't explicitly remember doing so.
And then I was falling.
In the moment I pictured cut sling, although I couldn’t comprehend what had gone wrong. I aware that I was disconnected from the rock face and that I wouldn’t survive the fall, it was too steep and we were too high. I felt enormous regret. I was leaving behind my wife Emily with our three month old son Calvin. I had betrayed them, I always promised Emily that I would be safe and come home to them, and I had failed. I also felt calm, my mind was clear. I hadn't yet registered the pain of scraping down the face, only noticing the discomfort. I hoped I would lose consciousness quickly, I didn’t want to prolong the inevitable.
Then I was on a ledge. I screamed “help”.
The ledge was narrow, down-sloping, and loose. I continued screaming, “911”, “call 911”. I could see hikers in the valley below. Alistair was also yelling to the hikers below.
I began processing my situation. A blue rope was hanging beside me, I tied a knot and secured it to my belay loop. I was in pain, my left ankle seemed unable to support the weight of my foot, and sitting on my tailbone was painful. I couldn’t easily reposition due to my instability on the sloping ledge, so I shifted my weight to ease the discomfort.
I retrieved my InReach out of my backpack, held down the SOS button, the beeping telling me that help was on the way. I then messaged Emily, my wife, to get ahead of the phone call from search and rescue. I sent: “I’m hurt but okay”, “I’m gonna get a heli” at 2:05pm. Below me and to might right was the bolted anchor we used previously, meaning I had fallen the full length of the pitch - 35 metres. The distance was confirmed by the middle mark of the rope, which was beside Alistair at the anchor above.
I yelled to Alistair that I was secured to a rope, on a ledge, and conscious. We yelled, forgetting that we were carrying radios. Alistair informed me that my carabiner was still locked to the rappel ring, and I confirmed that my PAS was unbroken. He offered to descend to me, but we decided he should stay at the anchor. I was in a precarious position and didn’t want to introduce any new hazards such as rockfall.
I sent and received several messages from the InReach dispatch, in my stunned state I had trouble keeping track of who I was communicating with. In between messages to search and rescue I messaged Emily: “I’m secure I think I broke my ankle”, “I love you and Calvin, I’m going to be just fine”, “Text my parents pls”. At 2:24pm the Banff rescue dispatch emailed my InReach asking for more details, I responded with “pitch 3 of the gmoser route on [mt] Louis” and they informed me that the rescue team was launching.
Rescue
At 2:48, the helicopter arrived and two individuals were long-lined onto the mountain, drilled new anchors, and secured themselves to the rock face. They asked if I had taken a lead fall and I informed them that it was an unroped fall. They had to confirm what I had said, my story seemed unbelievable. I was informed that I should buy a lottery ticket. I tried to remain upbeat and cheerful, making jokes about the situation. It was with the intention of gratitude for the rescure, but I was clearly in shock.
I lacked signs of internal bleeding or a spinal injury, so they chose to longline me into the meadow below, before getting loaded into the helicopter at around 4pm.
Recovery
I told my understanding of the story to the rescue team, the medical staff at the Banff Mineral Springs Hospital and was consistently told to buy a lottery ticket. I was treated in the trauma ward of the Banff Mineral Springs hospital, staying overnight, before being transferred to the Rockyview Hospital in Calgary for my surgery on my ankle.
During my fall, I broke my left fibula and had dislocated my ankle, resulting in tendon damage. Despite my many bruises and abrasions on my hands, arms, thighs and calves, I was relatively unscathed. A screw was added to my ankle to stabilize the bone, and I wore a cast for 6 weeks. Very lucky for what should have been fatal.
Analysis
I believe what happened to me is similar to this story from the AAC: https://americanalpineclub.org/news/2022/2/9/the-prescription
I mis-clipped my PAS and had no backup. While I had weighted my PAS and it held temporarily, it eventually released. Backing up a PAS isn’t something I typically do, since it is easy to inspect for error, and a second carabiner takes up valuable space on the rappel rings. It is easy to inspect, if you take the time to do so.
I don’t recall how my fall stopped, but I may have been slowed down by our loose rope during my fall. I found myself sitting on the last two meters of the blue rope on the ledge, and I have a rope-shaped bruise on my inner biceps that might indicate that I was entangled, but I can’t say for sure.
Regardless, if I had not stopped on the ledge and continued down steeper terrain, the fall would not have been unsurvivable.
The rescue team commented that my InReach messages were valuable, they were seemingly familiar with the mountain and the route, and had no trouble locating me.