| Name | Age | Sex | Injuries | Injured areas |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Beall, Jim | 27 | Male | Fatality | Not recorded |
A group of six were searching for a cave on the Fair Oaks Ranch in Ken- dall Co., Texas. Some of them had been caving before but none had any vertical training. At a potential entrance, a 3 foot by 6 foot pit, they rigged a homemade rope ladder. One caver descended 60' down to a floor and looked around. He found a second pit of 50 but the ladder reached only 10" down this. Jim Beall (27) with only a flashlight hung around his neck, climbed down to have a look. The ladder work was being done without belay. Beall began to climb back out. About 15' from the top he hesitated, then fell. He hit feet first, rolled 35 down slope and then fell another 50 to the bottom of the second pit. He was determined to be still alive but the group didn't have the equipment to reach him. The others were sent to get help which arrived in about 1.5 hours.
A medic descended to Beall and tied him to a wooden backboard. The victim reported that his legs were getting stiff and he was having trouble breathing. A one inch manila rope and a steel cable were attached to the stretcher and Beall was lifted into a head-up, vertical position. Beall then passed out, presumably due to lack of blood flow to the brain from internal bleeding. Communication between the tow truck winch operator and the rescue team was difficult and several relays were necessary.
The victim was hoisted by people hauling on the rope and the tow truck winching the cable. At the top of the 50' (lower) pit, the stretcher hung up on the lip. Continued pulling on the rope caused it to break, the loose end falling back down the pit. The medic at the bottom tried to use this to pull Beall away from the lip while another caver pulled on the cable. At this point, however, the cable tore through the wooden backboard allowing the victim to fall back down the 50' pit. The medic checked vital signs and pronounced him dead.
References: Tom Iliffe "Accident Report" Texas Caver April 1976 p 70.
Tom Iliffe Personal Communication February 28, 1980.
Analysis: This is another example of cavers using extremely poor techniques and getting in trouble. A belay should always be used in ladder work. However, it must also be said that the rescue group displayed techniques just as poor and turned the badly injured victim into a fatality. The rescue group was local and it is unfortunate that the Texas Cave Rescue System, (cavers) were not utilized. They could hardly have done worse.
Fall from rope ladder, then rescue rope broke. Texas Caver Apr76 p70
This record was last updated on 27th Apr 2024 at 23:11 UTC.