| Name | Age | Sex | Injuries | Injured areas |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Towle, Cindi | 23 | Female | Not recorded | Back, right arm; spine |
On January 12, Lona Brown, Beth Maple, Dave Bradford, and Cindi Towle (23) went up to Fireside Well, a 117 foot pit across from Russel Cave in Alabama. At about 2 p.m. they rappelled in and then spent about 15 minutes on the bottom looking around. In exiting Lona Brown went up first followed by Cindi Towle. The rope, a PMI, was rigged from a tree down a steep slope to the breakover which was a rock with a vertical flat face two feet high. Below the breakover the drop was free.
Towle was climbing with two knots attached by slings to her feet and one Jumar attached to her seat harness. She reached this breakover, tucked her feet under her, stood up pushing the Jumar over and sat down, expecting to be supported by the Jumar. Unfortunately she was wearing oversize leather gloves and one of these had caught in the teeth of the Jumar and Towle went right over backwards. The Jumar then hit the top of the knots (ascender or "helical" knots) causing them to lose their grip and she fell free back down the drop. The knot slings were made of Tenstron and quickly melted through. In free-fall, Towle, amazingly enough, did not panic and reacted by trying to slow herself as you would a rappel, by moving the rope below her, around behind. This she did with her right hand. She feels that she also tried to grab the rope with her left hand, and when the hand resisted due to the glove being caught in the Jumar cam, she yanked it, with great force, out of the cam. The Jumar then caught the 7/16 inch PMI and she came to a very sudden stop, 20-30 feet from the floor.
Towle's injuries were light. She had a strained back and right arm and a pressure fracture of one lower vertebra. She was quite shaken. The sheath of the rope had parted where the Jumar caught and had been pulled down some 18 inches on the core. Towle transferred to rappel, freed the Jumar, and rappelled to the floor.
Another rope was rigged and after a couple of hours of regaining her nerve, Towle and the others exited the cave.
REFERENCES:
1) Jim Smith Personal Communication February, 1980.
2) Marion Smith Personal Communication December 29, 1980.
3) Cindi Coffroth (nee Towle) Personal Communication February 18, 1981.
ANALYSIS: An accident like this is always a cue for some members of the caving community to condemn Jumars, gloves, knots Tenstron, pits and life in general. Certainly, one should always be careful not to let items of clothing, hair, etc., get caught in vertical gear. But there are "ifs" that are appropriate here which we should examine. If the ascending system had been all ascenders or knots which would not release when struck from above, as ascender knots do, then there would have been no accident. If the Jumar had been a knot, presumably, again, no incident would have occurred.
I don't feel that wearing gloves with Jumars is inappropriate. The fact that the glove initiated the accident is immaterial. Many things can cause an ascender to lose its grip. More pertinent is the point that any vertical system must be set up so that, if part of it fails, the caver is still safe. Towle's system was not so constructed.
Another point is the melting of the Tenstron slings. Polypropylene or polyethylene sling material is cheap but has a dangerously low melting point and should not be used in vertical gear.
In the final analysis, though, it is Towle's amazing presence of mind that prevented this from becoming a very serious accident.
Glove gets caught in Jumar while ascending over a lip. Jumar jams open and falls into prusik, causing caver fall stopped only by quick thinking near bottom of rope and the Jumar tearing the sheath of the rope.