Matching Climbing Systems to Glacier Travel Specifics to Reduce Risk

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When I was just beginning my climbing career, I was taught by a group of mentors. There was a lot that was positive about those early interactions with the previous generation of climbers, climbers who had learned by doing and were excited about passing on hard-won knowledge to those they hoped would avoid the same mistakes they made early in their climbing. I would say that I was generally taught “one way” to do things, however. I don’t know if it had to do with the relative comfort these mentors had with different systems, settling on the one they were most comfortable with, or if it was that they were thinking incrementally: learn this basic thing first, then we can get into nuance. It was probably some of both.

But one of the things I came to appreciate as my climbing career advanced was that the professional guides I started to seek instruction from were a lot less “black and white” about systems. Most of the instruction was of the ‘you could do this, but you could also do that’ sort. Their perspective tended to be more along the lines of ‘all systems have strengths and weaknesses, and so this whole climbing thing is more about matching those system strengths to the right circumstances.’ Basically, the idea was that each system I learned was best applied to some particular circumstance and as I started to apply it to other circumstances, I would start to see that the system didn’t work as well or needed more attention or exposed me to a new set of risks.

So, I needed to learn multiple ways to “do a thing.” Then I could pick from a larger set of options and use what I perceived was the best one for the situation. The upside is that I learned a lot. The downside is that it placed a lot of responsibility on me to be aware of context and selective in my decisions.

I tend to feel that climbing comes down to awareness and decision making, anyway. So, I’ve embraced the added responsibilities.

And so is born my Glacier Travel Series, for which this is actually the second video. I’ve seen a lot of instruction, and had my own instruction, that told me to “do it this way.” Well, there is always more than one way. And indeed, sometimes the “one way” may be less than ideal. Rather than get dogmatic about one way being the best way, then, it is my hope that this series spawns critical thinking. I’ll try to spend more time talking about contingencies and tradeoffs.

This video sets that context. Take a look and decide for yourself if you agree with my over arching premise: we actually are increasing our risk when we hold to the “one way to do it” mentality.