4/8/2012
Warning: This post isn't as fun. Mom? You don't want to read this one. Another decade-old incident but this time recounted from memory, since my notes at the time were "My femur and my boot both really wanted to be in the same place at the same time, they had a 40' race to get there, and my boot won. Other than that great weekend."
I spent a long weekend with urbex buddies, climbers, rope-nerds, and all-around great people. We hit up a nuke plant, we slithered through paved-over waterways, we climbed a handful of factories... one of the best weekends of my life. But Sunday was the crown jewel. We had a 300' rappel down into a dam spillway, and I'd spent months preparing, going so far as to purchase a 400' rope just for the occasion.
Setting up, all our nerves were setting in. Even though we know what we're doing, this is a slippery 300' hyperbola on wet ropes that would be happy to end any or all of us. So we confirm our knots and backup knots, anchors and backup anchors, I mentally rehearse the tricky bit step-by-step, and just like that it's go time. I'm confident, I've been training, so I take on the split-rope. Rappel 150 feet, then pass a knot and rappel the second half. I leave my straight-shot rope for those with less experience, figuring I can support anyone having issues from the other rope.
Once I get over the gradual lip and the floor is finally a vertical wall, I'm pretty happy. I've rappelled hundreds of times and the sketchy bit is over. Amazing and surreal views both up and down, watching teammates descend across the gorge, everyone was doing well and it was a great time. Passing the knot was tense, but I'd practiced this, and I safely transferred my weight between ascenders, bights pre-tied for this purpose, and the rappel rack maintaining 100% locked-in
I continued down and finally touched down 300 feet later, excited to explore the internals of this dam, but I didn't want the fun of the rappel to be over yet. The reports over the walkie-talkie were that the rest of the abseilers were going to take the straight rope, so I decided to ascend back up the two-piece rope to hang out with them, snap some pics, and enjoy the spillway. I ditched most my gear to save weight on the climb and headed back up the rope with only some ascenders, webbing, and an ATC for the return trip.
I ascended 30-40 feet and it was indeed a super fun encore. Finally ready to explore the rest of the tunnel, I switched over to the ATC to head back down. I put the brake on, kicked my feet free of the rope-wrap I'd been resting on while switching over, and immediately knew something was wrong. My exact thoughts were:
LOCK! NOPE.
This is very bad.
How bad?
Not sure. We'll know soon
And I slammed into the concrete at the bottom. Right boot tucked under my left thigh. The ATC did not grab the wet rope at all. That's not a standard warning for the ATC, believe me I checked. I still don't understand why it let go, and to this day I will use a rack or a figure-eight (Rescue 8s are my favorite) every time.
Anyways, there I am at the bottom of a 300 foot hole, wind knocked out of me, with my leg in the wrong direction, afraid I ruined everyone's trip by dislocating my hip. I know it should hurt but there's only minor pain, so I tried to move it gingerly back into place. There's the pain, bad enough it's impossible to gently push through. I know I only have one more shot at it before the pain ramps up further, so I kick that fucker back in front of me.
The pain instantly ramped all the way up. Nothing went into place. Just pain, an order of magnitude worse than I've ever felt, and I've done a lot of dumb shit.
At this point, my friends had ran over to me. I only had one (stupid) plan and it had failed, so I surrendered full control to the team, which fortunately included two EMTs. They're super calm, so I'm super calm. It's not like I can do anything about it anyways. They cut my clothes away for a better look ("This is my favorite T-shirt, can you cut around the no-climbing logo?" "Of course!"). They know what happened, but they just tell me they can't pop it into place and I need to go to the hospital. Unfortunately, we're deep within the earth and even if we had cell signal it'd take any rescue crew a day to get to us. No worries. They're cool and collected. The trip organizer is freaking out slightly, but productively. He's deferring to the EMTs and assisting where he can.
They craft a surprisingly decent splint out of tripod legs and donated belts, locking my femur in place. Giving me my now-shredded shirt to bite down on, they load me into an inflatable raft that became my stretcher, and the full crew carried me down to the waterfront of what could have been my sepulcher. My raft was gently placed in a second raft, and two of them climbed into a third raft that had been tied to mine, and towed my bier out of the mountain to a service road.
Now that I'm stabilized, their priority is not getting arrested. I was fully on board, they saved my life, I'm doing ok but thought I ruined the trip (later they told me it was an amazing experience and we've all bonded over it), I figured it was the least I could do. Leaving me one raft to support my leg, they ferried the whole crew out of the dam and evaporated into the woods. With three of us left, we (they) called 911 to send an off-road ambulance to rescue a poor hiker who slipped on some rocks. As we heard the ambulance approach, the organizer reclaimed my splint and melted into the terrain, leaving me with only my EMT friend who'd originally taken charge. Dear OrangeDrank: I still don't know your real name, but I love you.
The professionals walked up casually. "Well, I guess you're the man we're looking for!"
"Yes. Can I have some drugs?"
"Of course!" And they shot me full of morphine. It was wonderful. I stopped shivering, I could relax, I was acutely aware of the pain, but I thought "Damn, that hurts way worse than I realized. Sucks for that dude!"
...That dude being me. I actually made small talk with the medics as they drove me over trails that barely qualify as roads. They were in a good mood, since it was a rescue and not a recovery. I was in a good mood. I'd made it through the hard part. I survived.
I'm sure the drugs helped.
At the hospital they informed me that my femur was completely snapped. They scheduled me for surgery to replace my bone-marrow with titanium in the morning, and strapped me into a tensioner to align all my broken bits overnight. The crew showed up to wish me their best and drop off a couple books, but they had to head home to their respective states in the morning. Xrays done, I finally called my parents. "I want you to know I'm ok. I'm in the hospital and I have surgery scheduled for tomorrow... because I broke my leg pretty bad."
It wasn't until several years later when I realized what a close call I'd had. A violent femur break can go two ways... inward or outward. Outward, it sucks. Inward, it slices the femoral, and you bleed out internally before you even realize what happened. And I tried to kick that bitch back into place.
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| Amazing diptych by Avius, who automatically clicked the shutter when I screamed. Like every good photog should. |
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