Si. Belay loop strappato su un imbrago molto vecchio e malridotto.
Todd Skinner's hands were cut up and he was tired after a hard day of climbing, but he was a happy man standing high above Yosemite Valley on what is known as Leaning Tower.
He and his partner, Jim Hewett of Fairfax, had spent two weeks practicing what would be the first free climb up this route, one of the hardest they had ever attempted.
"We'd probably been up and down it 100 times," Hewett said Wednesday. "We were working out the route, figuring out moves. He was the same super happy person he had always been."
They talked about their plans for the next day, then Skinner began rappelling down from a ledge part way up the 2,000-foot face. Five minutes later, he was dead.
Skinner, a 47-year-old former rodeo cowboy and world-renowned rock climber, fell more than 500 feet to his death Monday after the nylon loop used to attach the climbing rope to his harness broke. The accident has sent shock waves through the climbing community, where Skinner's outgoing nature was almost as legendary as his courage and skill on some of the world's most dangerous rock faces.
"There is just general disbelief that this could happen to him, because he was such a safe climber," said Ann Krcik, a longtime friend who also employed him as a motivational speaker. "He was the pioneer of big wall free-climbing, but he also affected every climber he ever met because he was so personable."
Skinner, who lived with his wife and three children in Lander, Wyo., was a specialist in free climbing, a style in which ropes and other equipment are used only as backup in case of a fall. He is credited with more than 300 first ascents in 26 countries, and his adventures have been documented on film and in magazines in 12 languages.
Among the highlights was the first free ascent of the Salathe Wall on Yosemite's El Capitan in 1988. The route, which is considered by many climbers as the best and most intimidating rock climb in the world, is steeper even than the famous Nose route, also on El Cap.
Skinner's other first ascents include the north face of Mount Hooker in Wyoming's Wind River Range, the Great Canadian Knife in the Cirque of the Unclimbables in Yukon Territory, the Northwest Direct Route on Yosemite's Half Dome and the East Face of Trango Tower in Pakistan's Karakoram Range.
He also led mountain and jungle expeditions to Pakistan, Vietnam, Mali, Greenland and Kenya.
Through it all, he gained a reputation as one of the world's great storytellers. With a mirthful cowboy twang, Skinner would describe in colorful detail his bull-riding experiences on the professional rodeo circuit or his jungle adventures with National Geographic, often with an emphasis on shocking detail.
"He was a character," said speed climbing record holder Hans Florine, who often ran into Skinner climbing the big walls. "He told me once that during an expedition in South America, their food drop didn't happen, so he had to eat monkeys. He said the meat smelled like burned hair because the monkeys weren't skinned before they were barbequed."
Skinner, whose stories were generally regarded as 85 percent true, parlayed his gift for gab into a money-making venture as a motivational speaker, inspiring audiences at 30 events a year.
Steve Schneider, 46, of Oakland, said he met Skinner on the rock climbing competition circuit 20 years ago and was captivated immediately.
"One of the things I remember him telling me was that his heroes were the Japanese left on the islands after World War II," Schneider said. "He said they found some of those guys 15 to 20 years later in the jungles still fighting the war. He emulated those guys in that nothing was going to deter him, and it didn't matter how long it was going to take. He had that dig-in-and-never-say-die attitude."
It was as much his attitude as his skill that made his death shocking to climbers, many of whom regarded Skinner as virtually invincible.
"It's really affecting the climbing community because harness failure is pretty unusual -- it is not supposed to happen," said Ken Yager, president and founder of Yosemite Climbing Association. "It's gotten people thinking about their old harnesses now. I know I'm going to go out and buy a new one."
The part that broke, called the belay loop, is designed to be the strongest part of the climbing harness, but Hewett, 34, said Skinner's harness was old.
"It was actually very worn," Hewett said. "I'd noted it a few days before, and he was aware it was something to be concerned about." Friends of Skinner said he had ordered several new harnesses but they hadn't yet arrived in the mail.
On Monday's climb, Hewitt said the belay loop snapped while Skinner was hanging in midair underneath an overhanging ledge.
"I knew exactly what had happened right when it happened," he said. "It was just disbelief. It was too surreal."
Stunned and in shock after watching his friend fall, he checked his equipment.
"I wanted to make sure that what had caused the accident wasn't going to happen to me," he said. "I then went down as quick as I could."
Hewett said he knew there was no hope. A search-and-rescue team found Skinner's body, wearing the harness with the broken belay loop, about 4 p.m. Monday on the rocks near Bridalveil Falls. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Skinner had survived virtually unscathed on many harrowing climbs. His closest call, friends said, came when a huge block of granite broke off Salathe Wall just as he and his partner reached the top in 1988. The huge slab scraped by them as it fell, breaking their bones but not their rope, which saved them.
In a sport that is full of rivalries and increasingly driven by competition, Skinner was universally regarded as the most generous, helpful and encouraging of all the top climbers.
"It's a huge loss for the climbing community," Schneider said. "I pay him the greatest compliment by saying that I was really jealous of Todd. He turned climbing into dollars better than anyone in America, and by doing that he's broken ground for other climbers. I really looked up to him for that."
capisciammè!!
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