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General Climbing Discussion

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Carrot failure @ Muline 18-Nov-2013 At 8:02:01 AM Ben_E

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On 17/11/2013 patto wrote:
>At what point does the safety of the climbing community take precedence
>over the whims of the f.a. ?

>Few, if any, are saying every carrot needs to be replaced. However some
>clearly do, and this issue is something that needs to be discussed and
>managed as a community.

An interesting qn, and I agree a consensus needs to be reached.

My take is that FAs come with certain "rights". These include naming the route, getting your name up in lights in the guidebooks and substantial say on the nature of pro on the route (runout sketch-fest vs. well protected, perhaps mixed pro vs. all bolts etc etc). Ideally the nature of the route should still fit in with the ethos of the area.

The flip-side is that generally FAs occur on public land, and, unless you're bashing your way into the middle of no-where, probably represent an ascent of something that would be ultimately climbed by someone else in the future anyway. This comes with responsibilities to make sure any bolting is to a good standard, and also some rights for that mythical creature "the climbing community".

In my view a FA should not give eternal rights to veto the replacement* of bolts that are clearly substandard or past their use by date. By all means, consult the FAist if they are contactable as a sign of respect when replacing bolts, but ultimately we can't be in a position where every rusted carrot or whatever needs to be cleared with a cantankerous geezer in the nursing home before being replaced (clearly HB and most of the FAists are not in this state yet... but they will be).

That said, any rebolting also needs to be done sensibly and with an eye to the inevitable re-re-placement that will probably have to occur in another 40 years, at least in popular areas that have not been re-claimed by moss.

It seems that the ASCA and others have been working in this space fairly well and with relatively little controversy for years in the US - is there a reason it is so hard to gain consensus here?

*Note "replacement". Adding of new bolts raises the bar significantly.