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Chockstone Forum - Crag & Route Beta

Crag & Route Beta

Area Location Sub Location Crag Links
VIC Buffalo (General) (General) The Cathedral [ Cathedral Guide ] 

Author
Loose rock at the Cathedral, Buffalo
scooby
25-Nov-2010
10:37:13 PM
On sunday markq, tim and I headed out to the Cathedral with the idea of climbing Maharajah via the flake start, and then catching up with the other aid climbers later in the day. It was a good plan until markq got hold of a loose block, which he then couldn't let go of without it dropping onto his rope.

Luckily there was three of us there and with a bit of mucking around we managed to get the rope out of the way so markq could release his burden. It promptly fell right where his rope was and bounced off down the hill taking out a tree as it went, check out the marks it left if you're up there anytime soon! Conservative estimate put the block at 50-60kgs. Anyway we finished the climb and decided to quit while we were ahead and wandered down to the Ovens pub (highly recommended) for a few quiet drinks and lunch.

It was interesting that this block hadn't come off before considering the traffic the route gets? I'd been up it a few weeks earlier with 6 others of varying experience and hadn't noticed anything loose. Possibly the recent rain has eroded a bit of dirt around the place?
citationx
26-Nov-2010
10:39:21 AM
I vaguely remember something about a big block in a crack (haven't climbed it since 2007). I'm sure the one i'm thinking about is at the top of the second pitch, as you exit the "big cleft" crack thing, but i reckon it would've been more than 50kg?

(btw - other than informing us this block is now gone, your last paragraph merely opens up the thread to people's pure conjecture about why it came loose...)

I don't think recent rain eroded the dirt. I reckon some aliens came down and were having a goof around with their "LASERs" attached to their heads. a stray beam must've struck the bottom of the block and toasted it, causing it to loosen.

ambyeok
26-Nov-2010
11:18:35 AM
The block was held in place by a bolt. Subsequent removal of the bolt by mr sonja had left the block unstable and dangerous. We can only be glad that no-one was hurt as a consequence of this reckless action.

ambyeok
26-Nov-2010
11:31:27 AM
(p.s. there are also several indicators that North Korea may have been involved)

Miguel75
26-Nov-2010
12:03:41 PM
Darn North Koreans can't be trusted with anything bigger than a penny banger...

The good Dr
26-Nov-2010
12:08:27 PM
1. M9 or Fish Boy loosened it by hammering a piton beside it.
2. While ODH was climbing the route and holding on to the block he became so enraged by a helmet wearer on Sultan that his intense rage induced body heat caused a crystaline structure change in the granite block resulting in a decrease in size and subsequent loosening.
2a. Or maybe it was Robertsonja and he saw the bolts on Sultan...
3. Mikl tested it using Eduardo (body weight only)
4. Simey spilt some Nati Cafe coffee on it ...
5. Dalai used it as a downhill MTB track causing significant erosion
6. Any number of people (eg WWS, Hugh, Afjclak, Wallwombat) had to relieve themselves on it after a big goon session the night before (like super intense smelly acid rain)
7. A sports climber followed the route - 'they totally crush' - causing damage
8. Wendy - being the crack climber extraordinaire - used an aggressive jam below, increasing the crack width by 1.27mm.
9. Some unnamed climbers from NSW with a grudge to bear heard that Onsight was going to climb it and planned 'an accident'
10. Kieranl had planned to use it for an ARG exercise
11. The rebolting of the abseil anchors by Nmonteith shook the block loose (installing those jgoding U bolts takes a lot of force)
12. The block was actually HEXY and someone twigged to it, he has now morphed into something else - BEWARE!

ambyeok
26-Nov-2010
12:11:18 PM
Sarcasm and mud flinging aside, glad everything worked out ok scooby. Must have been scary as hell. I recently trundled a large block off the organ pipes at Araps, this block was certain death and took the gentlest of kicks to dislodge. Goes to show that loose stuff can be found even in the most frequented of places.

[edit] props to the doc for post of the week!!!
scooby
26-Nov-2010
12:47:02 PM
On 26/11/2010 citationx wrote:
>(btw - other than informing us this block is now gone, your last paragraph
>merely opens up the thread to people's pure conjecture about why it came
>loose...)

But isn't pure conjecture what we do so well here? see the above posts!

Yup there is a loose block on the second pitch just before the slab, it's still there and doesn't look like coming out....yet
bl@ke
26-Nov-2010
1:55:48 PM
Brendan will sort out any trundling that needs to be done.

There are 9 messages in this topic.

 

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