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Rescued in Blue Mountains May 31, the analysis 25-Jun-2015 At 10:35:41 AM phillipivan

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That guy canyoning in the video, and, well, that's about it.

There are a variety of failure modes that auto blocking knots in either configuration won't protect you from at all, or at best offer a sliver of safety (going off the end of the rope with a knot above the device). Furthermore to the 'auto bloc' is not a back up argument has anyone ever abseiled with a gri-gri (or similar) and a back up for that? I've never heard of it happening. The knots do provide a fairly reliable method to go hands free to attend to other issues like sorting out the next anchor, cleaning gear, untangling ropes, or cowering from falling rock/ice/stubbies/car parts/etc.

I pretty much only use an autoblock when I expect to want to stop for what ever reason part way down. Yes a wrap around the leg also works, but at a certain point becomes kinda annoying.

I extend the belay device off the harness the vast majority of the time though (probably 100% for descents >1 pitch) because I like the ergonomics.