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She's seen using an ascender on the video, the blue Petzl model. Plus this is all the gear you really need to climb mountains, isn't it?

MoapaPk wrote:

climberslacker wrote:but still, the boots were compleatly unnesesary, i would have prolly just hopped over and got the cat, it was what, 7 feet? at the most? But still cool that shes 60, and still doing that crap.

-CS

It looks at least 7', but the main thing is that the top of the wall was well beyond her reach when she was on the ledge. More important, the narrow ledge was quite high up on the abutment. Unless one is extremely agile, just hopping down to the ledge would be extremely dangerous. And how would she get back up, once down, since she couldn't reach the top of the abutment?

I can't tell from the video, but the description makes it sound like she had tied friction knots, but hadn't used enough coils, so the knots were slipping. Maybe she did have an ascender.

The ledge is not that narrow. She's standing sideways on it when she picked up the cat. And then she handed it up to the people above her while standing on it. (Look at minute 1:26.) It couldn't have been more than 7' high. Anyone that is comfortable with heights could have lowered themselves down to the ledge and then hopped back up afterwards.

I'm not dising her in anyway. She played it safe and did great for a 60 year old woman.

MoapaPk wrote:

Ammon Hatch wrote:Why is she wearing mountaineering boots? Was that what she was running in? Seems like she wanted to put on a show.

She says that she went home and got her climbing equipment first.

I understand that. But if I did this I'd run home for the rope, harness and ascenders. Does footwear really matter on a 7' rappell/jug?

Alpinist wrote:The ledge is not that narrow. She's standing sideways on it when she picked up the cat. And then she handed it up to the people above her while standing on it. (Look at minute 1:26.) It couldn't have been more than 7' high. Anyone that is comfortable with heights could have lowered themselves down to the ledge and then hopped back up afterwards.

Say the ledge is 18" (when I stand with my feet comfortably apart, that is 16"). Would you have just "hopped over" to the ledge (with a several story drop below) as the previous poster suggested? If you were as short as she?

If she had been shown with lesser gear, someone would have complained that she was being reckless.
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When I came back from Williamson in June 2008, I met a woman in the parking lot; she was wearing plastic boots. I told her that she could make the trip in much lighter footwear; she shrugged and said, "these are the only boots I own."

Would I have "hopped over"? No.

Unless it was wet or extremely windy or something, I would have been comfortable lowering myself down though. I'm sure you know how to lower yourself down off a ledge from a sitting position. Spin around and lower until you are hanging from your fingers... Getting back up would have been just as easy. As long as you have a good handhold and it's not eroding dirt on the edge, then that would be simple enough.

I'll grant you that it's hard to know what the conditions were like. It looked safe enough to me though. Cheers...

It would have made a lot more sense to just continue the rappel down to the ground; it was less than half a rope length. Ascending, even 7 feet, adds complexity to something that would be quite simple otherwise.

Of course, this is hindsight and an armchair quarterback comment on my part, so take it only as that.

But I can imagine how silly she would feel if she, being for some reason unable to do the ascent, did not use enough rope to do that simple rappel to the ground, and she would have rescued a dumbass cat but then required rescue herself.

Alpinist wrote:Getting back up would have been just as easy. As long as you have a good handhold and it's not eroding dirt on the edge, then that would be simple enough.

I think it's a reasonable statement that very very few 60+ year-old women have the finger and arm strength to do a legitimate pull-up on a chinning bar at the gym, let alone one hanging from fingers on a broken concrete ledge.

The simplest solution would seem to be to tie a rope to a basket, put some fish of other cat treat in the basket, lower it to the cat, wait for the cat to jump in, and then use the rope to raise the basket with the cat.

But, of course, this is a climber's site!

Day Hiker wrote:

Alpinist wrote:Getting back up would have been just as easy. As long as you have a good handhold and it's not eroding dirt on the edge, then that would be simple enough.

I think it's a reasonable statement that very very few 60+ year-old women have the finger and arm strength to do a legitimate pull-up on a chinning bar at the gym, let alone one hanging from fingers on a broken concrete ledge.

No argument. I did state earlier that a younger/stronger climber would not need a rope if he/she was comfortable with heights.

isostatic wrote:The simplest solution would seem to be to tie a rope to a basket, put some fish of other cat treat in the basket, lower it to the cat, wait for the cat to jump in, and then use the rope to raise the basket with the cat.

But, of course, this is a climber's site!

OR - we could have tied a rope around your foot and lowered you down head first. You're not very heavy...

Alpinist wrote:OR - we could have tied a rope around your foot and lowered you down head first. You're not very heavy...

No personal attacks, please!

Anybody who mocks/critiques the techniques of a caring lady who saves a cat with any kind of seriousness needs to get a life. And if you haven't climbed an 8000-m peak, you probably have no idea of how difficult it is to function at that altitude. Props to her for saving the cat, using safe techniques, & to summiting Everest (& the others).

Day Hiker wrote:

Alpinist wrote:Getting back up would have been just as easy. As long as you have a good handhold and it's not eroding dirt on the edge, then that would be simple enough.

I think it's a reasonable statement that very very few 60+ year-old women have the finger and arm strength to do a legitimate pull-up on a chinning bar at the gym, let alone one hanging from fingers on a broken concrete ledge.

I would heartily agree. I can still do at least 23 good pullups, with full extension. But doing pullups from a bar is one thing; doing them against a vertical wall, with a likely rounded edge, is quite another. And once you have pulled yourself up as far as you can, you have to swing one arm into a mantel (mantle!) position and do a one-arm pushup with your full body weight, if you want to top the wall. That's not easy.

Long before the rotator cuff tear, I used to do pullups on a heavy-duty metal door in a room with a 15' ceiling; I'd swing the door open and hang against it. The top of the door was about 7.5', and I'm just 5.5' high (I'm guessing the woman in the video is about this height). Occasionally I would try to get to the top of the door from the pullup position, but the door was so thick that I wasn't guaranteed success, as I couldn't simply hook my hand over the edge.

"Last May Kay also became the second oldest American woman to summit a peak in the Himalayas called Everest."

Wow. Just wow. I'm not sure if this is sarcasm or not, but it's pathetic wording either way.

I think it's cool that she rescued the cat. The boots were total show though.

-Mark

She is tenacious too! She reached the summit of Everest on her 4th attempt.

Ammon Hatch wrote:Why is she wearing mountaineering boots? Was that what she was running in? Seems like she wanted to put on a show.

Hahaha, I was just thinking the same thing. It seems she is wearing a pair of La Sportiva Wmn's Trango S EVO GTX's boots!