How to Avoid Dropping Climbing Gear

A case of the "drops" is not only bad for your expensive climbing hardware, it can leave you without a crucial piece of equipment that you'll need further up the climb.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• Climbing Gear
• Climbing Harnesses
• Climbing Helmets
• Climbing Ropes
• Climbing Shoes

1. Remove the climbing hardware from the rock and clip it to your harness or gear sling when using quickdraw-equipped gear. Don't detach the gear from the quickdraw, just detach it from the rock and clip it to you.
2. Unclip the quickdraw from the rope with the gear clipped to you. This way the gear is always clipped to either you or the rope.
3. Remove the piece of protection from the rock or unclip the carabiner from the fixed bolt or piton.
4. Let the whole quickdraw/protection or lone quickdraw setup dangle from the rope in front of your tie-in knot.
5. Grab the carabiner that is not attached to the rope and clip that carabiner to a gear loop on your harness or to your equipment sling.
6. The gear is now connected at both ends, and you cannot drop it, so unclip the carabiner attached to the rope. The piece of "pro" and/or the quickdraw will now dangle out of the way along with the rest of your climbing hardware.

Tips & Warnings

• When you remove protection with only a single carabiner attached (instead of a quickdraw, which has two carabiners), be careful not to drop it when you transfer the piece from the rope to your rack.
• Rock climbing is an inherently dangerous activity that can result in serious injury or death. We recommend that you seek proper training and equipment before attempting this activity.