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trkrunner03
Oct 28, 2002, 5:04 AM
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I was talking with some friends who don't climb about climbing being a relatively "safe" sport and I know I have heard that it causes less fatalities than many other outdoor sports and was wondering if anyone knew the average number of climbing fatalities per year in the united states or in just colorado. I have looked all over and have not been able to find anything so any help would be great, you can either post or email me at TrkRunner03@aol.com
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data118
Oct 28, 2002, 5:25 AM
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There's a book published every year about accidents in mountaineering, I think by the Alpine Club.
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brianthew
Oct 28, 2002, 5:25 AM
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Although I haven't an exact reference for you, climbers account for less than 5% of rescues/recoveries performed each year by the NPS. Even the "other" category is larger.
Here's a link for climbing related accidents:
http://www.bml.umn.edu/~peter/climbing/ANAM/ANAM.html
That just lists climbing accidents in particular, though.
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eclarke98
Oct 28, 2002, 5:27 AM
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The best source of info is from the American Alpine Club, they publish a book every year entitled "Accidents in North American Mountaineering." However their numbers include activites besides rockclimbing, such as ice climbing and mountaineering. The number of fatalites in the USA for the past few years are as follows:
1998 - 20
1999 - 17
2000 - 24
2001 - 16
And specific to your question, Colorado had one reported death in 2001. Remember, these stats are not just for rock climbing. Hope this helps.
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curt
Oct 28, 2002, 5:43 PM
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Safe is a relative term. You need to be quite specific about your definition of "climbing" if you want your analysis to reveal how safe (or unsafe) climbing is. For example, do you mean all climbing, including high altitude mountaineering, or just rock climbing. Limiting safety issues to just rock climbing will make climbing look much "safer" statistically, because you are removing that component of climbing that has the highest level of objective danger.
I do remember that Lester Germer calculated (back in the 1960s) that a climber was 100 times more likely to get killed driving from New Jersey to the Gunks than he/she was to be killed actually climbing at the Gunks. I do not know how he made this calculation. However, if he was correct, that ratio may not be so different today, since both climbing and automobiles have become safer over the last 35 years.
Curt
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trkrunner03
Oct 28, 2002, 10:50 PM
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Hey, thanks everyone for the numbers. Curt if you would have noticed in the post I said "safe" in quotation marks meaning I am aware that everyone has a different meaning to the word, I was just looking for a number to show my friends that the ammount of deaths is not as high as they think.
Thanks again,
Dave
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curt
Oct 28, 2002, 11:38 PM
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Dave,
I was merely pointing out that you might be selective of what numbers you show your friends--in order to convince them that climbing is "safe".
Percentage wise, climbing K2 is very UNSAFE. Something over 10% of all people attempting this peak have died. That's barely better than Russian roulette.
Curt
Edited because I can't spell and type at the same time.
[ This Message was edited by: curt on 2002-10-28 15:40 ]
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wildtrail
Oct 29, 2002, 9:28 AM
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I didn't read all the posts, so forgive me if this has been said.
I have written for "Accidents in North American Mountaineering" which is distributed by The American Alpine club. Checking this will give you an idea, but not all cases are reported.
Steve
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