Mt Wilson death
David Killick
I don't know how many people have seen the story about the death of the
woman canyoning up near Mt Wilson on the weekend. (I've put a copy of a
story from ninemsn below.) I'm not a canyoner and I don't know the
particular canyon, but I was up at Mt Wilson on the weekend and I'm
astonished anyone went canyoning at all. It rained all Friday, it drizzled
Saturday, rained heavily on Saturday night and steadily through Sunday.
Sunday morning, which is when these people set out, it was raining so hard
we delayed our departure. It's hardly as if this could have taken anyone by
surprise. Is it just me or were these people simply foolhardy? Someone with
more experience on the area might have some better insight.
cheers,
David.
---------------------------------------------
Police lash out at unprepared adventurers
The death of a woman in a canyoning accident prompted police to lash out at
adventurers who set out unprepared for bad weather.
A man watched in horror Sunday as waters swollen by rain swept his
28-year-old wife to her death while canyoning in the Blue Mountains, west of
Sydney.
A helicopter had to rescue two men who set out on a canyoning trip in the
same area on Saturday, but became hopelessly lost in wet weather and fog.
Riddled with deep valleys, the Blue Mountains is a popular but potentially
lethal canyoning destination which last June claimed the lives of two young
men who became trapped on a freezing waterfall.
Police said the woman's death and the rescue highlighted the danger of
people taking unnecessary risks in poor weather.
"Police are concerned about the high number of people going into the
mountains unprepared without a clue about the area or the conditions," said
Inspector Mark McCallum, of Katoomba police.
"They are putting our lives and the lives of volunteers who rescue them at
risk and they shouldn't be in there."
NRMA Careflight director Ian Badham said he could not understand why people
continually failed to take better precautions.
"It is just plain dumb, they have no regard for their own life and no regard
for the people who rescue them."
The 28-year-old woman, an experienced canyoner, became stranded on a rock in
waist deep water at Bowens Creek, south of Mt Wilson, at midday Sunday.
Police said waters were rising rapidly because of heavy rain.
The other three in the party, including the woman's husband, had not yet
entered the water when the accident happened.
Her husband, also an experienced canyoner, stayed behind with his wife while
the two others left the valley to raise the alarm.
Ground crews reached the distressed man and called in a Polair helicopter,
which found his wife's body at 6.45pm.
A local canyoning expert said while Bowens Creek would not normally flash
flood, rains in the Blue Mountains had made it more dangerous.
The two Sydney men winched to safety by the NRMA CareFlight helicopter had
endured two days in cold, wet conditions after setting out to go canyoning
on Saturday.
They had become lost and were trapped on a cliff at Pierce's Corner.
The pair had used a mobile phone to telephone Katoomba Police on Saturday
night.
"They were disorientated because of the wet weather and the fog and could
not find their way out," Insp McCallum said.
"We found them half-way up a cliff."
Police said one of the men had suffered back injuries.
Mr Badham said the pair were ill-prepared for the trip.
"These guys really had no idea - only a general idea (of where they were)
and they just became hopelessly lost," Mr Badham said.
"Our crew came back shaking their heads in disbelief."
ends
David Noble
>
> Hey there,
>
> I don't know how many people have seen the story about the death of the
> woman canyoning up near Mt Wilson on the weekend. (I've put a copy of a
> story from ninemsn below.) I'm not a canyoner and I don't know the
> particular canyon,
It was Bowens Creek - North Branch - in the start of the constriction
just before the junction with the South Branch. This is one of many
canyon sections in the greater Bowens creek area - and is very popular
with commercial operators - as there is a track leading from Mt Wilson
to near the start of this section and another track, just past the
junction leading back to Mt Wilson.
but I was up at Mt Wilson on the weekend and I'm
> astonished anyone went canyoning at all. It rained all Friday, it drizzled
> Saturday, rained heavily on Saturday night and steadily through Sunday.
I am astonished as well.
> Sunday morning, which is when these people set out, it was raining so hard
> we delayed our departure. It's hardly as if this could have taken anyone by
> surprise. Is it just me or were these people simply foolhardy? Someone with
> more experience on the area might have some better insight.
Look for more details in a report of the tragedy by Nigel Hardiman, that
I have posted at:
http://www.ozemail.com.au/~dnoble/canyoningnews.html
Here you will see that:
1. It was the deceased girl's first canyoning trip (so she was not experienced)
2. Two others in her party did manage to reach the carpark above the
canyon (near Wynnes Rock LO)
3. Police S&R squad would not allow the canyoners who were on the scene
to enter the canyon area - instead they waited for the helicopter. This
may not have been the best course of action given what seems to have happened.
also
I don't know who the "local canyoning expert" is, but Bowens Creek does
flash flood. I have experienced a flash flood in the north branch of the
creek on my first trip down the canyon many years ago. The water level
rose 1 metre or so while we were in the section of the canyon above the
south branch junction. It was quite scary. Needless to say - we climbed
out at the junction and missed out on seeing the lower canyon sections.
Interestingly, when we got to the first of the two abseils, we didn't
like abseiling down off the then normal belay point (a log in the creek
I think) - as this would take us into the full torrent of the water, so
looked around for an alternative that would avoid this. We put a sling
around a thread belay high on the right side. On a recent visit to the
canyon - this now seems to be the main belay point.
In my opinion - the upper parts of Bowens Creek - would be more
dangerous in high water due to their more constricted nature.
Dave
>
> cheers,
>
> David.
--
--------------------------
David Noble
dno...@ozemail.com.au
http://www.ozemail.com.au/~dnoble/
Mitchell Isaacs
news:zt%q6.13359$v5.5...@newsfeeds.bigpond.com...
snip
> A local canyoning expert said while Bowens Creek would not normally flash
> flood, rains in the Blue Mountains had made it more dangerous.
What, when it's not raining?
It has a pretty decent catchment, a fairly narrow constriction, and with
rain through the week the catchment would have been saturated.
Seems a pretty likely candidate for a flash flood to me - just add heavy
rain.
It would have been pretty high already though - I was out on the weekend &
saw one creek that flows into a canyon - normally just a trickle, almost 4m
wide in some places!
Cheers,
Mitchell
Peter Worrall
http://www.ozemail.com.au/~dnoble/canyoningnews.html
I went to Bell on Saturday morning with the intention of doing Yilleen
Canyon. Driving past Mount Tomah water was cascading down the banks at the
side of the road. It was not the right day to be canyonning in that area.
Peter.
"David Killick" <dkil...@bigpond.com> wrote in message
news:zt%q6.13359$v5.5...@newsfeeds.bigpond.com...
snail
>David Killick wrote:
>It was Bowens Creek - North Branch - in the start of the constriction
Crikey, this was my first season canyoning and I've been six
times but I've managed to do that one twice.
>> but I was up at Mt Wilson on the weekend and I'm
>> astonished anyone went canyoning at all. It rained all Friday, it drizzled
>> Saturday, rained heavily on Saturday night and steadily through Sunday.
>I am astonished as well.
A few of us had been thinking about it on the Friday; the weather
reports we'd seen at that point suggested that SUnday might be ok
but the others decided to go mountain bike riding instead. Seeing
all the rain on Saturday (combined with the rain during the week)
was enough to convince me that canyoning wouldn't have been an
option anyway.
>http://www.ozemail.com.au/~dnoble/canyoningnews.html
Read it :(
>I don't know who the "local canyoning expert" is, but Bowens Creek does
>flash flood. I have experienced a flash flood in the north branch of the
When we went down it a couple of weeks ago there was definitely
more water than there had been when we down early January.
>Interestingly, when we got to the first of the two abseils, we didn't
>like abseiling down off the then normal belay point (a log in the creek
If I'm thinking of the right canyon, there's a belay point on a
wedged rock in the creek which we've used. Then there's two options:
abseil from there, or descend to the next level via a log that's
below the higher belay point (that David mentions below) and hook
onto the rope there for the descent down the short waterfall.
>looked around for an alternative that would avoid this. We put a sling
>around a thread belay high on the right side. On a recent visit to the
>canyon - this now seems to be the main belay point.
That did seem to avoid the problem of unhooking under the waterfall.
It's a beautiful little canyon though, not too arduous with a
reasonable climb out. Claustral has been my hardest climb out so far.
--
snail | sn...@careless.net.au | http://www.careless.net.au/~snail/
I'm a man of my word. In the end, that's all there is. - Avon
David L. Jones
news:3aacb...@bn.ar.com.au...
> For the full (and accurate) story go to Dave Nobles canyon news page at
> http://www.ozemail.com.au/~dnoble/canyoningnews.html
>
> I went to Bell on Saturday morning with the intention of doing Yilleen
> Canyon. Driving past Mount Tomah water was cascading down the banks at the
> side of the road. It was not the right day to be canyonning in that area.
I noticed that as well, it was really flowing down the banks about 8am Sat.
Definately not a good sign when you see water overflowing banks driving to a
canyon. We did Dalpura and seen four guys comming out of there at 8:30am
after just having done it - no packs, no rope, no food, no map, no
equipment, nothing. Some people ain't too smart.
Dave :)
PCA
news:3AACA1FB...@ozemail.com.au...
The account of the tragedy in David Noble's website is very disturbing and
seems to be putting as positive a spin on the episode as possible. Hopefully
it won't lead to the authorities trying to restrict access . It certainly
raises a whole lot of questions about taking inexperienced people into even
simple canyons, especially when the odds start to stack against you. Having
used both Yileen and Bowen Creek recently as suitable for new canyonners
(though with people already trained in abseiling, prussiking and basic self
rescue) the news of accidents in both canyons was quite worrying.
As often the case with serious accidents, the causes seem to have been
multiple poor decisions by several parties which ended up having a
disastrous cummulative effect. > --
David Noble
>
> David Noble <dno...@ozemail.com.au> wrote in message
> news:3AACA1FB...@ozemail.com.au...
> The account of the tragedy in David Noble's website is very disturbing and
> seems to be putting as positive a spin on the episode as possible.
I agree that the account(s) are disturbing - but I don't think they put
any spin on the epsisode. Note that there has been some additional
material added on 13 March as well as the original report of 12 March.
There are certainly a lot of questions that need to be asked. I didn't
want to editorialise too much too early without knowing too much.
Eg:
Why did the party start to descend some drops if they didn't intend to
do the canyon - and only wanted to have a look? They should not have
gone down something that they all could not get back up again quickly
and easily.
Once the girl was stuck on the ledge and unable to get back up - one
would think that it should have been possible to get her to a safer
position. But is can be unwise to speculate here without being fully
aware of the situation.
Why were the experienced canyoners that were on hand (eg Nigel Hardiman
and the uni party that party seeking help met on their way out) - not
utilised imediately?
Hopefully
> it won't lead to the authorities trying to restrict access . It certainly
> raises a whole lot of questions about taking inexperienced people into even
> simple canyons, especially when the odds start to stack against you.
I don't think that there is anything wrong with taking inexperienced
people down canyons - but I do think it is unwise to take anybody down
wet canyons like Bowens North Branch in flood conditions. This is not to
say that all canyons should be avoided in wet conditions - there are
many that are perfectly safe in any conceivable flow they may have.
Having
> used both Yileen and Bowen Creek recently as suitable for new canyonners
> (though with people already trained in abseiling, prussiking and basic self
> rescue) the news of accidents in both canyons was quite worrying.
> As often the case with serious accidents, the causes seem to have been
> multiple poor decisions by several parties which ended up having a
> disastrous cummulative effect. > --
I have heard a recent report (late 2000) of a party setting off for
Yileen Canyon but ending up making a navigational error and going down a
tributary of Birribang Creek instead. The party did not realise their
error until they were well into the Grose Valley!! (and couldn't find
Pierces Pass?). Parties such as this are a worry.
Dave
Paul and Noelene Davis - PROJECT X
> seems to be putting as positive a spin on the episode as possible.
We must be reading something totally different. What I read is remarkable
because it gives the facts and no spin.
gav
if it is
raining
or there's
a chance of rain
DON'T GO INTO THE CANYONS.
Commonsense rules over so-called experience anyday and it'll save your life.
NEVER LEAVE ANYBODY BEHIND TOO.
David Killick <dkil...@bigpond.com> wrote in message
news:zt%q6.13359$v5.5...@newsfeeds.bigpond.com...