Define a QAS

[Tim White]

These following post were moved from the topic A Complete Vertical Frog System with the hope that doing so would keep things a bit more organized. These comments and questions seem to fit this topic better.

Hope I did not make thing more confusing to follow.
Please read George's comments and Stelios' question and respond here.

I defined a QAS as a safety jumar or ascender, and they are just as important on way down as the way up. Maybe more important on the way down.

And I too am citing Kyle Isenhart as the originator of the statement.

But I stand by my words.

On the downhill: There are bad lips where you need the ascender, I've had my own rack bend on a bad lip, and I've seen very experienced vertical cavers take their hands off the rope to point out possible survey stations (I didn't know talking with your hands was that ingrained of a habit!). You REALLY REALLY need that ascender on the rappel. It is THE mark of a competent vertical caver, and it is even more important when you're rappelling into a pit no one (or few people) have done before.

Now I guess you could argue the point on the uphill. A Texas System has only two ascenders and you don't really need a third. A Ropewalker (Simmons Roller) system doesn't need that extra ascender, but both the Ropewalker and the Texas have that safety ascenders build in. A Frog? Sometimes I carry an extra ascender and sometimes I don't. It depends on how nasty the cave is. And I don't have enough experience with a Mitchell to comment.

And what about crossing re-belays and re-directs?

A helmet, scuffed up toes, and the safety ascender. These are the first things I look for with someone I don't know when doing vertical work. That and dirty, well-used equipment.

A light is only needed for underground work. It is not critical for all vertical work.

"Whit" Whitamore had the rope sheath come loose from the core and start to slide down the rope while at the top of Golondrinas in the 1970s.

What would you do then without a safety ascender?

On the downhill: There are bad lips where you need the ascender, I've had my own rack bend on a bad lip, and I've seen very experienced vertical cavers take their hands off the rope to point out possible survey stations (I didn't know talking with your hands was that ingrained of a habit!). You REALLY REALLY need that ascender on the rappel. It is THE mark of a competent vertical caver, and it is even more important when you're rappelling into a pit no one (or few people) have done before.

I had never heard the term QAS before joining this BBS.

Could you clarify for someone without too much experience who has been taught only "frog" system: why was the rope rigged in a way that it was so close to the lip that your rack bent on the lip? It sounds crazy to me. Why would you need to attach an ascender to the rope so as to point things out. Why isn't locking-off the descender enough? Do you rappel with an ascender attached to the rope in two foot sections, sliding the ascender down, rappelling a little more, sliding it down again? I cannot visualise why an ascender would be useful when rappelling.

Is the American SRT so different to European practice?

[Scott McCrea]

So it seems the basic premise of the QAS is a group of items and not singular item. Thus lies the confusion.

The term QAS is too broad to accurately describe what we are talking about here. The first time I remember seeing the term "QAS" was in On Rope, Revised Edition. The first version called it a 'safety jumar.' Maybe we can come up with some better terminology. Any ideas?

[chh]

I personally define a QAS as ANY mechanical ascender that attaches directly to your sit harness whether it is an integral part of your climbing system or serves as an addition or backup. I say it has to attach directly to your sit harness because that is my definition of a safety. You can use a mechanical, in a ropewalker for example, that is quick, but can result in a heel hang in the worst case scenario if there is no safety. If you use mechanicals for your foot and knee attachments, but a prussic above your chest box for your safety, you are using mechanicals but NOT a QAS. Hence, not having a QAS doesn't make you any less "safe" in my opinion, but perhaps slower in a changeover or rebelay, etc.

If you are using mechanical for your upper ascender in a frog system your QAS is built in. Any additional mechanical attached to your sit harness is exactly that - an additional QAS.

[Scott McCrea]

Could you clarify for someone without too much experience who has been taught only "frog" system: why was the rope rigged in a way that it was so close to the lip that your rack bent on the lip? It sounds crazy to me. Why would you need to attach an ascender to the rope so as to point things out. Why isn't locking-off the descender enough? Do you rappel with an ascender attached to the rope in two foot sections, sliding the ascender down, rappelling a little more, sliding it down again? I cannot visualise why an ascender would be useful when rappelling.

Is the American SRT so different to European practice?

One reason a QAS may be handy on rappel is for a second point of attachment in sticky situations, like not being able to lock of a descender.

No, the ascender is not usually attached to the rope during a rappel.

There is a rigging style called IRT (indistructable rope technique) (wrap stiff, 11mm rope around tree, throw rope in hole, follow rope.) that is popular in the eastern US. American's also use a European style rigging, with rebelays and deviations to avoid lips and rope rub. It's all SRT, just different styles for different situations.

[Evan G]

Scott wrote:

Exactly! The term QAS is too broad to accurately describe what we are talking about here. The first time I remember seeing the term "QAS" was in On Rope, Revised Edition. The first version called it a 'safety jumar.' Maybe we can come up with some better terminology. Any ideas?

QAS= Quick Ascender Safety aka ascender on a cowstail


Once you drop the broad word "Attachment" things start making sense.

[George Dasher]

I never heard it called a QAS until coming to this Discussion Board. We just called it a safety Jumar. But now there are more ascenders out there than Jumars.

You don't use the QAS when things are going well; you use it when things are going bad.

The example in question was outside at the New River Gorge. It was a practice session, and we were going off a bad lip with a BAD undercut sandstone ledge about two feet thick. The real cavers elected just to jump and swing under the ledge. But I, being a chicken, did not jump. I instead inched over the lip, trying to keep my hip between the rope and the rock. I want to make it very clear the only rigging point was about 30 feet back from the lip. There were no trees near the lip, and no way to rig high. Which is always by #1 way of rigging. I REALLY like to defeat the lip so it is not a problem on the way down or up.

Anyway, chicken-s**t inching over the lip did not work. I instead got caught on the lip with my rack at a real bad angle. And worse, the rack started to bend! My rappel device was failing right in front of me!

Up until that time my QAS was hanging un-used off my seat harness. It was not on the rope. As soon as my rack started to bend, I got that Jumar on the rope PDQ. Then I had time to safely deal with the rack bending issue.

By the way, seeing Kyle Isenhart demonstate the QAS was something to REALLY see. He would have down a Western gunfighter proud with the speed he could get his Jumar on rope. And his talks were incredibly funny!

A QAS isn't something you use or need when things go right. It never goes on rope then, unless it is a part of the climbing system. But it is something that can save your life if something goes wrong.

[fuzzy-hair-man]

George to me your example is just as easily handled by performing a change over to ascenders and heading back up (with a frog there is no QAS or safety ascender required to do this).

To my mind the QAS exists because some on rope manouvers aren't able to be performed safely or easily without it. That said if there is a system that can perform these manouvers without a QAS then it is no less safe because it doesn't require the extra gear.

If you see benefits in your system that makes it worth carrying the extra gear then that's fine that's you decision but it doesn't make other systems less safe.

[Scott McCrea]

George to me your example is just as easily handled by performing a change over to ascenders and heading back up (with a frog there is no QAS or safety ascender required to do this).

But you do have a QAS with a frog system and you used it to get out of this example. When you put your upper ascender on the rope above the rack, that was a QAS. It gave you a second point of attachment, protecting you should the rack break (unlikely). Then, when you stepped in the footloop, you turned it back into an upper ascender. Multi-functional gear is good. An extra piece of gear, is... extra.

[adleedy]

You don't use the QAS when things are going well; you use it when things are going bad.

The example in question was outside at the New River Gorge. It was a practice session, and we were going off a bad lip with a BAD undercut sandstone ledge about two feet thick. The real cavers elected just to jump and swing under the ledge. But I, being a chicken, did not jump. I instead inched over the lip, trying to keep my hip between the rope and the rock. I want to make it very clear the only rigging point was about 30 feet back from the lip. There were no trees near the lip, and no way to rig high. Which is always by #1 way of rigging. I REALLY like to defeat the lip so it is not a problem on the way down or up.

Anyway, chicken-s**t inching over the lip did not work. I instead got caught on the lip with my rack at a real bad angle. And worse, the rack started to bend! My rappel device was failing right in front of me!

Up until that time my QAS was hanging un-used off my seat harness. It was not on the rope. As soon as my rack started to bend, I got that Jumar on the rope PDQ. Then I had time to safely deal with the rack bending issue.

By the way, seeing Kyle Isenhart demonstate the QAS was something to REALLY see. He would have down a Western gunfighter proud with the speed he could get his Jumar on rope. And his talks were incredibly funny!

A QAS isn't something you use or need when things go right. It never goes on rope then, unless it is a part of the climbing system. But it is something that can save your life if something goes wrong.

I whole heartedly agree with you george

[fuzzy-hair-man]

But you do have a QAS with a frog system and you used it to get out of this example. When you put your upper ascender on the rope above the rack, that was a QAS. It gave you a second point of attachment, protecting you should the rack break (unlikely). Then, when you stepped in the footloop, you turned it back into an upper ascender. Multi-functional gear is good. An extra piece of gear, is... extra.

I (personally) would lock off my descender, because as I said in another thread somewhere, to me one ascender is not considered safe. In the case above my intension was always to do a change over if I happened to have a handled ascender on rope then that is because it is part of a changeover, I never relied on the single handled ascender to catch me or provide a safety there must be two ascenders on the rope to do this in which case I'm ascending anyway.

I guess in this case it is a case of semantics and what you like to call it.
You could say I connected a QAS then converted to ascenders my view is I was doing a changeover, if the rack broke the handled ascender may or may not catch my fall (a fall on any single ascender should I my mind be considered marginal safety) the intension was not to connect a QAS but to do a changeover, and to get two ascenders on the rope as quickly as possible once I realised I could no longer rely on the rack.

My reason for saying I do not use a QAS is that I NEVER rely on a single ascender to catch my fall. So I never use my handled ascender in the manner you describe using a QAS. Therefore I don't have and have never needed a QAS.

[JoeyS]

Being a fairly new vertical caver, I am just reading all this and trying to learn, but I would like to ask this:
Assuming we are talking about frogging; How many ascenders do you have at your disposal (ie, tied into your mallion)?

I was told by several experienced cavers who frog that 3 is mandatory. One is not part of the climbing process, just a petzl basic tethered to the mallion and clipped into a gear loop. That's how I'm rigged (and like I said, I'm just following advice). This was my understanding of what a QAS is, for what it's worth.

[Stridergdm]

JoeyS, glad you asked!

Being the person who started this thread, I wanted to wait to see others reply before I jumped in. (And I'm still reserving comments for the most part.)

But, here's my thoughts so far.

It's quite clear that there is no clear definition of what a QAS is. Which in my opinion makes statements like, "you must have a QAS" useless since people don't agree on what that means.

Generally yes, it stands for "quick attachment safety". I think replacing attachment with "ascender" is a bit more clear, but would be hard to change people's habits. I do not consider clipping a cowstail into a biner, tape, etc. as a QAS simply put because most definitions of a QAS I've seen (here and elsewhere) require the ability to attach it at any point in the rope quickly, not just where a loop or something already exists.

Ok, so where's that leave us. To answer your question, I frog and use a total of two ascenders, the croll and one ascender (in my case a right-handed petzl) for my upper ascender with a lanyard to my D and a footloop.

When I first learned change overs, I learned using a 2nd handled ascender. But after being harrassed by a fellow caver enough, I decided to learn as she did and just use the one. With a micro-rack not only was it easier with just the one handled ascender, it was faster. I no longer carry the 2nd handled ascender and can't imagine a situation where I'd absolutely need it. (though I will say with a fullsize rack a changeover on the frog is a bit harder for me, but I haven't done a drop yet that required a fullsize rack. But then again, I haven't been to Golandrenas

And for the record, a number of the froggers I cave with (instructors with the NCRC for example) also do not carry a 3rd toothed ascender.

I do carry a small prussik loop with me, "just in case" . Given the length of time it would take to put on a rope, I do not consider it a "QAS".

Others may chime in otherwise.

[paul]

But you do have a QAS with a frog system and you used it to get out of this example. When you put your upper ascender on the rope above the rack, that was a QAS. It gave you a second point of attachment, protecting you should the rack break (unlikely). Then, when you stepped in the footloop, you turned it back into an upper ascender. Multi-functional gear is good. An extra piece of gear, is... extra.

I (personally) would lock off my descender, because as I said in another thread somewhere, to me one ascender is not considered safe. In the case above my intension was always to do a change over if I happened to have a handled ascender on rope then that is because it is part of a changeover, I never relied on the single handled ascender to catch me or provide a safety there must be two ascenders on the rope to do this in which case I'm ascending anyway.

I guess in this case it is a case of semantics and what you like to call it.
You could say I connected a QAS then converted to ascenders my view is I was doing a changeover, if the rack broke the handled ascender may or may not catch my fall (a fall on any single ascender should I my mind be considered marginal safety) the intension was not to connect a QAS but to do a changeover, and to get two ascenders on the rope as quickly as possible once I realised I could no longer rely on the rack.

My reason for saying I do not use a QAS is that I NEVER rely on a single ascender to catch my fall. So I never use my handled ascender in the manner you describe using a QAS. Therefore I don't have and have never needed a QAS.

Same here (UK) - andprobably for the majority of European cavers.

[paul]

Being a fairly new vertical caver, I am just reading all this and trying to learn, but I would like to ask this:
Assuming we are talking about frogging; How many ascenders do you have at your disposal (ie, tied into your mallion)?

I was told by several experienced cavers who frog that 3 is mandatory. One is not part of the climbing process, just a petzl basic tethered to the mallion and clipped into a gear loop. That's how I'm rigged (and like I said, I'm just following advice). This was my understanding of what a QAS is, for what it's worth.

The standard setup for a Frog rig (at least for European cavers) is:

- A "chest" jammer attached directly to the central maillon on the front of the harness. Usually one that is specifcally designed for the job such as the Petzl Croll.

- A scond jammer (either with or without a handle) to which is attached the loop which is stood up in while prusiking. Ther will also be a safety link from this jammer to the central maillon in case the "chest" jammer were to become detached. Some use a short separate length of dynamic rope, othrs use a continuation of the cord used to form the footloop. Fench cavers often use the long cowstail as a safety link to their jammer to save weight.

- Two cowstails: short and long. The short is used to hang from while passing rebelay swhile descending. The long is used to clip to the rope or anchor while performing such manoevres or while approaching the pitch head, getting on or off the rope, passing traverses, etc.

- A descender - usually Petzl Stop or Simple and braking karabiner.

This is the set-up as shown in various textbooks on SRT and taught by professional caving instructors in the UK.

If a third jammer is carried at all (other than in a tackle bag or clipped to the harness on a spare karabiner, for use as a replacement in case of failure or for hauling or assistance in rescue) - and this is a recent innovation, it will be a Petzl Pantin which is attached to the foot and is very useful while prusiking using the Frog method as it helps maintain an upright posture and also pull the rope through the "chest" jammer at the bottom of a pitch.

Have a look at Alpine Caving Techniques by George Marbach and Bernard Tourte, for more information.

[George Dasher]

Again: I think the argument could be made that the Frog and Texas both have the QAS built into them.

And yes, if you are hanging in free fall, you are going to need a second ascender to get the first ascender off the rope.