Practice Day Report - July 31, 1996.

Attended by - (3) Steve Jones, Lucas Trihey, David Wagland

Venue - Mt York

LT briefed on previous work, police and accreditation. LT briefed on packaging in litter. Set up two lowers and raises on the small boulder, then moved to main cliffs where lowers and raises were carried out with the litter and rescuer. Due to small numbers, we could not put anyone in the litter for the haul. Two people could safely haul the third using a 4:1 or 5:1 system. We did not have a spare person for the separate belay line so we used a fixed rope with a Petzl shunt or Gibbs as the safety back up (safe enough for just one person).

We carried out lowers and hauls with edge rollers and with the Larkin.

Important points learned from these scenarios :

(i) The Larkin worked quite well as a simple tripod to give a high point for hauling.

(ii) We did a couple of hauls in a corner which proved quite difficult with just one litter attendant. The ends of the litter were difficult to keep from banging into the rock because the belayer could not reach the rock to push out. Corners would be worth keeping away from.

(iii) When using the Larkin we went to some pains to tie the tail off and to haul in a direct line with the direction of the load - this kept it very stable.