Nalini Nadkarni Fall

scottdb

TreeHouser
Joined
Jun 17, 2015
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Nalini was injured an accident recently on one of her research sites in the Olympic Forest. She fell 50 feet when, apparently, her rope failed. I have no technical details but when they are available I expect we will hear the whole story.

She is in the hospital, Harborview in Seattle, with serious injuries. No visitors yet. The family has set up on the CaringBridge web site so if you know Nalini you can send her a note via CaringBridge -"Nalini's Recovertree".

The Queen of the Canopy will need a lot of support as she recovers.... please keep her in your thoughts and climb safe. Scott
 
Wow Scott, that's a heck of a first post for you on The TreeHouse. Hope she is ok and I'll be following this thread for sure.

Still, I have to ask, in this day and age, how does an experienced climber's rope fail? It certainly doesn't just break. Looking forward to more details.
 
Good point Chris... There's no way her "rope failed," I gaurantee you she fell off the end of it. :(
 
As Jer so eloquently says...best wishes for a full and fast recovery.

And as others have noted, our ropes in and of themselves do not fail...something else when wrong, has to be.
 
Remember Wild Trees... not a very good book in my opinion; but there's the part about the gal with all the experience climbing with Steve who just happened to clip a biner onto thin air--she had absolutely no idea how it "missed" the ring--then she double-checked it, and somehow still fell.
 
Here's a new video about her fall and recovery. Great. Great woman!

https://vimeo.com/152582090

and, from the production company: http://vitabrevisfilms.com/short-documentary-films/nalini-nadkarni/

I bought Nalini's book at the PNW ISA 2014 conference. It's excellent:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/05...kCode=as2&tag=kuer-20&linkId=PEG24MZ47L7FPZRB


Scott Baker had told me about her and her canopy work several years ago. Also, she gave an excellent talk at one of our yearly ISA conferences a few years back. I hadn't checked to see how she's doing, but it appears she's made a full recovery,as seen in the video and on her Facebook.

https://www.facebook.com/nalini.nadkarni?fref=ts

Here's one of her two TED lectures:
http://www.ted.com/talks/nalini_nadkani_on_conserving_the_canopy
 
Hearing her tell the story of her fall is very reminiscent of my own experience. I came off the end of my rope not paying attention, fell 40 feet, knocked unconscious. It happened so fast that I didn't even have time to focus on what was happening before I was knocked out. No time to sense fear, and I do remember one thing very vividly -- brushing through the feathers of redwood limbs. I was a lucky SOB. Able to limp back to the truck and get home. No hospitalization, but shock left me weak and lame for several weeks.

I didn't have any spiritual awakenings, but I sure did wise up.
 
Dang, Jerry...interesting what you can remember about those moments. Amazing how such a fall can be survived...a slight twist this way or that on the way down and the results could have been catastrophic. Surely hard to understand some things.
 
The only excuse for not remembering is if the fall knocked ya out cold.

I recall my three falls easily. 35 or so years ago, I was maybe ten feet up, Clipped in to a dead limb (only one tie-in much of the time those days), fell back onto soft ground, and gave it another go. Careless.

Not long after that, I fell about 15-18 feet onto hard ground, when I was descending out of a 40 foot stick, using a new 5/8th three strand line, but around a very short stub. Came down most of way mindful of that stupid short stub, then, my mind wandered, and as I kicked back and sped up a bit, the line worked off the stub. Ouch!! Dropped the stick and went home. Didn't miss any work time. Back hurt a bit more than it had, for a long time... Careless

Fell about 30-35 feet onto slightl sloping ground, big lineman's boot first, Rolled onto asphalt. Went back up, but ankle hurt to much. Had a screw put into the large side ankle bone which had a slightly separated break. This was 1995, when we were new to closed climb systems, which require a few knots. I'd had a coworker set my line, and had been in a minor argument with a crew member. Climbed up a few feet on an orchard ladder. Tied a blakes hitch wrong, with no backup. Started footlocking the tail, until the knot let go. Careless.....

Scott Baker had a long fall a few years back. He was SRT'ing into a willow. Line was out a ways on a fair sized limb, but the limb had defects. He was near it and noticing that the line set was not kosher and about to clip in, when it let go. Whacked himself pretty badly, but nothing badly broken if I recall correctly. Internal bruising likely. Scott is one of the best consultants around. He climbs as needed for the task at hand, and trains his staff to do the same. He's a few years younger than me, but has climbed for just as long. Highly skilled, knowledgable fella. Back when he didn't have as much consulting work, he used to work for or with me now and then. www.treesolutions.net
 
I don't think she had any spiritual awakenings either Ger. I'm really sorry to be the downer in a thread like this, but she struck me as a bit of an atheist wind-bag, "We're all a part of this 'universal process,'" or however she put it, "When a tree falls in the woods, another one takes it's place," "Forests and diseases recover from fires and insect blights, and so do we sometimes..." Blah, blah, blah. No gratitude to a higher-power who may not exist, allowed.

How much more edifying would it have been to have heard the stupidest southern redneck in the world just say, "I was a dummy and broke my butt, but thank God... looks like I get another chance. Guess someone up there must be looking out for me..."

Sorry.... just how I felt about it. :(
 
You don't have to be an atheist to not buy into higher powers caring wether or not you fall out of trees. Like the football players giving credit to God when they score a touchdown
 
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