An Alaskan climbing influencer has died after falling from El Capitan, a famous vertical rock formation in California’s Yosemite National Park.
Balin Miller, 23, was live-streamed on TikTok ascending and subsequently falling from the monolith on Wednesday.
In an emotional social media post confirming her son’s death, his mother Jeanine Girard-Moorman said: “My heart is shattered in a million pieces. I don’t know how I will get through this. I love him so much. I want to wake up from this horrible nightmare.”
Details of what caused the incident are not clear, but Miller’s brother Dylan told AFP he was lead rope soloing - a technique that enables climbing alone while still protected by a rope - on a 2,400ft (730m) route named Sea of Dreams.
I will never understand the appeal of such dangerous hobbies.
Roller coasters are pretty thrilling and dont come with the risk of death (typically).
I like being alive more than I need some thrills.
He was using a rope. I imagine the risk of death while climbing with a rope is outweighed by the health benefits of leading an active life style.
Besides, I’m sure he loved doing it. Sometimes you have to take risks in life for the things you love.
Eh… I’m no actuary, but I can tell you with 100% certainty that I will not die in a rock climbing accident.
But even without knowing you I can say there is a non-zero chance of you dying doing some other activity, that you do simply for fun.
Can you really not grasp the concept here? It’s obviously a relatively dangerous hobby. Why argue against that? Weird hill to die on.
Maybe talk to an actual actuary, and they can explain the statistics side better than me.
Most of my job is risk analysis, so I can help explain the statistics
More climbers die in car accidents going to the climb site than they do climbing
Traffic fatalities rarely make the news, so even though the drive is statistically more dangerous, the climb emotionally feels more dangerous
Climbing a dangerous hobby, but road tripping is even more dangerous, per trip. It’s important to keep the relative risks in mind
It’s also perfectly valid to say either hobby is too risky for you personally. Underwater basket weaving is plenty fun and quite safe
If you’re an expert in statistics, then I think you’ll immediately recognize why what you’re saying is misleading.
For one, we are talking about driving cars, period. For transportation. Not for pleasure. Not as a hobby.
Putting yourself in mortal danger for fun, by putting yourself into situations that no person will ever naturally be in (e.g. free climbing mountains), is not comparable to driving a car for your work commute.
I specifically used road trips as an example because they impetus is more closely aligned. Road trips are generally a pleasure hobby
I’ve done a road trip through the mountains of Colorado. Stunning views right from your car. Objectively a dangerous hobby
For the record, free climbing is a very different sport from rope soloing. It’s not the same ballpark of danger. Unless your name is Alex Hannold, free soloing is a bit more like riding a motorcycle through DC traffic with no helmet - a death wish
Yeah but he died. The health benefits were explicitly NOT outweighed because he’s fucking dead!
Good health and love aren’t worth much when you cease to exist.
Also, his mom gotta bury her son. She thought he was gonna go out, live his life, do stuff. Now when his birthday comes, she will cry. She gets to throw all his stuff away or box it up and save it because shes too heartbroken to get rid of it.
Have you ever got in a car to go somewhere to do something fun? You can die doing that too, but millions (billions?) of people drive every day.
Eating an apple is healthy too unless you choke on it. Accidents can happen doing healthy things.
Cars are a mode of transportation, its a tool that gets us somewhere. Apples are nourishment, we literally need to eat to live.
Nobody needs to climb mountains to live.
That’s why I specified the destination. Nobody needs to drive a car to get somewhere for leisure, yet people don’t think twice about it, because it’s an accepted risk.
People don’t have to climb things, but it’s not an unreasonable risk to take. It’s a generally safe thing to do, where accidents occasionally happen. Just like lots of other things people do all the time. You can’t go through life never taking any risk or you’d never get out of bed.
What?? It’s a hobby, not a utilitarian mode of transport.
They make documentaries about free soloing because it’s exciting and dangerous.
It seems like everyone but you understands this
He wasn’t free soloing. He was using a rope. That is not unreasonable.
I don’t mean to argue that people shouldn’t ever do dangerous things for fun, but you can get those same health benefits without climbing to lethal heights. You can traverse at just about floor level or roof climb at less than your own height, both of which are extremely engaging for the whole body.
Climbing is fun
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Honestly, it could be some kind of hormonal imbalance.
I don’t know about that, but the extra risky stuff is somewhat correlated with depression. Partially because they’re okay with dying, partially because the extreme focus takes their mind off the depression.
This article has a couple paragraphs on it: https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/climbing/austin-howell-fallen-soloist/
No. It really isn’t. This was not free solo, it’s not super dangerous. On average.
I have a feeling that it’s more lethal then other hobbies per Capita.
But that’s just anecdotal of course. I’d be really curious to know what the actual data.
That said, it can be argued that it’s definitely a hobby that’s perceived to be much more dangerous.
People don’t choose their hobbies based solely on risk. I love riding road bikes. There is a (small!) risk of death or serious injury in that sport too. But I love doing it and it’s one of the most fun things on earth for me. If I died and it was possible to ask me afterwards if I’d still do it, I might say no. But you don’t get to make these decisions retrospectively and so it’s worth the risk to me.
I don’t know much about solo lead climbing, but it seems sketchier than I’m comfortable with. Had he done conventional lead climbing the belayer would have either avoided that problem entirely or sorted it out for him.
Also, climbing is pretty safe when proper precautions are taken. A lot of people seem to be a little laissez-faire about details like stopper knots, though. This guy was either missing one, or used one which was too small for his combination of rope thickness and belay/rappel device.
Anecdotal, but as a newbie climber I once went out with some friends who climb a lot outdoors, so I trusted them to know what they were doing. When it was time to rappel they attempted to use a figure 8 as a stopper knot, which naturally untied itself instantly. Clearly they didn’t usually use stopper knots when rappelling, because if they did they’d know the proper knot.
I totally have a hormone imbalance, but if being normal means wanting to do dangerous stuff, I will happily remain imbalanced.
I’m just assuming, from what little I know of in the subject at least, that something involving adrenaline and dopamine must be involved.
Evolutionarily, that would have been useful to keep in as a feature I imagine. But in modern times, I guess it manifests as rock climbing or tight spelunking.