Webbing, not just for ducks

Webbing, rope and carabineers are not usually included in a day pack but I suggest they should be essentials for anyone hiking in steep terrain or on rubbly slopes. I’ve used this equipment to get out of difficult situations in the Colorado River gorge and in the Mt. Tipton Wilderness area. The equipment I’m referring to is one-inch tubular webbing, 8-millimeter static rope and S-rated aluminum carabineers. This type of equipment is only available at mountain climbing shops such as Arizona Hiking Shack in Phoenix or REI in Las Vegas.

The webbing is called 1-inch tubular webbing, has a breaking strength of 4,000 pounds and costs about 44 cents per foot. You can find a type of webbing at local hardware stores but that webbing, also called strap, only has a breaking strength of 200 pounds, not as useful and definitely not strong enough to bet your life that it’ll hold you while rappelling down a cliff.

This gear is useful in many situations such as tying anchors around trees to pull vehicles out of the mud with a winch or come-along. But I don’t want to use equipment that might’ve been damaged by pulling a vehicle in a people-rescue situation so I separate the gear into two sets. One is for general use that I keep in my vehicle for pulling cars, tying down gear, setting up anchors around trees, etc. and one that I carry in my pack for people-rescue use only.

In the Arizona rescue fraternity, webbing is color coded; 20-foot lengths are green, 15-footers are red and 30-footers are black. I use green colored webbing for people-rescue and blue colored for general use, this way I don’t get them confused. For most people, twenty-foot lengths of webbing are the best.

S-rated aluminum carabineers are the lightest and best for personal use. I carry two auto-locking carabineers. The S-rating stands for single use, meaning it’s safety rated to support one person. The auto-locking feature is the safest and best but the screw-lock also works. The cost of a good low-cost carabineer is about $10.

I use ¾ inch or larger clevis and clevis pins as connectors when working with vehicles. Just in case, I also have steel G-rated carabineers. Again, I don’t want to mix equipment and using gear designed for working with vehicles makes sense.

The rope I use is 100 feet long of the static type (it has very little stretch), is of kernmantle construction (has a central core with an outer sheath covering) and 8-millimeters in diameter with a breaking strength of 2,500 pounds. It costs around 50 cents per foot. Even though this is more expensive than the rope available at the local hardware stores, it’s safety rated and much stronger so you can have confidence that it won’t break while you’re hanging off a cliff.

You don’t have to become a rock-climbing expert to effectively use this gear, but I suggest you take basic rope instruction and learn three knots- tying a Swiss seat, water knot and a Munter hitch. The best way to learn these knots is to google “animated knots” on the web. There are videos and step-by-step procedures for tying all kinds of knots so focus on the ones you’ll be using and practice until they become second nature.

The water knot is used to tie the two ends of a length of webbing together to make a loop. When using a tree for an anchor, the webbing protects the tree better than rope or a chain. When going around a jagged rock, it holds up better than rope and is a lot cheaper to replace than having to buy a new rope.

The Munter hitch is one of a number of friction hitches that can be used to control the rate of descent on a rappel. It’s easy to tie and can be used for lowering someone or lowering yourself. If I encounter a rock face in a wash, called by some as a dry waterfall, or steep rubbly ground where there is danger of falling and breaking a leg, I find a suitable anchor, tie webbing around it then attach the rope and lower myself. The trick is how to attach the rope so it can be recovered. If the fall is less than 50 feet, I run the rope through the anchor and drop both sides. Using the Munter hitch on a carabineer, I attach to the two sides of the rope and rappel down, then pull on one side of the rope to recover the rope. The webbing is sacrificed in the name of safety.

The addition to your pack of webbing, rope and carabineers will add little weight but can be a life saver if you encounter steep terrain or a rock face in a wash during your hike and can’t climb down safely. Better the added weight than a broken leg!