Originally posted by dukedogsmom
For those of us that didn't see it, what decision did he have to make?
After making the summit , climbers Simon Yates and Joe Simpson, are on the way down, and they are tied together.

Simpson falls and breaks his leg. His shin bone tears his knee apart, and breaks off the lower part of his femur.

His partner, Simon Yates, climbs down to help.

They tie two 150' ropes together so Simpson can be lower 300' at a time.

The only problem is a climbing aid called a descender. It's a spring loaded plate that helps a climber descend. The holes in the plate will not allow the knot to go thru, so halfway thru the 150 foot length, Simpson has to brace himself to take the weight off the rope so Yates unthread the rope and thread it BACK thru the descender!!!

At one point Simpson is lowered over a cliff and is just hanging by the rope in mid-air. There is no way that either one can communicate to each other.

Yates cannot pass the bypass the knot because all of Simpson's weight is on the rope. After a few HOURS of holding his postion,
unable to talk to Simpson and slowly sliding down and out of the seating position that he has carved out of the snow, Yates cuts the rope and Simpson falls about 150' feet into a crevasse.

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The problem can be summed up as -

Do you cut the rope not knowing what condition you partner is in?

Remember, you are sitting in powdery snow at about 20,000 feet for a few hours, You don't have any water (melting snow in your mouth decreases your core temperature....you'll freeze sooner!), you don't know if your friend is dead or not, you are slipping out of position....by holding on you both will eventually go over the edge.

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The film touched briefly on their relationship and the thoughts of What Yates would have to say to everyone as to why he cut the rope.

An interesting and wild question to have to answer.

Do you take the chance that both of you will die OR cut the rope to save yourself??