
In mountaineering, a fixed rope or fixed line is the practice of fixing in place bolted ropes to assist climbers and walkers in exposed mountain locations. They are used widely on American and European climbing routes, where they may be called
via ferrata routes,
but are not used in "
Alpine style" mountaineering. Many guided expeditions to any of the
eight-thousander
The International Mountaineering and Climbing Federation (UIAA) recognises eight-thousanders as the 14 mountains that are more than in height above sea level, and are considered to be sufficiently independent of neighbouring peaks. There is no ...
s normally set up fixed rope on steep or icy sections of the route. For example, on the
Hillary Step of
Mount Everest, fixed rope was used to reduce the bottleneck of climbers that typically results from climbing this technical section just below the summit.
In changing mountain environments such as glaciers, ice falls and areas with significant snow, fixed lines must generally be established anew at the start of each climbing season.
References
Climbing techniques
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