You can always use more rope, and if you know how to make it you have as much rope as you need to do anything. In the BBC series Edwardian Farm, they show how to make rope:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=By8K5mKSwDA?feature=player_detailpage]
Just being able to make a rope bridge doesn’t mean you’ll necessarily be able to cross it. The less crossing ropes to your rope bridge, the more complicated the crossing will be. For suspension bridges and any other bridge where you can plant your feet firmly and walk forward, that’s exactly how you cross. Just be cautious of your footing.
For either a one or two rope bridge you will want to attach yourself to one of the ropes via a safety harness. There are safety harnesses commercially available, but here at The Armageddon Blog, we like to assume the worst. You can tie a Swiss Seat using a 6-10 foot length of rope. This will prevent you from falling while crossing.
For a Postman’s Bridge you will need to devise a safety rope to tie your safety harness to the top rope of the bridge. I would suggest tying a bowline knot to a carabiner attached to the top rope, and another bowline knot tied to the carabiner attached to your harness.
Once you are attached, you will use the following system of movements in order to cross the bridge.
This seems fairly easy, but there are a few things to be wary of.
There are two ways to go about this. You can either cross on top of the rope or below the rope, either way will be equally taxing.
For this, you lay on top of the rope with one leg bent, foot hooked on the rope and as close to the butt as possible. The other leg dangles to maintain balance. You move across the rope using the hooked foot and your arms to drag you across. While it is harder to maintain your balance with this technique, it is a lot easier to stop and rest your muscles should they become fatigued.
Grab on to the rope with both hands and hook both heels over the rope. Move by crawling forward. This is a simpler method to maintain, however it is much more taxing and nearly impossible to stop and recover should you become fatigued. On the other hand, if you are using a safety rope you can simply let go with your arms or feet (but not both at the same time) to give them a break.
Should you need to cross with any equipment, hopefully it is in bags. Attach the bags to the line via carabiner and drag it along behind you. You can attach the equipment carabiner to a rope and attach it to your safety line carabiner to make it easier to keep track of.
There are plenty of knots you can learn that will have much more use and be of more value than the Swiss Seat. That is, until you need to go climbing or rope crossing. The Swiss Seat is a makeshift harness that you can use to attach yourself to a rappel or bridge rope in case you don’t have a climbing harness.
This should be uncomfortably tight around your body but not cutting off circulation, and certainly not squeezing… sensitive… regions. After you’re all tied up, attach a carabiner to the wrap of ropes at the front of your body and then attach it to the line and your ready to go.
There are certain skills that won’t benefit you right away in the P.A.W. Knowing how to build a rope bridge is definitely one of them. If you’re on your own and still wandering around looking for a safe location, this skill will be of almost no use to you. However, if you’re traveling in a group with more gear than everyone can carry on their backs or you’ve made a permanent settlement and you cross that particular stream/chasm frequently, knowing how to build a rope bridge and cross it is an invaluable skill.
There are more types of rope bridges than you can shake a stick at, so I’m going to go over some of the most basic varieties: the one-rope, two-rope, three-rope, and simple suspension bridges. All of them rely on several fundamental basics.
The anchor mechanism on the near side is referred to as the “transport tightening system” because it is tied in such a way that all the slack can be taken out of the rope, thus tightening the whole system. It is a rope and series of knots tied around the anchor point in such a way as to secure the bridge and tighten the ropes to the desired tautness.
The first knot you will tie is a static knot (like a wireman’s knot or a figure-eight slip knot) around three to six feet from the anchor point. Clip a carabiner through the knot with the gate facing upward. Continue wrapping the rope around the anchor. At this point you need to decide whether you’re going to do a “dry crossing” or a “wet crossing”. A dry crossing is when everyone but the first person cross over the bridge. A wet crossing is when the last person is required to dismantle the bridge prior to crossing.
If you decide to perform a dry crossing, you will need to add a transport knot into the system. I personally prefer this method because you only have to have one strong swimmer/climber to initially take the far side rope end to the far side.
Now that you’ve brought the rope around the tree, go back to the part of the rope on the other side of the tree and make a loop with the piece of rope coming from the far side crossing over the piece that goes around the tree. Now go back to the part that you just looped around the tree. Make a bight in the rope and pass it through the back of the loop you just made and clasp it into the caribiner on your static knot further down the rope.
If you didn’t tie the transport knot into the system, clasp the rope into the carabiner attached to the static knot. Now you need to tighten the bridge. Pull the loose end of the rope coming out of the carabiner until the bridge is the appropriate taughtness. Tie the rope off on the anchor point. You can tie the rope off with any number of knots, but the easiest on to use is a round-turn with two half-hitches.
For a dry crossing,after everybody but the last two people have crossed, untie your rope anchor knot and tie it to the second-to-last crosser and have him cross. As long as the slack end is directed toward the far end from the loop in the rope, the tension will be maintained. If you want to be doubly safe, you can twist the rope at the carabiner to bind all the rope. Once that person has crossed, pull the loop from the transport knot out of the carabiner and let the transport knot collapse. At this point, you basically have a rope tied on the far end anchor point, that crosses to the near end, loops around the near anchor point and back across to the far end. Have several people on the far end pull the rope tight and anchor the rope to the far end anchor point as described above. After you cross, untie the rope at both end and pull on the end until all of the rope is on your side.
The one-rope, or commando, bridge is the simplest to build and tear down, but the most difficult and physically demanding to cross. As the name hints, you only use one rope to traverse your obstacle, meaning you’ll be in an awkward position, using pure muscle strength to drag yourself along the length of the bridge. This is ideal if you’re only crossing with minimal gear and able-bodied individuals, and in a hurry. Also, this is probably what your going to need initially when building a permanent bridge in order to move things back and forth during construction.
Crossing a bridge made with one rope can be tricky.
The ever fancy Postman’s Bridge adds a whole additional rope to the Commando Bridge… Fancy! In this configuration, you walk on one rope and hold onto the second rope at chest level or slightly above.
If you have a lot of equipment or people incapable of crossing a Commando Bridge, but you still need your bridge to be temporary and/or hastily constructed and dismantled, then the Postman’s Bridge is your best bet. It is a reasonable balance of stability and expediency. When constructing this bridge, you are basically just building 2 Commando Bridges at different heights.
The Monkey Bridge requires a bit more preparation, and because of the required resources and investment of time in this bridge, it is likely that you will use this in a semi-permanent capacity. One benefit that this bridge has over the previously discussed is that it can be used to span further distances.
Fortunately, the construction process is not overly complicated. Lay your hand and foot ropes out and tie stringers onto them so that the strings wrap each rope at approximately three foot intervals.
Build the shears by laying out two equal-length pieces of wood and tying them 2/3 of the way up. Spread them apart at the feet and lash them to a cross brace.
Lay the foot rope in the crux of the lasher, tie it to the anchor on one end and then tighten and tie at the other end. Do the same with the hand ropes, looping them over the tops of the shears first.
The Figure Eight Slip Knot is an adjustable loop-on-the-bight knot.
There are many knots that fall into the loop-on-the-bight category, but this one is particularly helpful when building a rope bridge (as described in an upcoming post). This knot is basically tied by reverse french braiding the loops.
Knots are pretty important in survival. Most people don’t realize it until they suddenly have to tie a rope and the knot collapses and they have no idea why. One of the best knots for tying the end of a rope to a static object is called the Round Turn and Two Half Hitches. Called this because of the components that go into tying it. You turn the rope ’round the object and secure it with two half hitch knots.
This will create a stable knot that can take a fair amount of weight without weakening.