The 200,000 cubic metre collapse of a rock pillar has destroyed two extremely challenging climbing routes.
At a time when there is a great deal going on in the landslide world, another really interesting event has almost passed me by. Thanks to loyal reader Scott for highlighting another remarkable event.
Overnight on 1 – 2 August 2025, a large rock pillar collapsed at Carne Wall in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales in Australia. This has destroyed a series of famously challenging climbing routes. ABC News has a really good article about the landslide – they estimate that the volume was about 200,000 m3.
This collapse at Carne Wall is located at [-33.65233, 150.33885].
On Facebook, Monty Curtis has posted a nice before and after image pair:-
And there is a really fantastic before and after drone video posted to Youtube by Simmo:-
Failures of this type would normally be via a topple, but I wonder if the debris field supports that interpretation? An alternative might be that the toe of the pillar failed and collapsed, with the subsequent pillar failure involving more vertical movement. This still from Simmo’s video shows that the pillar had a remarkably narrow base, which would have been under a high compressive load.
Perhaps the base of the pillar underwent progressive failure, leading to the collapse of the mass?
Either way, it was fortunate that there were no climbers on the pillar when it failed.