Double sure can make you feel half as safe.

Recently I took my kids into the local Carlsberg compound to hone their cycling skills. After moving most of their production out of the Copenhagen, Carlsberg have peppered their site with lots of activities, one of which suddenly took precedence over the planned bike practice; three huge, high and elaborate arial walkways criss-crossing their way through the trees. My kids were kitted out with helmets, harnesses and instructions.

What struck me afterwards was a comment made by my nine year old daughter. Although Sille thoroughly enjoyed it, she felt slightly unsafe when moving from one ropeway to another, as it meant having to unhook and rebook each of the two carabiners in succession. Clearly by having two meant that she was always connected to one wire at any one time, but as she had two carabiners, she has quite understandably equated two as meaning 100% safe and one, I presume, as 50% safe. 

So what to make of this. Perhaps the focus on the two carabiners to enable safe transfer from one wire to another, distracted from establishing the baseline safety for simply being on the wires. Clearly two carabiners will always be safer than one, but interesting that by being more secure, created the illusion of being less safe. 

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