Tributes to victim of cliff fall

The family of a Black Country rock climber killed in a 500ft cliff fall today paid tribute to "an amazing and loving son and brother." Matthew Allison, aged 26, had lived in New Zealand for three years.

He was working as a rock climber and canyon guide when he died after a tree he was secured to snapped, sending him plunging down the side of a popular rockface for climbers in November 2009. He had been "full of life" said his mother Melanie.

"As hard as it was to lose him, he was just following his dreams and there was no way he would have stayed at home," said Mrs Allison of Hurst Green, Halesowen.

"Everyone who met him was bowled over by his bubbling enthusiasm for life, and by the way he encouraged others to get up and do things. When he was at the top of a climb he would always say 'life doesn't get any better than this' – that was his motto, he was always saying it."

She told an inquest at Dudley Coroner's Court that he did "absolutely everything" correctly. "A lot of climbers use trees to anchor them."

Black Country coroner Mr Robin Balmain echoed a New Zealand inquest's concerns over climbers relying on trees instead of finding a "bomb-proof" way of securing themselves, preferably to two different objects.

He recorded a verdict of death by accident.