Tie a Span Loop: the Mid-Line Loop That Never Jams

The Problem

A loop in the middle of a rope — not at the end — is one of the most useful things you can tie: a hanging point, a handle, an anchor for a trucker's hitch. The knots most people reach for (a slip knot, an overhand on a bight) have two failure modes: they cinch down and crush whatever's inside the loop, and after real tension they weld themselves shut and have to be picked apart or cut.

The Technique

The span loop is a slip knot with one more pass, and that pass fixes both problems.

1. Tie a simple overhand slip loop in the line where you want the loop to sit.
2. Take a bight (a folded section) of the working side and pass it under, up, and through the slip loop.
3. Take the new lower bight that move creates and pass it the same way — under, up, and through the top slip loop.
4. Pull everything snug. The loop that remains is now fixed: load it as hard as you like and it neither slips nor strangles its contents.
5. To untie, flip the knot over and push the collar back — it opens even after serious tension.

Three uses cover most of what it's for: hanging something from a horizontal line (a lantern, a work light, a pot); a grab handle for dragging, or the loop a trucker's hitch pulls against; and a retrievable high anchor — throw the rope over a branch or beam, tie a span loop in the standing side, pass the other end through it and pull, and the loop cinches the rope up to the branch. When you're done, pull the free end and the whole rope comes back down.