Annabel Choy was so graceful when she swung herself across the face of a cliff she would earn applause from fellow rock climbers.

The bubbly 19-year-old died doing what she loved on Sunday when she fell 150m from the eastern side of Mt Tibrogargan in the Glass House Mountains.

Police said initial investigations reveal Choy might have been moving one safety clip to another when the cliff-face gave way in her hand.

She suffered multiple injuries as she fell back on to a ledge and then fell to the bottom.

Choy, from Calamvale in Brisbane's southern suburbs, was in her final year of a creative industries degree at Queensland University of Technology and an active member of the QUT Cliffhangers rock-climbing club.

She was on her last rock climb before going to Japan this week for a three-week holiday.

Fellow climber Adam Gibson remembered his friend as smart, capable and confident.

Choy was an "elegant" rock climber, he said. "I remember her climbing the Blue Mountains, she had very fine balance in climbing and she put on such a show during one climb - she was incredibly flexible and agile - that she got a standing ovation from other climbers watching," Mr Gibson said.

Choy climbed every weekend and twice during the week.

"She loved it, she really put herself into the climbing and club life," he said.

QUT Cliffhangers quartermaster Ria Zoeller said Choy had a "permanent smile on her face".

"It didn't even matter whether it was four in the morning to go climbing, she was a bucket of fun and smiled all the time," she said.

"One of the things from the Blue Mountains trip we learnt about Annabel is she would curl up and go to sleep wherever or whenever.

"We have photos of her on top of a lounge chair asleep while others watched a movie."

Choy, who joined the Cliffhangers about a year ago, was also a circus performer in her spare time.

Pinnacle Sports operations manager and experienced rock climber Adrian Amies said the climb Choy was attempting when she died was called Halfway House and was popular for intermediate to advanced climbers.

"It's actually quite clean rock on the Halfway House, but if you are climbing from the bottom, rocks can be quite loose," Mr Amies said.

"It's a ledge and there's trees and grass up on the ledge; there's enough room to walk around.

"Rock climbing is actually extremely safe . . . the most common cause of accidents is inexperience," he said.