ALPINE SPORTS AND GEOLOGIC PROCESSES
The four of us might have been the luckiest random encoun- ter of their lives. Two hours after we had spotted them, the Air National Guard Pavehawk arrived on scene. We were right beneath the towering peak above, so they hovered at eye level approximately 100 yards away and dropped 2 Para- rescue Jumpers (PJs), which are the Air Force equivalent of Special Forces field medical technicians. While I was staring at the pilot, awed by his steady control of the now impossibly close airship, my climbing partner (retired USMC) leaned in and yelled, “one gust of wind, and we’re all finished!” The PJs now standing on the mountain below us, began their climb up to our position. Thankfully, they took over the direct patient care, which quickly included morphine drips for each of the broken men. “More,” they cried. “Any more, and your heart will stop,” replied the medics.
We were now free to focus on the logistics involved in mov- ing the patients. The anchor to lower the litter, with atten- dant, ended up being one of the more challenging aspects of the rescue. The rock quality was terrible, with only a few small fractures capable of providing a solid placement. So, we improvised. We excavated deep, narrow slits in the lip of the “bergschrund,” which is the crevasse that forms between a snow field or glacier and the rock headwall. The snowpack was extremely consolidated into what is called “firn ice,” an intermediate substance somewhere between snow and glacial ice. Once the slots were cut, we anchored to our hiking poles which were situated perpendicular to the slot in the ice. The rock had failed once, and we were not about to give it a second chance.
Once we had established the anchors, we had to do the unthinkable. We had to move each of these men into a lit- ter, to be lowered away from the cliff and hoisted into the hovering Pavehawk. We started with the patient in the worst shape (broken femur, pelvis, humerus, and internal bleeding). Despite the morphine, he was in excruciating pain. To this day I can’t believe he didn’t just pass out, if not from the lack of oxygen caused by the guttural screams as we very gently loaded him into the litter, then from the pain of a shattered pelvis and femur that no longer provided a structure for us to lift. We lowered him (and his attendant PJ) without incident, they were hoisted away, and we later learned that he was in surgery before the Pavehawk returned for the second climber. His injuries were less severe, but still life threatening and he knew what was coming because he watched the process unfold only 45 minutes earlier. They too were lowered, the pair was hoisted aboard, and they were gone. Surreal silence, the sun setting out over the coast range, and piles of gear, ropes, and anchors surrounded us. Did all that just happen… and why didn’t we catch a ride home in the helo?
After cleaning up some of the mess, we were greeted by the official Mt. Rescue deployment that had been dispatched fol- lowing our first phone call. They stayed behind and finished cleaning up the site, while we began our long walk out. We walked out in silence, in the failing light, each of us lost in our thoughts and replaying in our minds the event we had just witnessed, participated in. Thinking hard about the two lives we just saved. “They were so lucky,” I kept thinking. But maybe, we were lucky too. Rock quality can change year to year, and who knows what we would have encountered had we climbed that route. The High Cascades are beautiful, they are a pleasure to explore, and the geology is complex and always interesting. I will always believe that understanding where the terrain comes from, of what minerals the rocks are comprised,
Figure 5; The patient and attendant (dark objects in lower part of picture, directly below the helicopter) are winched aboard for transport to the trauma center. Source: Jeffrey Frederick © 2000”.
and the weathering mechanisms at work are powerful tools in the kit of any outdoor or Alpine enthusiast!
Post Script: Both men physically recovered, although it took multiple surgeries, months of intravenous antibiotics, and exhaustive rehabilitation. They published their story in Rock and Ice Magazine in the early 2000s.
Jeff is a CPG with over 20 years of professional geologic experience. In his previous life, he was an avid mountaineer and spent many days and nights suffering above 10,000 feet. Since the birth of his son, he spends much more time explor- ing the south shore of Long Island, NY on the family sailboat. Currently, he serves as a Program Manager at Louis Berger US, where he provides sound project management, technical advice, and litigation support to his clients in the private and public sectors.
New Applicants and Members
Can now be found on the AIPG website at
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