ffmntnman

I wanted to share with you all as Jon Cahill's climbing partner on that tragic day on Mt. Rainier. We were having a great trip before the accident happened. We had spent a day acclimitizing at Thumb Rock for our big push to the summit. We were planning on staying on the summit that evening and pushing out to White River the next day. Many of you had questions and comments regarding what happened. I will try to answer some of them and others I cannot. I am still trying to get in touch with some of the other climbers who were there and helped, to find out from their point of view as to what happened. Jon and I had finished climbing the 60 degree slope to the right when you leave Thumb Rock. The conditions were excellent and we enjoyed the beautiful meteor shower at 2:40AM. We topped out from there and were just below the final little ridge before coming around the front of the Black Pyramid when I slipped on the ice as I was leading and was unable to gain my footing and my hand slipped out of one of the leashes on my ice axe. I attempted to hold on with the one and it let go. I attempted to self arrest and it caught and then let go. We fell at least 200 feet before coming to a stop. We were very fortunate that a rock caught the rope and stopped our fall. I fell to one side and Jon to the other. I ended up hanging about 12 feet over the edge and Jon was about 50 feet below me. The other groups came over to help and one of them went down to help Jon. I had dislocated my left knee and tore up my hand pretty good from trying to do the self arrest. One of the other climbers called 911 on his cell and kept in contact with them through this whole ordeal. The news choppers began hovering about 30-45 minutes after the first 911 call. It took a long time to get the climbing rangers to us, but they did all they could and did an excellent job. Unfortunately Jon passed away within one hour of the accident. I was plucked off the mountain about 5 hours after the accident happened and Jon's body was about a half an hour after I left. Please be in prayer for Jon's family as they deal with this tremendous loss.