gary_hehn

Yes, the best I've come across are BandAid blister busters. Next best, as a preventative, is regular athletic tape.

My condolences Cindy.

No but, I was alone with no one else around at Write-off Rock once. It was quiet (quiet being relative with i90 in the background of course) and then suddenly I heard a horrific thundering roar of rock fall apparently from somewhere up the Change Creek drainage! It was very loud and rumbled and echoed for quite a long time. Just another "make you feel small in nature" moment. Small, but at the same time so fortunate for the experience.

Nice

Ok, you asked for it. This climbing buddy of mine is so hot it's hard to keep the ice frozen. And as you might suspect, there are few dull moments.

Thanks for the tip kev. #5 what - camalot? That would probably mean the need for a purchase or a chunk of 2x4? What route - South Face as per Selected Climbs Vol.1?

Yes, one long day! You didn't climb the South Face, from the car and back, in a day did you? Now, I would like to try a South Face route. I had an opportunity with a team last fall, but my heel injury had me cragging only and on steroids.

Soon after we moved to the Seattle area, twenty years ago, a friend showed me a picture of Prusik Peak that he had taken. I had wanted to try climbing it ever since, but the permit issues pretty much kept me doing other trips. Five of us went into the Enchantments in late October 2002 with Prusik in mind, but it was cold and ended up snowing. So, we scrambled up McClellan Peak instead - great scramble by the way. Finally in August 2005 I got my opportunity to climb Prusik Peak. I went the whole trip in 5.10 guides, but now with a heel injury I realize that they are not good shoes for one's feet - too soft torsionally and bend in the arch (bad) vs. the forefoot (good) where the foot bends. What a beautiful day we had in a spectacular setting on a fabulous peak! Here is my TR: http://hehn.org/mountaineering/prusik/prusik.html

Don't know, but tried using my Sprint with analog from Stellar Falls at Alpental on Monday and didn't get a signal.

So, was it staged?

Big fall and no helmet; he's lucky he stayed upright!

Nice clean start. I like the thumbnail gallery approach with the images. Yes, I didn't have that much trouble with them, but you could maybe work the fonts a bit.

I'm not big on carrying much sleeping bag as it is pretty much a single use item. So, my bag is basically just liner weight, around 10oz. My solution is to carry a pretty substantial belay jacket and some sort of insulated pant. I use these in the bag. I don't wear the jacket but, pull the sleeves inside to act as baffles and lay it over me inside the bag. This puts all its insulation over me and other than having to manage it some during the night it works very well.

Pro Mountain Sports web site has a good page with suggestions. This could give you a reference point. http://www.promountainsports.com/upk.shtml

I believe the Civettas have too small a profile for the Intuition Liners to fit, but may be worth a try - the liners in the Civettas are quite thin. Just make sure your toes don't get hammered going downhill. I had Civettas that I fit for climbing, but the fit turned out to be brutal for long trips. If I where to do it over I would try sizing them larger. The inner boot laces well and should be able to set your heel when sized to make room for toes. As Mark says, you can get them stretched although, I understand that stretching length wise is limited.

Snow caves are great protection from the elements and can be far warmer than the conditions outside but, they aren't "warm" so to speak. You tend to get soaked building them and they take a good amount of time and effort to build. That whole time one was probably digging while the other two supported the effort as best they could, while still being pretty much exposed to the elements. They were all probably suffering from hypothermia. Kelly may have been in a deeper stage of hypothermia once they completed the cave and got into its shelter. If they were unable to raise his core temperature he would have continued to slip deeper. He would have needed a warm environment to recover if he was beyond mild hypothermia.

Do we know what the summit pictures revealed about the weather at that point in their climb? I'm suspecting it was bad, but all was still going to plan. I'm guessing that due to poor visibility they were unable to find the descent route that they planned to take and that during the time they were searching for this route the conditions worsened to the point of being intolerable. This is when things went bad for them. Finding a location for a snow cave and digging it would have been difficult. I don't think most can appreciate what they were likely up against. The winds could easily have been strong enough that one couldn't stand up, but would be restricted to crawling on all fours. Building the snow cave was the right thing to do. What I don't understand is why they didn't stay put and wait for the weather to clear. They must have felt that they weren't going to survive long enough in the snow cave.

Mountaineering First Aid - Jan D. Carline, Martha J. Lentz, Steven C. Macdonald Self-Rescue - David J. Fasulo Staying Alive in Avalanche Terrain - Bruce Tremper ( I used to ski race with Bruce back in one of my previous lives, great guy )

Has anyone mentioned Angels Four by David Nott? Old school, trad, epic! One incident involved running out of gear to rappel with. They resorted to using shoe laces. At the bottom of one rappel they went to pull the rope and it broke right through the lace! When they finally completed their descent from the climb exhausted and starved, they lay on the bank of a river waiting to die.

cbs - I'm with you they're big, they have a mind their own, and it's only the size of a walnut! I have had two rides though and both were memorable: a moonlite night on the stable hag and a wild ride on a cutting horse retrieving a bull on the open range if you can believe that! I realized with the cutting horse that I should just hang on and let it do its thing and it worked.

Yes Matt and Michael, I agree, it feels to me like this thread has been taken over by non-climbers, and maybe that is okay. It has been a good source of information. Unfortunately, it looks like this thread is a goner and has degraded to the point of being an injustice to the original intent of tracking the status of three climbers lost on Mount Hood. For non-climbers - As far as fast and light goes, non-climbers just don't get it! This is not a put down. Even climbers don't generally get it at first, until they've suffered enough to. There is a saying that is often applied to mountaineering/alpine climbing and it is "weight is the enemy". This is, with respect to technical climbing, universally true. Again, if you are not a climber, you won't get it and you never will unless you become one and this fact frustrates many of us who are climbers. This doesn't mean going unprepared, but it means going with the minimum of what you can reasonably expect to need. What that minimum is is a team / individual decision. It is part of the nature of the mountaineering experience and it is one of the many judgment calls that must be made. I always consider the possibility of an injury, but pray that it doesn't occur – even in good conditions an injury in mountainous terrain is a serious matter. Matt, this is an attempt to appease non-climbers, but will probably just add fuel to the fire. If you feel it doesn't belong feel free to delete it. This thread has degraded badly. I'm sorry for those that have come here for useful information and status. And I am sorry for the families and friends affected by this tragedy, my thoughts and prayers are with you. Thank you again to all those involved in the rescue effort – stay safe.

It seems the best we can hope for is that they're all dug in and waiting for the weather to break. At the least the three climbers are going to be half starved, cold, and beat. But, there is plenty of reason to believe that this could have a good ending. Keep the faith and sincere thanks to everyone that is working this rescue.

Poached skiers in St. Helens crater?!

I always thought that a climb from inside the crater direct to the summit on rim would be a sweet necessarily dead-of-winter climb. You think it will ever happen ... ever be allowed?

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