Avalanche/Accident on North Sister?

[gapertimmy]

had a message on my cell phone about this, and then found this on koin tv's website:

 

------

Sunday, May 22, 2005

 

Oregon Army National Guard to assist injured hikers in Central Oregon

Press Release from: Oregon National Guard

 

At the request of Oregon Emergency Management and Deschutes County Officials, one of two UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters from the Oregon Army Aviation Support Facility, Oregon National Guard in Salem, Ore. will depart at approximately 3:30 p.m. enroute to the North Sister to assist in the rescue of two hikers who are reported to have critical injuries.

 

A second Blackhawk helicopter is preparing to respond to this situation and will depart from Salem within the hour.

 

Piloting the first aircraft are Lt. Col. Dan Hokanson, Co-pilot Chief Warrant Officer Rob Brattain, both of Keizer, Ore. The crewschief and flight medic on this flight are Sgt. Pat Casha and Sgt. Erikson of Salem.

------

 

i heard it was a group on the thayer glacier. hope everyone is okay.

[Ducknut]

Two injured in North Sister avalanche

5/23/2005, 9:59 a.m. PT

The Associated Press

 

BEND, Ore. (AP) — An avalanche in the Central Oregon Cascades injured two Portland residents, the authorities said.

 

The victims were plucked from the 10,085-foot North Sister mountain by Oregon National Guard helicopters late Sunday afternoon. They were taken to the Sisters Airport, and then transported to St. Charles Medical Center-Bend, said Kay Fristad, a guard spokeswoman.

 

The injured were identified as Nancy Miller, 40, and James Ellers, 36.

 

Hospital spokeswoman Minta Woll said the two were listed in serious condition on Monday.

 

Miller and Ellers were on the east side of the mountain with James Brewer, 50, and David Byrne Jr., 39, both of Portland. Brewer and Byrne were able to call 9-1-1 at about 1:20 p.m., alerting authorities that Miller and Ellers were injured, said Lt. Michael Johnston of the Deschutes County Sheriff's Office.

 

Miller and Ellers were stabilized on the glacier by search and rescue crews. A helicopter sent by the guard retrieved Miller from around the 8,000-foot mark and then a second helicopter evacuated Ellers.

 

Johnston said the avalanche started from an area above the foursome, and they did not trigger it. Three other avalanches were reported on the mountain Sunday, but nobody got caught in those, Johnston said.

 

_____________________________________________________________

 

Both Nancy and Jae are experienced PDX based climbers.

Jae posts on this board as Jaee.

Wishing them a speedy recovery.

[gapertimmy]

it was a group of mazama's, and apparently the slide was naturally triggered.

[sheskis]

It was NOT a Mazmas climb. Just climbers that are Mazamas members. Very experienced climbers. All have summited Denali. Two summitted Ama Dablam in Nepal. MY thoughts are with them in their recovery.

[Gaper_Jeffy]

Very experienced climbers.

It is too bad experience does not equate good judgment. This was a highly avoidable accident, not a freak act of god which you Mazamas seem to be suggesting by repeatedly pointing out how "experienced" they were. I would have loved to gotten on something steep and high this weekend but the mountains were *screaming* redlight conditions up high. I do not consider myself "very experienced", yet it was still crystal clear to me how dangerous conditions were. Please stop dropping the e bomb in a way that suggests this was a freak accident.

 

One of the kindest gestures I believe we can make to those injured/killed is to learn from their mistakes. Lets try to do that.

 

I wish them a super fast recovery!

 

[Gaper_Jeffy]

Oh and I googled the Mazama's site. Nancy Miller is a climb leader, the Ama Dablam climb was a Mazama climb and she has assisted with the Intermediate Climbing school.

[ashw_justin]

Yep, sketchy conditions. But I think climbers in general (experienced or not) tend to pay less attention to avy conditions than backcountry skiers.

[iain]

Don't be too quick to judge the decisions of other groups even if they appear strange at first. They were climbing Early Morning Couloir, then for some reason decided to descend Thayer HW instead of a more typical descent.

 

Perhaps there was something about the bowling alley that was not to their liking. It would have to be something pretty bad, because descending the Thayer in those conditions mid-day, yikes. It is usually wind-loaded, gets first light, and flushes repeatedly. The entire SE face of North Sister sits above like a massive reflector oven. Even with cloudy skies it can be hot, and any release will be on top of you down low.

 

Maybe they felt temps were cool enough to give it a go. Maybe they understood the risks, and felt they were less than those on the normal route. Sometimes you chose the lesser of evils to get out of a situation, and you find yourself in sketchville hoping you don't get it in the neck. Without information it's all speculation. Right now two of them are in the hospital and can't defend themselves. Nor should they have to from anyone here.

 

I agree with you that climbing Denali or in the Himalaya does not by default make one a good judge of avalanche terrain or conditions in the Cascades. Also, there is climbing Denali, and then there is climbing Denali

 

It's so easy to armchair quarterback avalanche incidents.

[gapertimmy]

i completely agree that it is easy to armchair avy accidents, but lets face it, the best tactic for avvy avoidance is exactly that, avoid slide prone terrain when the conditions are ripe for a slide.

 

last weeks snow and the subsequent warming temps on saturday screamed high risk. regardless of ones experience, or backcountry pursuit, please be safe and watch the weather, and do your best to not get yourself into sketchy terrain during sketchy conditions.

[iain]

I completely agree with you. The risk was clear days out and there are few other places I'd rather not be than those east routes at noon in spring, after a storm.

[gapertimmy]

regardless i'm still sending + vibes there way, hope they have a speedy recovery and can get back in the mountains soon.

[cj001f]

Interesting for all people bitch about the media treating every yahoo as a climber, these 2, who are obviously climbers, are "hikers"

[ashw_justin]

Interesting, but I wonder at what point are you climbing and no longer hiking? I think we'd agree that most of the volcanic peaks around here are basically hikes, no? I consider it hiking until crampons or an ice axe are (not only worn but) necessary. Then again I am not at all familiar with the climbing south of Mt. Hood.

[cluck]

North Sister is a climb for sure

[bdog]

So even though it is May there are still reports coming in. A lot of the

western US, including Colorado in particular, have had very poor

refreezing and lack a good melt-freeze base layer. This is also true in

the Northwest where the weather is clearing in another day or two. If

people venture onto steep slopes in these areas we will see more

incident reports. The spring seems unusual many places, as was the winter.

 

Jim

 

 

The above was posted by Jim Frankenfield, Director of CSAC (Cyberspace Avalanche Center www.csac.org) on 5/22/05. The conditions in the Northwest this past weekend were pretty clear to those who understand snow. It is also true that unless one was there it is not possible to really know why this group made the decision to descend the Thayer. Still, it was poor judgement regardless.

[jaee]

Hey folks,

A quick shout out and big update to you folks.

 

First, to those well wishers:

And to those armchair quarterbacks:

 

Now, on to the dealio:

We took off from Pole Creek to do EMC. We came out of the trees a bit north of it and in the dark ended up just to the north on a small ridge above EMC. We stopped as the sun was coming up as there was a bunch of cloud cover activity. As the sun rose this seemed to dissapate, and we kept climbing after a very long break.

 

We hit the N. Ridge a few hundred meters from Glisan. The instant we went from the E. face to the W. it was a whole new ball game. Stonker styrofoam, dark and solid. We soloed under Glisan, up the bowling alley, to the summit.

 

I think it was the dark, bomber conditions on the W. face that helped sucker us in. It felt to me like 7:00 am, but must have been more like 10 or so when we summitted. By this time it was bluebird.

 

It was kind of steep in the bowling alley and we were looking for alternate routes down. We'd seen another party of 2 on Thayer HW, headed down. We could see avy debris from the morning that had released between their descent and ours.

 

Thought it should be clear after running a couple times....

 

So we dropped in. After around 1500' of downclimbing we hit the HW and were just starting to poke around for a rap anchor when a small slough just took off and grew pretty big in a few seconds. I had a chance to take a couple steps and it was on me. I dropped on my axe but it pulled me off instantly.

 

Then it was over the falls without a barrel, down the Thayer HW, inside the slide. I was under for this point and pretty freaked by the roller-coaster ride. During this time I felt my lower legs break. After the slope mellowed I got my arm out, then kind of just peeled the slide off and got my upper body out as it slowed down. I hadn't tumbled, but remained upright, just rotating from self-arrest to sliding on my right hip to sitting on my butt when I stopped. Nothing was burried except my lower legs.

 

I took stock and realized my left leg was "mildly" broken and right leg was tib-fib. I got my pack off and threw on my DAS, then started dealing with my leg. I tried moving the right foot to splint it but figured I'd wait a bit and see if the cavalry showed up, as it was a bit sensitive.

 

One partner had gotten pulled down with me and was a 150 yards or so uphill of me. I could just see her out of the corner of my eye.

 

The guys who didn't get caught immediately called 911 before starting to downclimb. Since they hit the other climber first they stopped and tended to her. They relayed her status to SAR via 911 and then one proceded to me and helped me splint the right leg. By this time LifeFlight had dropped 4 responders on the scene and headed out for another load. As they came in the cavalry arrived in the form of 2 blackhawks and a bunch of National Guard guys. There were probably 12 folks running around getting us prepped to lift. Before the Blackhawks showed they were lowering Nancy to ease the lift for LifeFlight, but then just dropped her in the basket and raised her in the Blackhawk. She was transported to Sisters, transferred to LifeFlight and off to St. Charles.

 

They flew me out in the second Blackhawk, transferred to an ambulance in Sisters, and off to St. Charles.

 

I was adamant about my gear, and talked both the EMT's and ER staff into taking my gear off the hard way. I managed to avoid destroying any gear.

 

Then into surgery, getting a plate on the right tibia, screw in the left fibula. Both legs splinted to recover from the trauma. Spent 6+ days at St. Charles with great care.

 

Now I'm back in PDX, cast on right leg, walking cast on the left. Total of 2 months in the wheelchair, then onto crutches. Looks like I may have some MCL damage on the left knee as well. Just had a MRI yesterday, don't know the results yet.

 

Overall a lot of good luck and hard work on the part of SAR, LifeFlight, Nat'l Guard, Sisters sherrif and rescue squad. Thanks to all those folks who assisted in getting our butts out of there so quickly. Also another big thanks to the staff at St. Charles and all those who have rushed to help me out.

[iain]

It would be conceivable to rap off the south end of the pinnacles to get on the south ridge w/o entering the bowling alley or doing the traversing. Did you rap off the NE side of the summit or something? I can't imagine that looking more appealing, esp with the bulletin posted.

 

It is good to see you are recovering. Others have died falling down that route.

[Ireneo_Funes]

Glad to hear you're on the mend! Thanks for filling us in on what happened.

[sweatinoutliquor]

Glad to head that recovery is going, though I am sure not as quick as you would like! I think despite some of the critical nature of folks on this site, lots of people were wishing you guys the best that weekend.

[Ducknut]

 

Glad to hear you are on the mend. I hope Nancy doing well too.

 

Thanks for the update.

[sk]

Glad you hear you are alive and well. I hope you mend quickly