Toppling serac on Deming Glacier on 7/17/05

[nolanr]

Got a late start on Sunday, headed up Railroad Grade, got to maybe w/in 500' of where the rock rib disappears, then headed west. Nibbled on some grub and sat gazing at the spectacular icefall on the Deming for a while. I heard a little bit of noise, some small slides and some falling rock. A louder noise got my attention, turned just in time to see a large chunk breaking off near the top of the icefall and pound it's way down probably a thousand feet or more. Very impressive. I haven't been lucky enough to see a spectacle like that before. It was on the far side of the glacier from me, near the Black Buttes. Hard to say just how big it was, but I'd guess at least car sized and probably bigger. After a couple of impacts on the slope below it busted into a bunch of smaller chunks. This was around 2 or 3 in the afternoon. There was another party on a grassy knoll (insert JFK joke here) downslope from me. Later on I went up to the Park Butte lookout, I don't think you would've been able to see it from that vantage. It was one of those right place at the right time things.