Little Cottonwood experienced a wide range of accidents in 2017, including an apparently intoxicated climber who fell 25 to 30 feet to the ground from a sport climb when his belayer failed to catch him. The climber was not wearing a helmet and suffered significant head and shoulder wounds. Various witnesses reported the two had been drinking alcohol for much of the day.

Two climbers had ankle fractures after falls at Gate Buttress: one while leading the third pitch of a climb and the other (a beginner) while scrambling the 3rd-class approach. One party was stranded on the south ridge of Mt. Superior, a popular long climb (5.4) that is often scrambled; a second had to be rescued from Superior when a September snowstorm caught them. In a bizarre and frightening incident, several climbers in the Pentapitch area reported more than a dozen gunshots aimed at or near them by an unidentified shooter on the road below. No one was hit.