In mid-June, a team made up of a 30-year-old male and a 37-year-old male attempted to climb Denali’s West Buttress from Anchorage; they planned to run and hike to the mountain and then start climbing. Near the Hidden Glacier, south of the head of the Pika Glacier, they realized they would run out of food at their current pace and decided to drop weight and race to a cache they had placed on the Pika Glacier. On June 17, they called to report they were lost and had run out of food, and they requested help. Searchers were unable to find them that day, in part because the “ping” from their satellite phone placed them 10 miles north of their actual location. They were finally located and rescued on June 18 after multiple search attempts by air taxi services and NPS personnel.

ANALYSIS

All routes in the Alaska Range require baseline backcountry skills such as navigation, weather reading, and wilderness survival. The NPS rangers recommend that any climber traveling to the range be as well practiced in these foundational skills as they are in the more technical aspects of a climbing expedition. (Source: Denali Mountaineering Rangers.)