During one of his frequent visits to Yosemite in 1966, Stanford University student Scott Davis and partner emerged from an early ascent of the Lost Arrow Chimney to discover that their friends had forgotten to leave fixed ropes for them to escape ...
He staggered out of the cave sporting well-worn tape gloves, covered in cobwebs, with dirt filling the creases of his eyes and bloody elbows that he had acquired from the heinous body-smearing roof crack of an offwidth. A previous first ascent of ...
Horton Johnson, a member of the American Alpine Club since 1967, died on January 21, 2022. A graduate of Van Nuys (California) High School and the Sparling School of Deep Sea Diving, Horton began mountaineering in 1948 after serving in the armed f...
Maria Boone Cranor—luminary rock climber, co-founder of Black Diamond Equipment, and lecturer in physics at the University of Utah—died of cancer on January 15, 2023, at the Salt Lake City home of her great friends April and Dale Goddard. She was ...
Bob Dodson died on December 12, 2022 in White River Junction, Vermont. He was born on March 15, 1926, in Mount Vernon, New York, to Louise Swift Dodson and Captain Harry Leluce Dodson. Bob grew up around the world as his father served as a mechani...
On January 24, 2022, William "Bill" Ellis Long, age 91, of Palmer, Alaska, and Tucson, Arizona, died of leukemia in Tucson, surrounded by family and friends. Bill's intelligence, strength, and physical ability, combined with a love of the mountai...
Steve Brown was a native New Englander who, as “a precocious intellect in his youth,” attended Harvard University, completing a bachelor’s in biochemistry in 1990 and a Ph.D. in molecular biology in 1997. As an undergraduate, he was an activist in...
In late July, Alexander Klepikov, Stas Lazarev, and Alena Panova launched an expedition to the Ikatsky Ridge, east of Lake Baikal in Siberia, with the aim of climbing the biggest wall in a line of impressive granite faces: the north face of Pik Os...
In October 2020, Timofey Ivanov and Alexander Zhigalov completed a new route up the northwest face of Pik Dinosaur (2,221m) in the Ergaki massif of the Western Sayan Mountains. The expedition required eight days, including a two-day approach and f...
On July 3, Neil Chelton, Maria Parkes, and I flew from Ottawa to Pangnirtung to start a seven-week expedition up the Weasel River in Auyuittuq National Park. After checking in with the park visitor center and learning all about the polar bears, we...
In 2019 and 2022, Korean expeditions attempted unnamed Peak ca 6,120m (35°28'48.74"N, 76°11'59.37"E) at the head of the Bukma Glacier. They found no previous record of attempts on this summit, though the Bukma Glacier had been visited in 2003 by K...
In August, Thomas Bukowski, Lindsey Hamm, filmmaker Lane Mathis, Sam Stuckey, and I were in the Charakusa Valley with the intent of opening long new rock routes. Our first objective was Farhod Brakk (a.k.a. Parhat Brakk, 5,300m), a soaring monoli...
The 2022 Narumi-Yokoyama attempt on the southwest ridge of K7. The duo’s high point is at the top of the Fortress. Photo by Genki Narumi. Kenji Sakamoto, Yusuke Sato, Satoru Tanaka, Katsutaka "Jumbo" Yokoyama, and I arrived at K7 base camp on...
On October 20, Rushad Nanavatty and I completed a likely new line, Lungta (820m, 70° ice), up the south face and southwest ridge of Langpo South (6,857m, 27°50'22.43"N, 88°12'5.57"E). This appears to be the second reported ascent of the peak. Aft...
In 2021, Liu Junfu and I were looking for a mountain on which we could climb a new route of moderate difficulty in a one-day push. We chose Yangmantai (5,666m, 31°11’58.31”N, 102°53’38.11”E). Viewed from the Changping Valley, Yangmantai is an eleg...
In 2008, three Chinese climbers made the first ascent of Xuanwu Feng (“Black Tortoise Peak,” 5,383m), situated at 31°7’14.93”N, 102°48’45.13”E, between Tan Shan (4,946m) and Angry Wife (5,005m). The climbers were Li Hongxue, a professional mountai...
Peak 5,324m lies in the far western sector of the Siguniang massif, at 31°11’22.242”N, 102°41’58.26”E, and is reached via the infrequently visited Jiesi Valley. On December 15, Wang Yongpeng, Wu Yunhe, Xu Gang, and Yang Sheng made a four-hour appr...
Wukuchu is a relatively recently climbed peak that lies around 35km southwest of the Minya Konka (Gongga Shan) group at 29°17’07.1”N, 101°41’24.2”E. It has two tops separated by a rocky col: Chu (west top, 5,526m) and Wuku (east top, 5,518m). A ba...
Climbing solo, Jost Kobusch (Germany) reached the summit of Denali on February 19, 2023. Kobusch made a single-push ascent from the standard 14,200’ camp on the West Buttress route to the 20,310’ summit via the Messner Couloir, believed to be the ...
In September I headed to Pakistan with Nigel Bassam, Ross Bell, Tom Bell, Karim Hayat, and Paul Winder. Karim provided the logistics through his Hunza-based company and also was a full climbing member of the team. The trip had been scheduled for 2...