Ama Dablam, Southwest Ridge in Winter. Ama Dablam was climbed several times by the southwest ridge in December of 1990. A Norwegian-Swedish expedition led by Norwegian Jan Westby climbed the mountain on December 2 when Norwegian Magnar Osnes and S...

Incahuasi, Ojos del Salado, Aconcagua. I was lucky to find a ride into the Ojos del Salado area. A group of government people left Copiapó on a Saturday morning to return eleven days later from Argentina. So I spent eleven days alone in the mounta...

FALL ON SNOW, UNABLE TO SELF-ARRESTWyoming, TetonsOn July 6, 1989, Ralph Trover (40) and Joe Kelsey (50), Exum Mountain Guides, successfully took clients Tamara Martin and Wesley Jones up the Grand Teton. At 1800, the four were descending the stee...

FALL ON SNOW, CLIMBING ALONEWashington, Mount AdamsOn October 18, Derek Mamoyac (27) fell as he was descending after reaching Piker’s Peak at 11,657 feet, below the mountain’s summit. He stepped in some snow he thought was solid, but it gave way.M...

Ratang-Parbati Expedition, Spiti. We explored and photo-surveyed a hitherto unmapped area of over 400 square miles, crossing ten virgin passes varying in height from 17,800 to 21,000 feet, one across the Main Himalayan Divide itself. Fifteen new g...

FALL ON ICE, INADEQUATE PROTECTION, OVERCONFIDENCEWashington, Mount BakerOn August 4, 1991, a group of two guides and eleven students walked to an area near the center of the Coleman Glacier on Mount Baker. The ice formed an amphitheater with 30 t...

Washington, Mt. Shuksan—On August 7, 1955 at 4 a.m., Dr. Paul Gerst- mann and Robert Parkhurst, both members of the Mountaineers and experienced climbers, along with Larry Wold, an independent climber with somewhat less experience, set out to clim...

ROPE STUCK ON RAPPEL, STRANDED California, Yosemite Valley, Royal ArchesOn June 16, 1993, around 1630, Erika Heine (19) and Tracy Walker (29) stuck their rope while rappelling on the Royal Arches descent route. They were at the third rappel statio...

The Cathedral Spires in the Yosemite were attempted late in the fall by Richard Leonard, Jules Eichorn and Bestor Robinson. They used a number of pitons and are still hoping to reach the top of the higher spire in a later attempt. The principal re...

Gurla Mandata, ascent. Japanese climbers, Masakazu Okunda and Susumu Yamada, together with a high altitude porter, climbed this 7694m peak in Western Tibet via the Original Route up the West Ridge approached from the north. The summit, a.k.a. Naim...

Bhagirathi IV (6,193m), III (6,454m), and II (6,512m). During autumn, Slovenians Rok Blagus, Luka Lindic, and Marko Prezelj blitzed the Bhagirathi Group, making three significant first ascents. The trio was reasonably lucky with the weather; durin...

PITON FAILURE AND FALL ON ROCK—Quebec, Val David, Mont King. On August 1, 1976, Julien Belanger (20) was leading la Traversee on Mont King and anchored himself to a piton on the highest part of the slab. While he protected his second, the piton ca...

Glaciology in the Sixteenth Century. The following passage is translated from Sebastian Münster's Cosmographia Universalis (Basel, 1543):What is understood of Glaciers. Glaciers, though not mine nor metal, yet resemble pure crystal in clarity, and...

ROCKFALLAlberta, Rocky Mountains, Cascade WaterfallOn Feb. 20, after a successful ascent of this waterfall (III, WI3), a party of three were setting up to rappel the route. A large rock (estimated at 50 to 80 lbs) came from above and hit one membe...

Two climbers, Stefan Zuck and Hans Teufel, during the summer of 1937, January through March, made a number of new ascents in the southern Andes of Chile. The E. peak of the Payne Group, Monte Admirante Nieto, 2460 m., and three other peaks of over...

Gyajikang. Gyajikang (7038 meters, 23,091 feet) lies northwest of Manaslu. Our expedition of ten Japanese and five Nepalese policemen, plus Nepali high-altitude porters sent a total of 17 men to the summit via the northwest ridge to the west ridge...

Cabeza del Indio, La Hoja, and La Espada, Paine Group. In November J-F. Lemoine, J-J. Jaouen, J-M. Boucansaud and I climbed on the Paine group despite bad weather. We climbed Cabeza del Indio (2350 meters, 7710 feet), La Hoja (The Blade; 1950 mete...

Flatirons. In the Flatirons above Boulder, Chester Dreiman and I made the first ascent of a tremendous overhang on the west face of Like Heaven Rock, which we named For Your Arms Only. We two also completed a new direct finish to Jeff Lowe’s route...

Mount Everest, From Sweden by Bicycle. I wanted to climb Everest by my own strength from my home to the top and back again. That’s why I started October 16, 1995, from Stockholm, Sweden, with my bike and a specially made one-wheeled trailer behind...

Gemse Peak, Anderson River Group, British Columbia Cascade Range, 1986. Maxim de Jong, Sybil Goman and I climbed a new route (5.7) on Gemse Peak, the southwest face, in May 1986. We made one pendulum. The rock is solid but quite mossy.Fred Beckey