California, Yosemite, Washington Column. On 4 September Ralph Love (36), and Rex Allen Spaith, Jr., were attempting the South Face of Washington Column. Ralph led the pitch off Dinner Ledge, and was at the base of the roof, trying to figure out ho...
This is the twenty-seventh annual Report of the Safety Committee of the American Alpine Club and the fourteenth in conjunction with the Alpine Club of Canada. Its publication was delayed by human frailties; the Committee expects to do better next ...
AVALANCHE, INADEQUATE EQUIPMENT, POOR POSITION, FAILURE TO HEED FORECAST British Columbia, Rocky Mountains, Mount Field, Silk Tassel FallsOn February 2, 1992, two parties of two set out for Silk Tassel, a grade 4 ice climb near the Trans-Canada Hi...
Mount Huntington-West FaceDavid S. RobertsIT was darker than dusk. The two of us stood in the gloom of Alaskan midnight on the last day of July. Ed said, "How do you feel?”"Pretty tired. I feel I’m getting overcautious. How about you?”"No,” he ans...
Bright StarEdward WebsterBright star, would I were steadfast as thou art— Not in lone splendor hung aloft the night And watching, with eternal lids apart,Like nature’s patient, sleepless Eremite,The moving waters at their priestlike task of pure a...
Fitz Roy, Guided Ascent. Possibly for the first time, a client was guided on a major Patagonian route. In the 1992-3 season, Italian guide Marcello Cominetti first hoped to lead Cesare Sartori up the Maestri Compressor Route on Cerro Torre, but th...
Early in the day on May 25, several groups went for a summit attempt from the 17,200-foot camp. The Alpine Ascents guide stopped by the NPS tent to let Rangers know that they would be attempting to summit. At 2315, NPS volunteer Mik Jedlicka ...
Climbs from the Klutlan, 1951Alfred W. BaxterTHE Stanford Klutlan Expedition represented an extension to Alaskan terrain of mountaineering doctrine and practice developed on the Sierra Club Expeditions to the Coast Range of British Columbia in 194...
Padmanabh, first ascent. Almost all the unclimbed 7,000m peaks surrounding the Siachen Glacier were scaled in the 1970s by expeditions entering the region from Pakistan. Padmanabh remained virgin. The period allocated to climbing during our traver...
Dhaulagiri IV. On May 9 two of the Osaka Mountaineering Federation party reached the summit of untrodden Dhaulagiri IV (25,135 feet) by its western approach, but they failed to return. They fell into the Konabon amphitheater from 24,600 feet where...
Mount Marcus Baker, Second Ascent, and Mount Goode, First Ascent, Chugach Range. On April 20 Eric Barnes, flying for Alyeska Air Service, set Helmut Tschaffert and me down at 8000 feet on the Knik Glacier between Marcus Baker (13,176 feet) and Goo...
First Ascents in the Mont Blanc AlpsJohn HarlinL’Aiguille du Fou’s South FaceIT had been three hours since the first wisps of high cirrus appeared from the west. The sky was now overcast and lowering. The summits of the Jorasses were put to sleep,...
FRANCYS DISTEFANO-ARSENTIEV 1958-1998SERGUEI ANATOLIEVICH ARSENTIEV 1958-1998About five years ago, Francys Distefano, a long-time member of the Telluride community and a rapidly improving high-altitude climber, arrived home with Serguei, her guide...
To begin, Keith (Spencer, 45) and I drove up to Cody on Thursday, New Year’s Day. Having recently soloed Cho Oyu, the world’s sixth highest peak, Keith was practically voluble. He talked more in that seven-hour drive than I’d heard him say in the ...
FALL ON ROCK, PROTECTION PULLED OUT, PLACED INADEQUATE PROTECTION, NO HARD HATWashington, Peshastin Pinnacles, Lightning CrackOn May 31, 1992, Bob Renz (40) was climbing Lightning Crack. He placed protection at the beginning of the climb and then ...
Dingjung Ri South (6,196m), first known ascent. Kenro Nakajima and Hiroki Yamamoto made the first authorized ascent of Dingjung Ri South. On March 7 they established base camp on the Meluka (Pangbuk) Glacier at 4,970m. They then placed a high camp...
Rakaposhi, by Mike Banks. 238 pages, 36 photographs, and three drawings. Foreward by Sir Gerald Templer. Appendices by F. R. Brooke and E. J. E. Mills. London: Secker and Warburg, 1959. Price 25s.This book is unusual in that it describes not one e...
Idaho Alpine Club. The club became increasingly active during 1991 in climbing access issues. Friends of City of Rocks, which is operated primarily by club members, published several newsletters funded by both the Access Fund and T-shirt sales. Th...
Lotus Flower Tower, Free Ascent. In early August Mark Robinson, Sandy Stewart and I completed the first all-free ascent of the McCarthy-Frost-Bill route on the Lotus Flower Tower during a three-day spell of clear weather. Several days earlier, we ...
Devil’s Thumb and. Mount Burkett. On May 21 Michael Bearzi and I began skiing up the Baird Glacier. We reached our airdrop at the base of the southeast face of the Devil’s Thumb (9077 feet) on the 24th and established Base Camp. We then had a go a...