Moose’s Tooth and HuntingtonJames Quirk, UnaffiliatedDAVE NETTLE AND I hadn’t been in Talkeetna for more than ten minutes when we descended on the bar at the Fairview Inn. One of the folks present was Doug Geeting, our pilot. We mentioned to him t...
Makalu, winter solo attempt and tragedy. The well-known French mountaineer, Jean-Christophe Lafaille, 40 years old, vanished on January 27, 2006, while attempting to make an entirely solo ascent of Makalu (8,485m), the world’s fifth highest mounta...
Colorado, Third Flatiron. On July 30, Dennis Dreher (18), Evans Winner (28), and Roy Rieckus (19) were descending the Third Flatiron in the face of an impending storm. Dreher rappelled down their ascent route, the east face. The rappel was fixed a...
FROSTBITE, INADEQUATE EQUIPMENT, BAD WEATHER, INEXPERIENCE Alaska, Mt. McKinleyMike McCoomb (21) was a member of the three-man “Bronze Carabiner Expedition” on the West Buttress of Mt. McKinley. They flew to Kahiltna Glacier on May 4 to begin thei...
INADEQUATE FOOD AND WATER, CLIMBING ALONEAlaska, Mount McKinley, West ButtressShigeo Tamoi (33) began his solo climb of Mount McKinley’s West Buttress on May 28. He ascended to the 14,200-foot camp in three days and then he acclimatized for three ...
Granitic Peaks of KirgiziaMark Bebie and Tom Hargis with Igor Tsaruk, St. PetersburgMICHAEL GRABER WROTE in Ascent of 1980, “God went nuts when He created the Cathedral Spires,” and halfway around the world from Alaska, this statement applies equa...
Denali National Park and Preserve Mountaineering Summary, 1985. There were no winter ascents of Mount McKinley or adjacent peaks during 1985. A Japanese team, filming a movie about Naomi Uemura, made this season’s first ascent. Their large filming...
Torres del Paine*Ramiro Calvo, Club Andino Bariloche, Argentinain PUERTO NATALES WE SET ABOUT GETTING PERMISSIONS. The Chilean officials try to explain that problems are to be solved without haste. Our anxiety accelerates the slowness, but at the ...
Ruth Gorge, ascents and attempts. The popularity of the Ruth Gorge continued, with many routes seeing ascents. The oft-attempted Cobra Pillar (VI 5.10+ A3, Donini-Tackle, 1991) on Mt. Barrill finally was repeated in June, by two parties. Canadians...
Over three trips in October and November, Aaron Mulkey and I looked for ice and mixed climbs in the Beartooths. We managed a major route each trip, which made the long and remote approaches worthwhile. After speaking with several Beartooth c...
FALL ON SNOW, FALL INTO MOAT, INADEQUATE EQUIPMENT, INEXPERIENCEWyoming, TetonsOn June 18, 1982, 24 members of a geology field trip from Western Illinois University hiked to the base of Hidden Falls on the west side of Jenny Lake. Upon arriving at...
HANDHOLD CAME OFF–FALL ON ROCK, INADEQUATE BELAY, INEXPERIENCE, FAULTY INSTRUCTIONWashington, WilkesonOn July 7, I (25) took S.P. (22), my girlfriend of a year, for a day of instructional rock climbing and rappelling. I have been rock climbing for...
Blow-Me-Down Wall, Lucifer’s Lighthouse. Towering nearly 1,300' above Devil’s Bay on the south coast of Newfoundland, the solid white granite of Blow-Me-Down offers some of the best sea cliff climbing in North America. Accessible only by boat, the...
Welzenbach’s Climbs. A Biographical Study and the Collected Writings of Willo Welzenbach. Eric Roberts. The Mountaineers, Seattle, 1981. 272 pages, black-and-white photographs, $14.95.Introduction to Alpinism 101. All right, class, What are the tw...
La Mascara, Fragile Faces, New Route. Gabor Babcsan (Hungary), Stéphane Bauzac (France), and Leslie Fucsko (French/Hungarian) opened the route Fragile Faces (A4+ 6C, 800m) on the east face of La Mascara, located at the end of the Bader Valley (for...
Huascaran massif, unnamed wall, Entre Boires. From July 23 to August 9, after seven days carrying loads, acclimatizing, and fixing the first 200m of the route, Youri Cappis (from Switzerland but living in Catalonia) and I climbed a new route on a ...
About 1130 on March 9, 1986, Tracy Dorton reported to the Valley Visitor Center that three friends of his were climbing on Half Dome and that he was concerned about them due to recent bad weather. Search and Rescue Officer Mike Murray was notified...
German Cho Oyu Attempt. This four-man expedition dwindled to just one member before arrival at Base Camp; two went to Lhotse first and never went on to Cho Oyu and the third got sick before getting to Base Camp and left Nepal. That left Hans Eitel...
ALLEN CARPÉ+1894-1932In the death of Allen Carpé American mountaineering has lost one of its most enthusiastic and accomplished advocates. He was born in Chicago, December 20th, 1894, a great-grandson of Ezra Cornell, founder of Cornell University...
Jirishanca NorteLeslie D. Wilson, unaffiliatedThe twin peaks of Jirishanca and Jirishanca Norte, 20,099 and 19,735 feet respectively, are located in the northern Cordillera Huayhuash between Yerupajá and Rondoy. The only ascent of Jirishanca was m...