You can’t climb mountains for more than half a century (yikes, that sounds like a long time!) without losing some friends. There’s no other pastime which is accessible to so many people yet also has a greater chance of injury or death. For proof of that, check out the publication entitled Accidents in North American Climbing which is released annually by the American Alpine Club. It describes, in hundreds of pages of graphic detail, all types of injury and death that occur in Canada, the United States and Mexico each year, and that’s only the ones that they know about. It is one sobering read. If there’s any doubt in your mind as to how much of a risky business is the sport of climbing, go latch on to a copy of that book – it’s a real eye-opener.
So enough for the preamble. I’d like to share with you some stories of friends I’ve lost through climbing accidents. Allow me go back to my early years. It was the summer of 1967, and I was working on a mining exploration crew in far northern British Columbia. There were, let’s see, how many of us? Cook, chopper pilot, mechanic, two bosses and another 6 or 8 of us, grunts who did all the real work. The big boss was this German idiot with a PhD who spent all his time scouring the surrounding bush for something to kill with his fancy custom-made rifle. Like one afternoon when he shot a black bear for no good reason, leaving her 2 cubs orphaned. God, we hated him for that. One of the cubs was dark brown, the other was pure white. The brown one took off running. We managed to grab the white one, all teeth and claws, and tied him up so we could figure out what to do with him. He was awfully small, maybe 25 or 30 pounds, and soon figured out a way to loose his bonds, then escaped into the bush forever. It was hard to imagine their surviving for long at such a tender age.
Anyway, the other boss was an East Indian man whose first name was Ram. This guy was a prince, loved and respected by all (except the idiot with the gun). It was always time well-spent hanging out with Ram. He ended up being our real boss, keeping the exploration show on the road, while the German played the fool (basically, we just ignored him). Ram had both a Master’s in Geology and an MBA. Well, the field season ended, we all returned to the city, and a few years passed. I don’t recall if I saw Ram during those years, but I had heard that he’d become engaged to a lovely girl. One day in 1970, I received a phone call from one of the guys on that 1967 crew. We had kept in touch and remained friends, so it was no real surprise to hear his voice on the other end of the line. What he had to tell me, though, was a real shock.
He brought me up to date. Ram had been working on an exploration crew at the north end of Vancouver Island – it was mid-winter and colder than usual. Ram was not only a good geologist, he was also passionate about climbing (which we had learned while working with him in 1967). Early one winter’s morning, he had set out with a partner. The bush was thick and the dead-fall was horrific (no surprise in that part of the world). The going became worse, and at some point in the day the two men became separated. Truth be told, Ram didn’t have the best sense of direction. The partner tried his best to locate him but failed, and before he lost the light completely he was forced to return to their camp. They had no choice but to wait until the next morning before they mounted a search party and went out looking. Late that day, they found Ram’s body – he had died of exposure, frozen to death in the unforgiving bush.
Several of us who had worked with Ram attended his funeral in Vancouver. Actually, it was more a memorial service than a funeral, as he had been cremated. His fiancée was there, and it was hard to both meet her for the first time and see the depth of her grief. She thanked us all for coming, and said that Ram had always spoken highly of our crew of 1967 and the camaraderie he felt with us, as it had been his first field season on an exploration crew in Canada.
Seven years later, I climbed a peak one January day in the Coast Range of British Columbia with a friend named Cam. It was a struggle as at times we ploughed through waist-deep snow during the 2,000-foot ascent. It all ended well, however, but I never saw Cam again. Some months later, a mutual friend called me out of the blue. Three of them (Cam included) had made a trip to the Yucatan to escape the Canadian winter, and had gone diving in one of the deep natural freshwater wells known as cenotes. The one that they had chosen was quite deep, and something went very wrong as they tried to reach the bottom. The other two had turned around in time and raced for the surface, while Cam didn’t make it and drowned in the deep, clear water. The Mexican authorities became involved, and Cam’s body was eventually flown back to BC.
Cam’s father was a school teacher in a town near me. Not long after the accident had occurred, he phoned me and asked if I could write a eulogy for Cam. I was happy to do it, but his father’s grief was palpable as we spoke that evening on the phone. Cam loved climbing, and it was hard to believe that he was gone without having reached his 30th birthday. A year later, I went back to the area of that last climb I had done with Cam, and re-climbed it in his honor. I ended up writing a piece for the Canadian Alpine Journal about some peaks I climbed in that area, and included that same peak in the story. As a tribute to Cam, I dropped the name “Cam’s Peak” on the peak we had climbed together that wintry day, and it seems to have stuck, as even today the name shows up on Google Earth. Although the name isn’t official, it’s a fitting tribute to a kindred spirit.
A dozen years later, I found myself with 2 climber friends on Mount Robson, the monarch of the Canadian Rockies. We were tent-bound in a never-ending storm at 10,000 feet for more than a week. During that time, as you might imagine, we had a lot of time to talk. What, you might ask, would we talk about, cheek by jowl, day and night, for a week? The answer, My Friends, is anything and everything. Of course, much of it had to do with climbing. Brian and I had already many years under our belts in a wide variety of climbing environments, but Scott was relatively new to the game. He was strong and fast, though, and was a quick study. During that week, we filled his head with details of many climbs we had done. Little did we know that he was sifting through them and making decisions about what he might do in the future.
Well, we finally escaped from our icy prison and ended up back at our respective homes. A month later, Brian called me. He’s a man of few words, and he cut right to the chase. “Hey man, I’m calling to tell you that Scott’s dead!” I was incredulous. After a few moments, he went on to explain what had happened.
Apparently, during our week in the tent, of all the different peaks we had discussed, Scott had become intrigued by Wedge Mountain, the highest peak in Garibaldi Park. Brian and I had climbed it by several different routes, so I guess we filled his head with a lot of ideas. It certainly was a worthy objective. After we had all returned home, Scott had made a trip to Vancouver to conduct some business for his employer. Thankfully, he had phoned his wife in Toronto to tell her of his plans for Wedge and the route he’d chosen.
He’d made his way into the Wedge area by himself, then over to the base of a difficult route known as the North Arête – he soloed it to the summit, where he signed the register. He decided to descend the same way, rather than taking an easier route back down. This was perhaps the riskiest decision he made. During the descent, it appears that he slipped on the steep ice and could not self-arrest in time to prevent himself from going over the edge of a 300-foot cliff. He was wearing crampons at the time and also had his ice axe with him. He died instantly from massive injuries. If he hadn’t phoned his wife from his hotel room in Vancouver before he went to Wedge and told her of his planned route, he might never have been found. His death was a real shock, coming so soon on the heels of having spent 24/7 lying beside him in a tent while the weather raged outside. It seemed surreal.
Many years later, I was climbing in the desert with a group of friends. We were a large, mixed group of men, women and children. As an enjoyable outing, we had decided to climb a small peak to its summit, maybe 800 vertical feet. We were in no hurry, having allowed an entire day for the experience. In a group of vehicles, we convoyed to a trailhead, parked and got ready for the day. We set out, going slowly and carefully as there was steep, loose ground in places. Some time later, as we neared the top, an accident occurred. One of the men, a skilled rock climber, was out ahead of the rest of us. He had taken a bold route up a rock face and had detached a large flake. He and the rock both fell backwards maybe 50 vertical feet through the air to the ground below. I was directly below him at the time and saw the fall. It was a horrifying sight, one that burned itself into my mind forever.
Several of the group were nearby and rushed to his aid. The leader of our group, the man who had organized the outing, asked me if I would gather up all of the children and escort them down the mountain and away from the scene of the accident and back to safety where our vehicles were parked. I asked one or two of the other adults to help me with this as there were probably 8 or 10 children, some of them as young as kindergarten age. It was a long, slow process shepherding them down – in places, the mountainside was quite slippery. We held hands as we descended to make sure that we stayed together and none of them got out ahead of the group. It took about an hour and a half to reach the vehicles. The children were scared, and asked if he was going to be alright. We said that it would all be fine.
Meanwhile, back at the scene of the accident, events were quickly unfolding. A group of 6 or 7 stayed at the scene to help in any way possible while all of the others singly or in small groups started down once they realized they weren’t needed up there. The summit was only 100 feet above where the accident happened, and fortunately there was a good cell phone connection from the top. One person went up and called 911. A helicopter was dispatched from Phoenix, 125 air miles away, and reached us in good time. However, once it arrived, it was obvious they could not land on the steep slope. It turned around and headed back while a second chopper was dispatched, also from Phoenix. In due time, it also arrived. I don’t know what the authorities were thinking, as this one was also unsuited to landing in such steep terrain. Within minutes, it too had turned tail and flown back to Phoenix. What to do?
I don’t know who thought of it, but it became apparent that real professionals were needed, people with the experience to pull off a mountain rescue. The Marine Corps Air Station in Yuma was contacted, and they dispatched a large military helicopter. It was obvious the moment they arrived that they knew exactly what to do. The machine hovered directly over the small group of people high on the mountain and lowered a marine medic to the site who quickly determined that our friend had passed away. They then rigged a basket to lift him off the mountain and fly him down to the area where we had all parked and were waiting. Several hours had now passed since the accident had occurred, and an ambulance was waiting to take him to a hospital in a nearby town. There, it was determined that he hadn’t suffered at all, that he had lost consciousness the moment he fell and had never re-gained it. This terrible accident was very traumatic and affected a lot of people, none more so than his wife who was there at the time.
The four previous stories were about people I had climbed with and knew personally, and whose accidental deaths seriously impacted me. There were others I knew as well, ones who died from other causes such as trying to ford a river while on a climb, or collapsing at the end of a climb. And others, from other causes. Each loss makes me realize my own mortality, and reaffirms the fact that my lifelong passion is indeed a risky one.