The 'Costs' of Mountain Rescue

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With all the media hype about the recent rescue attempt on Mount Hood for 3 lost climbers, I felt obliged to post my 2-cents worth. We in the SAR community have been watching how this most recent tragic event was handled by the media with great concern. So many of the articles were based on the subjective opinions of people who do not have an understanding of search and rescue operations or an appreciation of the athletic sport of mountain climbing.

I suppose search and rescue operations above the tree line will always hold a kind of fascination with the general public. The pundits always come out of the woodwork screaming for climbers to pay rescue fees, for mandatory rules on MLBs, for requiring some kind of climbing certification, and so on. The bottom line is that these mountain rescue operations are a very small fraction of our total ‘call-outs.’

Many folks do not realize that the individuals who volunteer their own time to assist in search and rescue operations devote a huge amount of time training for myriad search scenarios. The vast majority of searches are for lost hikers, hunters, ATV riders, and so on. These searches get very little coverage in comparison to mountain rescue operations. Nevertheless, we do not hear complaints about the cost of these operations or see campaigns focused on making hikers and hunters carry location devices and pay additional fees.

People venture beyond the obscure line that divides supposed ‘safety and security’ from 'risk' to experience life without cellular communication, the internet, and the constant deluge of information that comprises the ‘modern’ world. If we try to legislate this essential and inherently human experience out of existence, then a fundamental element of the human spirit dies.

Oregon’s SAR volunteers contribute not only their time, but also their own money and resources in many instances. We contribute to the cause of helping others without expecting anything in return. Much of our hours in training or in ‘stand-by’ mode go unnoticed. Corvallis Mountain Rescue for example had a team of 6 members standing-by ready to deploy at midnight on Saturday, December 12th. We were deeply disappointed and saddened by our inability to help find these unfortunate climbers due to the unsafe avalanche conditions on the mountain at the time.

If you were to ask each one of us why we freely give of our time and resources you would get a variety of answers, but at the heart of it lies an appreciation of the human spirit and an understanding that at some point in our lives all of us need some form of help and support.

One fine day at the police range

Watch the Range Master's face when she's done shooting.


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Mt Adams South Side

A Dry and Windy Ascent of Mount Adams (12,276 ft)

At the trail head...Nice and clean.

This was kind of a first for me. A colleague of mine at ENTEK that I run with during lunchtime signaled an interest in climbing a volcano. He is a Russian immigrant and had never been up one of our volcanoes here in the Northwest. After some discussion and consideration, I volunteered to lead a climb up Adams for him. In the weeks prior to our climb, he asked if his 20 year old daughter, Sonya, could join us. She is a recent graduate of OSU with a degree in Civil engineering. She also had no mountaineering experience, but as she is also a runner and in good physical shape, I agreed to the addition. So I became a mountain guide for the 3-Day weekend. The three of us left from Lebanon at 6am on Friday 9/25 and arrived at the trail head around 11:30am after buying our climbing permits at the Mount Adams Ranger Station.

Mount Adams from near the junction of the "Round' The Mountain" Trail. The false summit is just visable as a thin strip of snow near "the top."

The weather was dry and warm with temperatures in the 60s. Our goal for the first day was to climb to the "Lunch Counter" at 9,500 feet and camp for the night. The Lunch Counter is a large "flat" area with good bivy spots and glacial melt for water. This allows some time to acclimate to the altitude and rest prior to climbing the more challenging portion.

Pavel Coming up the Crescent Glacier

The view from our bivy site at 9,500 on the Lunch Counter. Pavel and Sonya's tent with Mt Hood on the horizon.

We arrived about 5pm and set-up our camp. There was a good rushing stream of glacial melt coming down close to our camp. I boiled water, cooked our meals and prepared water and gear for the summit day while Pavel and Sonya rested and took-in the surrounding beauty.

Home, sweet home for the guide!

At sundown we took to our sleeping bags as the temperature dropped. It was a breezy night and I enjoyed the brilliant stars of the Milky Way while watching the slow progress of satellites and the streak of shooting stars from my bag. The sound of the rushing stream of melted glacial water disappeared around 10pm as the upper reaches of the mountain froze solid and stopped the flow of water like turning off a spigot.

Sonya strapping-on crampons for the first time.

I woke Pavel and Sonya at 5am for the summit push. We ate a quick snack and headed up to the thin ice fields coming down from Pikers Peak (The false summit at 11,500 feet). At the ice fields I demonstrated crampon use and self-arrest in the event of a fall. I warned them of the potential hazards from of all the "sharps" on their feet and on the ice axe. I drove this point home by cutting the palm of my left hand through my gloves with adze of my ice axe while demonstrating self-arrest on hard ice (Some guide huh?). It bled pretty good, but was only superficial and I bandaged myself up quickly while they practiced the technique without cutting themselves.

Once everybody was 'comfortable' with the techniques, we began the climb up the ice fields. During the ascent, Pavel had trouble with the crampons I lent him as they did not properly conform to his borrowed boots. This lead to a tense moment on the ice when I eventually had to strap one of my crampons onto his boot in order for him to traverse to the adjacent scree until we could rectify the problem. We all had to switch around crampons until everyone had a set that properly fit.

Pavel taking a brief rest during the ascent up the ice field at around 10,500 feet.

We reached Pikers Peak just before noon. We took a brief break before climbing to the true summit another 700 feet above.

Shaking hands with Sonya as she reaches the summit.

At the summit there is an old fire tower that was built in (1921?) but only used for 3 years before the adolescent USFS realized the total impracticality of the project. The skeleton of the building is still there. It is remarkable that it was attempted at all, and I wonder if the taxpayers in the early 20's were happy about that!

Sonya and Pavel lean into the wind at the summit. That's Rainier on the horizon.

The wind at the summit was probably in the range of 65MPH. It was fairly warm however and we had a nice view of Mt Rainier to the north.


On descent with the Mazama glacier behind me.

Sonya and Pavel on descent.

The descent went without incident. We came down by way of the scree fields and stayed off the ice. It was a relief to me when we finally got down to the Lunch Counter. I'm not sure I am cut-out to be a guide. I spent most of the time worrying about a potential fall, how long it was taking us to ascend, and how the descent would go. Once we were above the Lunch Counter, I knew that rescue would be very difficult and that it was my responsibility to keep them safe. I was happy to see our bivy spot at the Lunch Counter again! For safety's sake we stayed on another night at the Lunch Counter before going back down to the car.

I enjoyed watching the Milky Way slowly rotating across the sky and counted a dozen shooting stars before falling asleep.

Mt Washington May 24 - 2009

Drew Bryenton (CMRU Colleague & Friend) and I made plans to try Mt. Washington earlier this month. I had not thought about the fact that it would be so soon after my oral surgery, but as it turned out that was not a problem.

We left our house at 2:30am and were on skis for the approach just as dawn was breaking at 4:30am. It was a beautiful morning with fog rising over Big Lake and Mt. Washington on the horizon.



We skied the Big Lake road on the approach and into the forest. We soon found the conditions to be too difficult on skis. The snow was deep enough, but there were dangerous tree wells and very inconsistent conditions being this late in the year, so we strapped our skis to our backpacks and began the long and arduous 6.5 mile, 7.5 hour approach on foot.



We stashed our skis at the base of the North Ridge and continued up. The temperature was probably in the 60s along the North Ridge and the snow was still firm. We put on our crampons about half way up the ridge and continued up to the Gendarm spires that shield the summit pinnacle from easy access. We traversed around these spires and up to a notch just below the pinnacle proper.






I led the first pitch up a snow covered ramp where Drew hammered in two snow pickets for protection. I went around to the east and up about 30 meters of rotten rock until I found a good block of rock where I placed protection to belay Drew.






Drew led the second pitch up a small chimney and around to the west to the next belay station about 40 meters above. Once I reached Drew, we switched places again and I led the final pitch to the summit using about 50 meters of rope.




The summit pinnacle was a mixed climb of rock and small snow fields that sloughed-off snow as we ascended. We wore our crampons the whole way up. We reached the summit at 2:00pm and found that we were the first to sign the summit register this year. We rappelled down the summit pinnacle to “The Notch” and began our descent of the ridge.


The rest of the trip went without incident. As we reached our skis, we found bear tracks close by. We had been following our own tracks back down and the bear tracks crossed our track.


We took a compass heading and went directly cross-country to the East side of Big Lake and around to the truck arriving at 8:30pm. Just in time to shoot a couple of photos of the mountain on the drive out. The trip took us 16 hours to cover 13 miles with 3,100 feet of elevation gain.