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News: Rainier Climber, Deathtrap Conditions May 19, 2004 Source: http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2001932914_climb19m.html Mount Rainier climbers battled 'deathtrap conditions' By Michael Ko Seattle Times staff reporter LONGMIRE, Mount Rainier National Park — When National Park ranger David Gottlieb finally reached the mountain's Liberty Ridge on Monday afternoon, what he saw astounded him. Climber Scott Richards had burrowed a tent into a narrow and precarious ice ledge on the north face of the mountain at about 12,000 feet. The ledge was just a few feet wide. Inside, Richard's friend and climbing partner, Peter Cooley, was wrapped in three sleeping bags. A head wound stretched from above his left eye to his ear. Cooley was mumbling incoherently and thrashing loudly, Gottlieb said. Richards, meanwhile, was boiling water to pour into bottles he could stuff inside the sleeping bags to keep Cooley warm. Despite a dramatic rescue effort involving an Oregon National Guard helicopter and dozens of search-and-rescue personnel, Cooley would die several hours later en route to Madigan Army Medical Center near Tacoma. Yesterday morning, the helicopter plucked Richards off the mountain as well and reunited him with his wife. Richards made a brief statement to the media yesterday, and then several rangers, including Gottlieb, talked about their part in the rescue and described in detail "the deathtrap conditions" in which Richards and Cooley had been stranded since Saturday. "Peter was a great guy," Richards wrote in a statement read by David Barber, a family friend. "Confident, trusting, very passionate in everything he does. He waged an incredible battle on the mountain for survival. I will be forever saddened by the loss of my close friend." As Barber read, Richards quietly wept. Patti Wold, a park spokeswoman, said Richards had thought he could speak for himself earlier in the day, but then changed his mind. "He hasn't been able to sleep in four days, and he can't put a thought together.... He's in such an emotional place, it's hard from one minute to the next," Wold said. Richards, 42, and Cooley, 39, two veteran climbers from Cape Elizabeth, Maine, were stranded halfway up Liberty Ridge, an area revered by experienced mountaineers because of the challenges it presents. The ridge runs between two frozen walls, ranging from 100 to 300 feet high, Gottlieb said. And with regularity, chunks of ice "the size of Volkswagens" break off the walls and plummet down the ridge. Richards described to Gottlieb what had happened: Just before the accident Saturday morning, the two climbers were walking atop the narrow ridge between the ice walls. Cooley was climbing on the east side of the ridge, while Richards was on the west side. Cooley was about 50 feet ahead of Richards, and they were connected by a climbing rope. Cooley, Gottlieb said, tripped on a crampon, slipped off the cliff to his left and fell about 30 feet. He was swinging like a pendulum when he hit his head on a rock. Cooley's fall yanked Richards forward, and he found himself holding Cooley's limp body at the other end of the rope. Richards wasn't pulled over the ridge because the rope was tied to a harness in a way that absorbed much of Cooley's weight. Richards jammed ice screws into nearby ice and transferred Cooley's weight onto those screws. Then he climbed over the ridge and rappelled down to his friend. He secured him and took him to the ledge where he pitched the tent and placed Cooley inside. "His entire motivation was, 'How do I help my friend get out of here?' " Gottlieb said. Richards called for help on his cellphone that night, and rescue crews started up the mountain Sunday. But what would have been an eight-hour climb from the base of the mountain to Liberty Ridge on a good day became a 24-hour ordeal as rescuers battled rain, snow and whiteout conditions, said Glenn Kessler, who supervised the rescue. Exhausted rescuers set up a base camp at the bottom of Liberty Ridge at about 8,800 feet. They decided to send up a "hasty team" of two rangers to find the stranded climbers as quickly as possible. The other rescuers, five rangers each carrying loads weighing 90 pounds, would follow. Rangers Charlie Borgh and Gottlieb reached the stranded climbers about 1 p.m. Monday. They anchored themselves nearby. When the weather broke, the Chinook rescue helicopter was brought in and lifted Cooley off the mountain. Gottlieb said the helicopter hovered about 80 feet above them while it lowered a cable with a clip. Because of the mountain conditions and the small size of the helicopter door, there was no choice but to strap Cooley into a small litter and send him up vertically. The rescuers had no neck collar or backboard with which to stabilize Cooley. Gottlieb said he anchored himself into the ledge and held on to a rope attached to the bottom of the litter in an attempt to prevent Cooley from spinning and hitting the chopper. Cooley probably suffered some trauma when rescuers prepared him for the airlift and hauled him into the helicopter, Gottlieb said. But given the circumstances, that was the best they could do. Getting Cooley to the hospital was the most important thing, he said. Rescuers said that, had the helicopter not come, it would have required six to 10 people up to 24 hours to bring Cooley off the mountain. About three hours after the helicopter left, the rangers heard via radio that Cooley had died. Rescuers decided to tell Richards, who took the news stoically. "Amazingly, he kept his composure," Gottlieb said. "I was broken down myself. I know he was terribly sad himself." They spent Monday night on the mountain. Yesterday morning, when the weather broke, rescuers made the decision to call in a helicopter. Richards, Gottlieb and Borgh climbed down to the Liberty Ridge base camp, where the helicopter picked them up about 9:15 a.m. "I think it was prudent for the park to get him off the mountain," Gottlieb said. "It would have been a monumental effort to get down to the parking lot. He had already given up so much." "My personal respect is substantial for Scott." |
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