Most people who have been mountaineers for any length of time have friends who have died climbing. Many of my friends have more dead partners than they have fingers. I have been lucky in that regard throughout my outdoor career, with only one death and a couple major injuries among my partners.
The other day I stood by and watched gravity challenge that fact.
Backcountry skiing is an extension of mountaineering. It is like downhill skiing without the ski lifts. You climb the top of a mountain and ski down. In the Northeast, Mount Washington is famous for the ski terrain in Tuckerman Ravine. The rest of the mountain, however, contains better and less crowded terrain for skiers willing to look around.
I am always looking for partners.
I found a dependable one, in my friend Brian. He is a ski patroller and a strong skier, always looking for a challenge. More importantly, he is a close friend. It is easy to find people to ski or climb with; it is harder to find partners.
Brian and I have been ski patrolling at Shawnee Peak for several years. On the mountain, we are often found together, whether taking runs or running accidents. Accident scenes are often silent because we are so used to working with each other. We have also spent numerous days exploring steep chutes and fresh powder in the White Mountain backcountry.
We had to work Sunday night, so we took the morning to play. I suggested we go up to Washington to find some powder. The weather had been horrible for the past week, and the only hope we had for decent conditions was up high. He agreed, excited for his first backcounty trip of the winter.
I met him early Sunday morning and we drove up to Pinkham Notch, the launching point for most winter ascents of Mount Washington. The plan was to climb a moderate ice gully up to the summit, ski the snowfields on the summit cone and then ski out the safest and easiest path.
Mount Washington has a history of high winds, freezing temperatures and deep snowpacks. It is one of only a handful of places east of the Mississippi River where lethal avalanches occur. It has killed time and time again. It is also one of the most popular winter recreation spots in the country.
We climbed up the trail that accesses the main bowls on the mountain. There are two bowls, or glacial cirques, on the east side of the mountain: Tuckerman Ravine and Huntington Ravine. Tucks is primarily ski terrain and Huntington is mainly ice climbing. We headed into Huntington.
In the ravine, we came to the base of a steep, large snowfield that led to the narrow ice gully we planned to follow to the summit. We donned crampons, which are spikes that attach to the bottom of your boots, and ascended the steep snow.
We got to the base of the ice gully just before noon. It was too late to make it to the summit and back to the car in time for work, so Brian and I discussed our options. The left side of the snowfield had been wind-loaded with about eight inches of powder. We decided to ski down this chute, back to the trail and out. We would make our summit attempt another day.
We snapped on our skis and admired the beautiful weather. Brian remarked how much better this terrain was than anything any ski area had to offer. He thanked me for dragging him out into this beautiful environment and for introducing him to backcountry skiing in the first place.
I made the first few turns on the forty-degree hard-packed snow and then pointed them to the snow on the left. I hit the powder and began carving turns. I let out an enthusiastic shout, but it was answered by a shout of another kind.
I stopped and turned around just in time to see Brian sliding out of control. He was on his stomach sliding face first towards a row of boulders. He screamed as his head and shoulders hit the first set of rocks. His skis came up over his head and he began to tumble. He cartwheeled down the rock-strewn slope, bouncing five or six more times before slamming into two rocks that would not let him go.
I shouted to him. He gave no response. I shouted again, more loudly. He yelled back that he was ok. I skied to about forty feet above him and removed my skis. As I down-climbed to him, I asked him his name, the date and who the president was. He replied, “I’m Brian, its Sunday, and that jerk somehow won.” I knew his head was ok.
I performed a trauma assessment, checking for broken bones and major injuries. It looked as if he had broken his left shoulder, injured some ribs, his right arm and his right thigh. His head, neck and back all seemed to be relatively undamaged.
By this time, several climbers who had witnessed the fall came to help. We slung his left arm and got more layers on him for the below-freezing conditions. We then decided what to do next, as it was obvious that he was not walking out on his own. Several of the climbers had cellular phones, but they didn’t have any signal. Someone was going to have to go for help.
Everyone looked at me. I was on skis. I could travel as far in half an hour as a climber could in two hours. I clicked into my skis for a second time and continued down the slope. This time, however, I was much more cautious.
There was a cabin at the base of the ravine that has a winter caretaker. I stopped in, but the caretaker was nowhere around. I had to continue on down to Pinkham Notch, two and a half miles away. I was shaken, having just watched one of my best friends do an accurate impression of a pinball, so I skied a conservatively. But I still flew.
I got to the bottom half an hour after I left Brian. I walked into the visitors’ center and asked if there had been a rescue called in yet. They said they had just gotten a report of one, but not much was known. I said I was the victim’s partner and that he was stable with several possible fractures, but no life threatening injuries.
The rescue went slowly. He had to be lowered the remainder of the slope and then carried half a mile to the Snowcat before he could be driven out. It took three forest service rangers, two guides and numerous recreational climbers to get him off the snowfield.
I paced back and forth at the base of the mountain for the four hours it took to get him down. Just before he was loaded into the ambulance, I hopped up on the Snowcat. He was packaged in blankets and tarps inside of a litter.
“Good to see you,” I said.
“I’m cold,” was his replay.
“You’re alive,” was mine.
Brian was lucky that day. His family was lucky. Looking back, I don’t see what we did wrong. I would ski the same slope again tomorrow, in the same conditions. Maybe I am doomed to be someone else’s dead partner. I am trying to learn from the experience, but what stares me in the face is the fact I already knew: this shit is dangerous. It’s impossible to argue with that, but so is life. So I’m going to keep playing.