Although I do wonder about the compass thing. It sounds like they were not too far and I wonder if they could have made their way to Muir, even in whiteout conditions with a compass.

Of course w/70 mph winds and whiteout...

It sounds like one of those mini pads could have made a difference too and they are not heavy at all.

As we've seen before, it seems like the difference between survival and not can often be very little.

-john

Defiantly, its amazing how just a little thing can do wonders to help you survive!

Here's another article, LA Times with more details.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-hikers12-2008jun12,0,5906441.story

It sounds like the sequence of events was 50 mph winds, then snow, then whiteout, within minutes on the descent. I think its a situation where if you haven't been there you can't quite get it. I've been to 10,000 feet, I've been to Camp Muir, I've been in high winds, I've been in a whiteout, but never at the same time. I can imagine the disorentation, sorta. As the climbing instructor says, people have died just outside the doors at Camp Muir and never knew it.

The Rainier weather I can vouch for though. Lightning storms, winds and snow come from nowhere, unannounced and unpredicted.

With the nature of that mountain such as it is, this group should have known better. Their over-confidence in their experience did them in. Their experience should have told them they might not make it back to their car, rather than telling them to hurry.

From the Article



This was probably where the screw-up happened. They had left it far to late leaving at 6:30 pm with only 2 hours daylight left. They left themselves no margin for error timewise. This suggests to me that they thought they were more capable than they really were. Considering they took 6 hrs to climb the trail, they should have known it would take at least 3 hrs to decend safely in the same conditions and possibly considerably longer in worsening conditions. I'm also surprised that no one at the camp asked them were they thought they were going so late in the day as well. Not being equipped for an overnight stay at the camp and the possible social embarrasment may have tipped them into making the wrong decision.

Another tragic story.

How good are weather forecasts there? I'm wondering if they just looked out a window and said "looks good to me!" or if there was a NWS forecast of some kind? Offhand it appears easier to find Volcano activity report on St. Helens than to find weather forecasts for any of the mountains.

Been lurking this thread for a bit. First Disclaimer: I am NOT an expert on this mountain...

... but I have co-led a large climb up the Eammons-Winthrop route (7 or 8 rope teams - don't recall exact number). And did a lot of pre-climb training for the noobs on the face under discussion because it is SO easy to get there. Drive to Paradise, walk away from the parking lot, and you're on a big mountain.

Second disclaimer: The outcome was tragic and perhaps involved some selfless sacrifice; I am NOT being post-event critical of the folks involved.

It looks easy from the parking lot at Paradise - and comparatively speaking, it is. Heck, Rainier is not a difficult mountain, relatively speaking. The Muir route starts you out with only a mile vertical left to go (from the parking lot). On a nice day with cooperative snow conditions it's possible to summit without a stop if you're very fit and not afflicted by AMS from the rapid ascent from near-sea-level.

I was always bemused by the huge numbers of folks tramping that route. We joked that if you were to stop to adjust your boot lace, 3 "beautiful people" in neon-colored nylon gear would crampon over the top of your prostrate body. Ah, the picture I'm trying to paint is that the parking lot at Paradise is like a lot of other cool places around the world - things look doable; non-threatening (on a good day), intriguing, "c'mon, we can do this and be back in time for a nice bottle of wine this evening..."

Won't rhapsodize about the weather-making potential of a big coastal mountain (true) and so forth. My point is that one simply should not leave sight of safety (the parking lot / lodge in this case) without everything you need to survive the potential conditions for as long as you potentially could need to. And it must be a conscious habit: What I carry walking away from the parking lot at a MidWest state forest in the summertime is different than what I walk away from a base camp in Colorado in the late fall.

The first principle of Leave No Trace (LNT) is: "Plan Ahead and Prepare." The BSA motto is "Be Prepared". I'm preachy on this (ask my scouts). I've also almost died spectacularly 3 times (very slow learner when I was much younger) because "it" DID happen to me and I was NOT prepared.

I wouldn't focus so much on this or that pet piece of minimalist gear they did or did not have with them. In total, they did not have what they should have had with them. That's what killed the guy who made the ultimate sacrifice for his wife and friend - not the mountain. (Heck, that route is not particularly dangerous as these things go).

Be Prepared.

Regards,

Tom