TR: Mt. Baker via Coleman-Deming - Jan. 25-26, 2014
In search of something other than resort skiing boiler plate, Crazyhorse, Splitz, the Bavarian and I headed to Mt. Baker. A quick trip across the border and we were on route towards Heliotrope ridge.
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We opted to test out the winter route via Grouse Creek. The lower section of the route had fairly low snow cover and was easier to hike than to skin. Once we hit Grouse Creek we encountered a 3cm thick melt-freeze crust that was almost impossible to skin but allowed for fast travel with crampons. This area would usually be a concern from an avalanche hazard point of view, but with the conditions we encountered the biggest worry would be a slip and a long slide down the inclined ice rink surface. More on that later...
After a couple of hours slogging we got onto heliotrope ridge. Our hopes for spring corn skiing were dashed as we found more inclined ice rink surface.
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We made our way to about 2000 m and found a nice place to set up a camp site.
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Part of the plan for the weekend was to brush up on some expedition and glacier travel sills, so we spent some time building a fairly burly wind wall. With the shortage of snowfall it'll probably be there for a while...
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And we practiced some anchor building and crevasse rescue skills as the sun was setting...
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I made the most of the golden hour to capture this, Not a bad view...
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Our camp with the sun setting.
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One of the nice things about doing baker as a two day trip is you can get a pretty late start. We got moving from camp around 07300H with the intent of letting the roman wall soak up some sunlight in time for our ski descent.
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The Coleman Deming route is still pretty heavily crevassed. It was not that dissimilar to the conditions I encountered when I climbed it in September 2012. The areas above our campsite in the shade at least had some nice wind buff/sastrugi which looked like it would be edgeable for skiing.
On our way towards the Roman Wall.
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Unfortunately the roman wall had soaked up just enough sun on previous days to turn into a disgusting textured mess. Alpine temps were low enough that even though it had been in the sun for several hours it was still pretty close to bullet proof when we climbed it.
Topping out the Roman Wall.
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We topped out around 1130 and lingered for a little while. We watched one party dropping down the south side of the mountain which appeared to have some nice skiing.
Walking towards the true summit.
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After a little waiting we decided it was unlikely the Roman wall would corn-up and discussed whether it was better to ski it or downclimb. Although conditions looked pretty un-enjoyable, we were confident enough to give it a go. We planned to ski with ice axes and if conditions got worse as we descended we'd improvise an anchor and transition to crampons and downclimb. As we dropped in we crossed paths with a party of two who had camped lower on Heliotrop and were on their way to the summit.
The skiing was poor, but do-able. What should have normally been a fun easy 35 degree line ended up being a pretty puckering experience.
Crazyhorse on the way down the Roman Wall.
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-w...MtBaker-44.jpg
Splitz
https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-x...MtBaker-48.jpg
The Bavarian
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That's about it for pics from me, but there's a bit more of interest down below for those of you that got this far...
After getting off the Roman wall, we made short work of the lower section of the mountain. About 100 m above our camp Crazyhorse opened up his turns a bit and managed to tear his toepiece out of his dynafit stokes. Somewhat soberring given the condtions we'd skiied up above.
We gathered up the broken pieces and made our way back to camp to gather our gear cache and start down heliotrope ridge with crampons. We crossed paths with the party of two on our way out, and had a quick chat with them. They were striking camp as we passed and were planning to head down Grouse Creek a few minutes behind us.
Cramponing down Grouse Creek was fairly uneventful for our group. We were fairly slow moving and Splitz, CrazyHorse and I were just at treeline with the Bavarian about 100 m behind when we watched a pretty horrifying sight... A short distance up the gulley, the party of two fell, failed to arrest, and accelerated towards highway speeds down the gully. One of them slid through some small trees and stopped before getting too much speed, but the other slid a fair distance and even appeared to catch air on a small rollover before managing to self arrest as the slope angle decreased.
Some parts of the next section don't paint the full picture, but I've done my best to sum things up here... Both of them appeared to be moving but we were sure they'd slid enough to be injured and we quickly climbed up to their position to offer assistance. The one who hit the trees appeared to be slightly banged up but had moved down to her partner while we ascended. The other party member was on his knees and conscious, but had some scrapes on his face and was bleeding from his arm/elbow a fair bit, and appeared to be in shock as we reached him.
After starting to ascertain the extent of his injuries, we got him seated on a pack and did our best to render first aid. The location was less than ideal being on an icy slope. Splitz and Crazyhorse helped the female party member, Sarah, who appeared to have few physical injuries because the trees had been small enough to provide a soft stop and she hadn't got up to high speed on her slide.
The male party member, Patrick, had some minor scrapes on his face, but had no signs of concussion. He did have what appeared to be a dislocated shoulder and a fair bit of bleeding. The Bavarian and I applied pressure and used a cellox gauze bandage followed by a tightly wrapped bandage to get his bleeding under control. Once we'd dealt with the bleeding we rigged a sling for his arm before contemplating the best approach to the situation. Both of them were confident they could move, and we felt that assisting them with a rescue was preferable to trying to bring in outside assistance.
I started downhill spotting Patrick. The rest of the team gathered gear and got moving about 10 minutes after me. Splitz somehow managed to rig a second pack onto his A frame style ski carry by lashing the pack to the upper parts of his splitboard. He looked like a totem pole. The Bavarian kept a watchful eye on Sarah who was shaken but uninjured while Crazyhorse and I moved down slope with Patrick.
Considering his injuries, he moved pretty well, and though it was a long, ugly slog we made it out about an hour after sunset. Everyone stayed pretty positive through the situation. We got them back to their car, and Sarah drove Patrick to the ER. We parted ways at the trailhead, but we've since heard by e-mail that they're both in OK shape though Patrick won't be skiing for a few months while his shoulder heals..
A summit, evac'ing an injured party and we were still driving through glacier in time to grab Pasta at Melino's.
