Brad Washburn...RIP

[strawjack]

http://www.mounteverest.net/news.php?news=15501

[ECbum]

RIP...love his pics of the Presidentials as well.

The man lived an amazingly adventurous and long life...

[MTT]

Brad made countless maps and pioneered the high-resolution, large-format aerial picture. He measured Everest in 1992 to 8846 meters with the help of laser and a prism on the summit. In 1999, he revised the altitude of Everest to 8850m, based on GPS-readings. In fact, the new CONTACT 4 interactive multi-layered Flash map of Everest is based on his photos of the peak.

Question:

Was he correcting an error in 1999, or is it possible that Everest Grew 4 meters from 7 years of snowpack?

[skiing-in-jackson]

what a great life! Wow- 96 y/o!

I've spent countless hours looking at his pictures of Denali.

RIP to a great contributor in the field of mountaineering.

[nhtele]

I had the good fortune to have dinner with him ~ 8 years ago. After dinner we went down to my school's climbing gym. He climbed some mellow vertical stuff on toprope in his New Balance running shoes while I belayed him. He was 88 years old then and still sharp as a tack both mentally and physically.

He led an extremely full life across several disciplines - truly an inspiration.

[Long Duck Dong]

Yeah I met him in the Spring of 2001 right before a Denali trip. He showed me some maps giving me beta for 3 hours over dinner. So, to recap, a 90 year old spent 3 hours with some young punk whom he had never met sharing stories and experiences from the mountain. I'd never met a 90 year old with so much energy.

[sfotex]

++++RIP++++

[mountaingirl1961]

Amazing life. If you've not read the book "Escape from Lucania" you should - a great write up on his and Bob Bate's FA of Lucania back in the 1930's. Those guys were mindbending tough.

You guys were extremely privileged to meet him.

Book link

[strawjack]

ya, i would have to say the same when i met Bob Bates. the guy is amazing at his age! i had dinner with Bob and his wife and several other people that weren't that interested in mountaineering. he was incredibly polite in answering all my questions.
reflecting back i must have seemed like a freakin' puppy. i was just so genuinely excited to speak with him about all his adventures. K2 in '38...seriously, wtf!! that is just unreal.

[bio-smear]

I only knew of Brad through his appearances in flying stories from the bush pilots who flew him back and forth from Talkeetna to the glaciers on Denali. What an amazing life. RIP.

[jmulcahy04]

Saw an exhibition a few years ago - just beautiful. In addition to the big Alaskan stuff there were some photos of spring skiing in Tucks, probably from the 20s or 30s. Having been up there more than a few times it was fascinating to see what it looked like on a busy spring day 70+ years ago.

[skierX]

from the globe obit:

in 1947, Mr. Washburn became the first to reach its summit twice, and Barbara became the first woman at the summit. After a decade of research on the mountain that included creating detailed maps and shooting hundreds of photographs, Mr. Washburn devised a new path to the summit. Known as the West Buttress Route, this approach dramatically eased the ascent and opened the mountain to tens of thousands of climbers who would follow in his footsteps.


q. have 10s of of thousands climbed denali?

[mountaingirl1961]

from the globe obit:

in 1947, Mr. Washburn became the first to reach its summit twice, and Barbara became the first woman at the summit. After a decade of research on the mountain that included creating detailed maps and shooting hundreds of photographs, Mr. Washburn devised a new path to the summit. Known as the West Buttress Route, this approach dramatically eased the ascent and opened the mountain to tens of thousands of climbers who would follow in his footsteps.


q. have 10s of of thousands climbed denali?

Don't know that that many have summited, but certainly that many have attempted it.

The year we went (2003) there were something like 1100 attempts and 475 successful summits. Something like that.

[bio-smear]

Anybody catch the article about Washburn in the april Natl Geographic ADVENTURE? Pretty cool, what a guy.

The camera he shot with was a Fairchild that shot 7x9 inch negatives and weighed 53 lbs.