Four climbers on North Face in bad weather
By Rob Gardner
At about 6:00
a.m. on February 2, 1985 four strong hikers began
pursuit up the steep North Face escarpment of Mt.
San Jacinto.
It had been snowing in nearby Banning since 4:00
a.m. The heavy storms continuing, it was snowing
in Palm Springs by 7:30 a.m.
Christopher
Jones (age 31, from San Diego), Terry Hartig (age
26, from Balboa Island), John Collett, and Doug
Kosti continued their hike up Snow Creek Canyon
in spite of the adverse weather conditions. Their
goal was the peak of Mt. San Jacinto. The hikers
had been unable to get a permit because the route
has been closed since November 1984. Nonetheless,
the climbers got past the water company at the
bottom of the canyon and continued up toward the
Isthmus area.
At about 8:30
a.m. the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway began to
close the road to the lower Tramway station,
eventually closing the road to all traffic due to
the unsafe icy road conditions. This road leads
from Palm Springs (at about sea level) to the
lower Tram station at 2,500 feet above sea level.
Snow in Banning is uncommon and snow in Palm
Springs is a rarity. It snowed all day Saturday
and through the night.
Chris, Terry, John and Doug
proceeded up the North Face, past the Isthmus and
on towards the snow tongue area. They bivouacked
Saturday night and resumed the climb on Sunday
morning. At about 5,000 feet altitude Chris
suddenly lost his footing, taking a fall on the
loose snow. In the fall Chris' ice-axe
accidentally struck John Collett on the head.
John was not seriously injured, however, it was
eventually decided that John would turn back.
Doug Kosti accompanied John on the hike back to
Snow Creek Village. Chris and Terry continued
forward, climbing up the main chute over Snow
Creek on the steep northern face of Mt. San
Jacinto.
Late Sunday
the storm subsided and the clouds thinned. Chris
and Terry planned to achieve the 10,804' peak of
Mt. San Jacinto on Sunday afternoon and to then
hike over to the upper Tramway station in Long
Valley (8,500'). They were to then ride the
Tramway down to Palm Springs, where an automobile
had been left for them in the lower Tramway
station parking lot.
Sunday
afternoon was of gentle weather, but still very
cold. Even in Palm Springs temperatures were
dropping to freezing in the night. Long Valley
was dropping near zero degrees Fahrenheit, before
adding on the chill factor.
Chris and
Terry did not make their destination on Sunday.
On Monday Chris Jones' wife, Jerri Jones,
contacted the California State Park Ranger at
Long Valley and reported that Chris and Terry
were overdue hikers. Jerri gave the Ranger
information on the planned route, the gear and
clothing the men had with them, and information
of their experience. Both men reportedly had
climbed the North Face before and were high
caliber mountaineers. They had good clothing and
adequate gear with them.
RMRU was
called out by the Riverside County Sheriff's
Office (RSO) at 2:10 p.m. on Monday, February
4,1985. It was very surprising and concerning to
hear that the call-out was to the North Face of
Mt. San Jacinto. With the heavy fall of new snow
in that area the immediate concern was of
avalanches in the chutes, with particular concern
for the higher altitudes of the main chute. It is
generally agreed that the prudent do not enter
this route after new snow until enough days and
proper weather conditions have occurred to allow
the snow to consolidate.
The RMRU team
members met at Snow Creek Village. With only a
couple of hours of day light left and clouds
around the top 2,000' of the mountain a
helicopter was requested. The RSO cleared for a
helicopter to be dispatched from Landells
Aviation Service. Pilot Mike Donovan arrived at
Snow Creek Village, where RMRU team members, Jim
Fairchild and Kevin Walker, boarded the chopper
and proceeded on to make an immediate visual
assessment. The other RMRU members prepared for a
cold night of searching in the mountains.
About twenty
minutes later Kevin made a radio contact with
base and reported that two sets of clear foot
prints had been located in the snow at the bottom
of the snow tongue. The footprints were in the
main chute, at about 5,100' altitude.
It was only a
few more minutes before Kevin was on the radio
again and advised that the helicopter was at
5,700' altitude, where the clear footprints
vanished under the tail end of a massive
avalanche. Mike flew the helicopter up the chute
to 9,000 feet altitude and the origin of this
major avalanche could not yet be seen. The
avalanche covered the chute, obliterating all
that was in it's path. The avalanche had started
above the 9,000 foot level. Mike could not check
any higher due to the cloud cover. The avalanche
was major, the snow having fallen down the sides
of the chute as well as from the top. The
avalanche covered over 4,000 vertical feet.
The chute was
too unstable to place anybody in it on Monday.
Two teams were flown up and around the clouds and
then over Mt. San Jacinto peak at 10,804' and
left on the peak. Darkness was setting in and the
helicopter headed home in the dark after leaving
the second team on the peak.
The search
went on through the night to cover areas between
the peak and the upper Tramway station. This area
was searched on the premise that Chris and Terry
were not under the avalanche, but may have made
it out of the chute, the avalanche wiping out
their footprints. One team on the peak was to
check the summit area for any signs that Chris
and Terry had been there, and if no signs were
found, that team would hike to the rock house
near the peak to see if the overdue hikers might
be there. If not, the team was to await daylight,
at which time they could re-evaluate snow
conditions, etc. and give assessments from the
peak to Long Valley, seeking out any tracks or
other signs that the overdue hikers may have been
in that area.
Randy Iwasiuk
and Curtis Pontynen were assigned to the summit.
Joel Ericson later joined that team. Bernie
McIlvoy was assigned to check the route down to
Long Valley. The cloud cover had dissipated,
allowing Bernie to ski the route by moonlight,
traversing and covering miles and miles of the
terrain. Bernie only found the tracks that Jon
Wallace of the Nordic Ski Center had left, when
he searched the area earlier in the day. Other
than Jon's tracks, no signs of people were found
by Bernie. Bernie did see the results of another
avalanche on the eastern slope to the summit.
The rest of
the RMRU team moved from Snow Creek Village to
the Tramway Mountain station to reestablish a
base camp. Cameron Robbins and Colin Chambers
were dispatched on snow shoes to cover the area
from Long Valley to Tamarack Valley, by the route
through Shangri La. They then hiked over to Round
Valley and returned to Long Valley on the
standard route. They returned to base at about
2:30 p.m. reporting no signs found of Chris and
Terry. A few months earlier two Marines two days
overdue from the North Face had made their way to
Shangri La after getting off route.
John Dew
managed the radios and logs at base camp and Bill
Blaschko checked out the Long Valley vicinity.
The night went
on without any clues to the whereabouts of Chris
and Terry, except for the footprints ending at
the bottom of the avalanche.
Kevin Walker
was the Operations Leader for this mission. Kevin
worked into the morning hours planning new
strategy for daylight on Tuesday. State Park
Ranger Rick Brown remained on duty through the
night making numerous telephone contacts and
interviews, gathering detailed information
regarding the overdue men's ability, equipment,
clothing, experience, attitudes, personality,
etc. National Weather Service Meteorologist Carl
Garczynski was contacted for a forecast for
Tuesday. The forecast was for clear skies, a
definite positive as RMRU wanted to have the
helicopter in the air at daybreak on Tuesday, if
at all possible.
The RMRU men
that were not already in the field got a good
meal and grabbed about three hours of sleep to be
prepared for dispatch into the field at first
light. Thanks go to Mr. Sherman Harris and the
Palm Springs Aerial Tramway for their support and
cooperation.
It was difficult to get much sleep
during those three hours as the haunt of the main
chute avalanche remained in probably
everybodys mind.
At daybreak
the next search phase was put into motion. Three
more teams were placed on the peak to search
towards Little Round Valley, jean Peak, and
Cornell Peak. Once those teams were in position
the helicopter was to pick up a team member as a
spotter and drop over the North Face to continue
an air search in that vicinity. As the helicopter
was about to depart for the spotter, it was
called back to transport Joel Ericson down from
the peak. Joel had been flown in to the peak on
Monday at sundown. He had made a quick gain of
about 10,000 feet altitude and was now suffering
serious altitude sickness. once Joel was off the
mountain and getting medical attention the
spotter was picked up and the air search resumed.
At the peak,
Rob Gardner located about ten deteriorated foot
prints in the icy snow. The prints included signs
of crampons. This was the first new lead as the
teams departed on their assigned routes. It was
not more than fifteen minutes before Cameron
Robbins broadcasted over the radio that he could
see clear and continuing tracks in the snow on
the Western side of the mountain. The helicopter
was brought up from the North Face and very
quickly followed the tracks until two men were
sighted. The helicopter, piloted by Don Landells,
found a clearing in the trees and descended to a
hover on the snow covered slope. The RMRU
spotter, Walt Walker, jumped out of the bird and
sank into the powdery snow clear up to his mid
thighs. Don lifted off and flew away so that Walt
could shout to the two men. It was quickly
established that they were Christopher Jones and
Terry Hartig, the overdue hikers. The men were in
good condition but very far off route, which they
did not know until told so by Walt.
Chris and Terry reported that they
had left the main chute of Sunday, taking a chute
to the West. They reported that about ten minutes
after changing route the major avalanche occurred
in the main chute. Chris said the avalanche
"sounded like a freight train going
by." They had continued hiking up the side
chute and inadvertently went to Folly Peak. Upon
getting to Folly Peak, they recognized this error
and climbed over to Mt. San Jacinto Peak,
arriving there at 10:00 P.M. on Monday night.
Being only five minutes from the rock house,
where three RMRU men awaited, Chris and Terry
were apparently disoriented and hiked the
opposite way by 180 degrees. When located they
said they were hiking to the Tramway Station. In
fact, they were hiking farther away from the
station. Although they were off route, they had
not suffered injury and were still strong.
However, they were not too resistant to a
helicopter ride back to the Snow Creek Village.
John, Doug, and Jerri were happy to see that
Chris and Terry were okay, as were RMRU, State
Park, RSO and Tramway personnel.
Chris Jones
and Terry Hartig were probably spared by a
combination of skill, proper gear, and a very lot
of good luck, The moral to this story is, stay
off of Mt. San Jacinto's North Face when there is
fresh snow!
Publisher's
Note: RMRU learned recently that one of the
mountaineers in the previous mission did indeed
suffer some fairly serious frostbite to the toes.
We were happy to hear also that he is not going
to lose any of the toes.
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