Helicopter Rescue on Mt. MoranMay 4
Alison and I wanted to return to the CMC Route on Mt Moran and get some more photos and studies done for paintings. Little did we know she would be flying off the mountain in a helicopter. But I’m ahead of myself…
Kynada Aldrich was with us on the trip. We canoed across Leigh Lake in the morning and stashed our canoes at the bottom of the long, broad coulior coming off Falling Ice Glacier. The first part is straight up.
So are all the other parts…
We finally reached the CMC Camp about noon. Although we were there at the same time as last year, there was no water in the stream this year.
I left the camp to bivouac up near Drizzlepus, where I wanted to do some pastels. I had a Jetboil to cook, a sleeping bag, ground pad and bivy sack, my camera and art supplies and all I would need for the next day’s climb. The gals would leave camp about 3 AM the next morning and catch up with me.
I caught the evening views..
and the dawn views… and got two pastels done, just finishing up as Alison and Kynada arrived.
We had a marvelous climb of the CMC Route.
and reached the summit about 2 PM.
On the way down I stopped to do another pastel of a view that I wanted to do a painting of, which features the West Horn and the Falling Ice Glacier with the lakes and valley below…
The pastel was quickly done but invaluable for color.
The painting, done in the studio looks like this 
But on with the story…
To drop into the notch between Drizzlepuss and Unsoeld Tower I was working my way down the shoulder with Kynada following, and Alison decided to drop over the side onto a steep face which she had climbed up earlier that day and considered a reasonable solo. However, halfway down the face she lost her grip and went down, falling 15 feet, breaking an ankle and then going backwards and upside down towards the steep south side of the notch. I saw this from where I was on the shoulder and it was a horrible moment for all of us indeed. Thank God she stopped and was conscious, though bleeding from numerous cuts and abrasions.
We did a primary survey and stopped the bleeding. Then we determined that if Alison was able to get up and over the steep face of Drizzlepuss then we could get her to the bivouac where, with the sleeping bag and stove it would be a fairly comfortable night until we could get help. Also if we need a chopper there was no way one could have gotten her out of the notch. We roped up and began the climb up the 100 foot face of the Drizz, me double belaying- Alison and Kynada so that Kynada could assist.
We spent the night fairly comfortably at my bivy site. With the sleeping pad and bag and a jet boil we were able to melt snow for water. The next morning at dawn some climbers came by, one of which was a physician and the other an EMT. They examined Alison’s ankle and suggested we call for a helicopter. They also had a cell phone, which I never carry, being old school. (I was planning to climb out and alert the Climbing Rangers, that method costing us 4 hours at least.) The Rangers were there with a chopper within 30 minutes to survey the scene. Then they flew back, picked up the personel and gear they would need and returned with two rangers hanging off the end of a cable. They were let down and immediately began a full survey of the patient, right down to glucose levels. Alison was attached to the cable with one of the rangers and flew off toward the Meadow Ranger Headquarters where there was an ambulance waiting. This method is called the ‘short haul’. I gave Alison the camera to take some once in a lifetime pictures…..
The other ranger and Kynada and I had to take the traditional way back, going at a sprint the whole way to keep up with the ranger. When we got back to Jackson Alison had already been released from the hospital and was recuperating at Dave and Theresa Hunger’s. She had a removable cast on her right foot, which the doctors said was a hairline fracture. Within three weeks she was trekking out to remote villages in Rwanda, but that’s another story…
Jean Hein wrote:
October 27, 2009 at 5:33 pm
Joe and Alison, what an experience you had together on Mt. Moran! I’m happy to admire it from afar—on Jackson Lake in a motor boat, at the closest.