Home > Trip Reports > May 23-24, 2009, Mt. Rainier, Fuhrer Finger++

May 23-24, 2009, Mt. Rainier, Fuhrer Finger++

5/23/09
WA Cascades West Slopes South (Mt Rainier)
33765
4
Posted by Charlie Hagedorn on 6/28/09 2:56pm
The short version:
        Will T. and I climbed and skied the Fuhrer Finger on the first two days of Memorial Day weekend. We skied off the top at about 3pm ad enjoyed a fine descent down the Nisqually and out the Finger. Descending from our camp on the Wilson, I caught a ski tip in soft snow and externally rotated my ankle by fifteen to thirty degrees, spiral fracturing my lateral malleolus. Through hard work on the part of Will, the fantastic climbing rangers, and a number of NPS rangers/staff, I was sledded under human power down the Nisqually from 8100', hauled up to Glacier Vista, and down to Paradise. An ambulance to the ER in Puyallup revealed the break; the fine folks at Harborview realigned things and fixed them with a stainless plate and screws on the following Friday. It is expected that I'll be walking again sometime between mid-July and the end of August.

        Post-mortem in the next post.

        My emphasis below is on completeness, not brevity. It's intended to allow the reader to learn as much as one can from my experience, so it will be less often repeated. In addition, I had no idea what to expect, from the patient's perspective, after evacuation from the field.

The long version - written under the influence of Percocet two days after the accident:
     After months of watching the mountain and waiting, Will and I decided that the time was right for an attempt at Furher Finger. Rainier has indirectly shaped my life for a long time (I'd first wanted to be an RMI guide as a twelve-year-old in Virginia), and it's been a goal of mine to make my first ascent a ski descent.

        We arrived at Paradise just before sunrise Saturday, registered for our climb, and headed up. Snow was less consolidated than we'd hoped, with a supportable but frangible crust atop ~1-2' of softer snow. Expecting further consolidation with time to aid us in the following days, we decided that our early start would give us sufficiently strong crevasse bridges to make it to our high camp before things softened. We moseyed up the Nisqually (Glacier), taking a direct route toward the Nisqually Cleaver before turning onto the Wilson. We'd originally intended to stay at the base of the Turtle, but decided to stay in what we thought was a sufficiently protected basin on the Wilson proper.
        Our decision to camp where we did was driven in part by a friend's experience two days before, when they had bivied on the Turtle, but didn't feel comfortable making the moonless crossing of the Wilson to get into the Finger until sunrise. We expected to be slow heading up, so we wanted to be able to make an early start up the Finger itself. A discussion with a splitboarder also suggested that parties sometimes stayed near the base of the Finger on a flat section of the glacier.
        We reached our campsite at about 1 pm, dug in our platform with uphill windwalls after probing thoroughly to the depths of Will's probe for crevasses, reveled in the views and our position, and made our simple plans to head up the fall line into the Finger. We knew we were directly below the Finger, but anticipated that the soft snow was easily absorbing any rockfall well above us. We lazed about for the rest of the day, preparing for the ascent that we intended to start at 1:30 am. Sunset was wonderful.
        At about 9:45 pm, we heard a "tap-tap-tap-WHACK" as a small chunk of ice or rock came down the now-firm snow from high up and hit the tent. We looked up the Finger and saw a climbing party's lights above us. We disagreed a little about what to do as a couple more chunks came down. I took a small snow chunk to the helmet at the end of the cascade as we straightened the Megamid. Continued cordial disagreement ensued, but ended with the arrival of a second, smaller, round of falling stuff that punched a small hole in the tent. We had to move. We were unsure of the crossing of the Wilson, didn't want to head down through the crevassed Nisqually, and we were already set to go, gear and routewise, to climb into the protected alcoves along the edge of the Finger. So, upward it was at about 11 pm.
        At the base of the Finger, we met the folks whose lights we'd seen. They'd not been climbing, but rather had established a bivy in the shelter of a rock directly in the center of the couloir. We'd either received chunks from the construction of their bivy, or as secondary fragments from some big stuff they'd seen go through at around the time we'd gotten hit. We ducked into the sheltered but steep climber's left side of the couloir as Beckey recommends and labored up unpleasant snow, enviously eying the good snow in the gut of the couloir. Once through the crux, we continued up and left up steeper slopes, trying to stay sheltered, unaware in the dark that we were clear of the focus of the rockfall. Very little rockfall came through the couloir as we climbed it. We reached the divide with the Thumb thoroughly wasted. Will wanted a nap and I wanted copious quantities of water, so we dug a bivy shelf atop the spine and napped until ~4:30.
        With pre-dawn light, routefinding was trivial, and we continued up to the top of the groove. We made the wrong choice to follow Wapowety Cleaver (I'm a glacier pansy, you see) rather than follow obvious ski tracks out onto the Nisqually just below 12k. We made a long climbing traverse to the top of the Cleaver, and enjoyed easy slogging up its crest. It was approximately here that it was clear that we were both getting hammered by elevation; Will helped me get my hydration and electrolyte situation sorted out, and I taught him about pressure breathing. Will correctly found a snowbridge off the Cleaver, and we made a slight downward traverse onto the Nisqually. We roped up and skinned to the summit, meeting friendly rangers Philippe and Rachel descending from the summit, post heli-evacuation of a fallen climber off the top. Will skinned to the summit proper, while ice buildup on my skins forced me to make a switch to crampons for the last forty vertical feet to the crater rim. I traversed around to Columbia Crest, and we made preparations for descent. I've not experienced altitude-driven nausea so bad since my first fourteneener ascents as an adolescent.
        The first turns off the top were on rime ice, but we quickly found our way into over-roasted powdery corn. That evolved into very soft breakable crust above 13k, and softened into fine corn on our way down the Nisqually. The position of fairly mellow skiing
above the icefall is stunning. The traverse to the Finger went easily, after a little uncertainty (the mountain is large), and we enjoyed stellar turns down  over-softened corn through the entire couloir. Easily among the finest descents of my life. At the couloir exit, we were surprised to see that the lower Wilson Headwall had slid huge in our absence, with a big crown wrapping most of the way around. We skied what we felt were fairly conservative lines down the apron, then wound our way down to our campsite.
        We retrieved the gear and food we'd buried the night before, bagged our optional plans for a trip up the Turtle or higher for Monday, and decided to make the trip out to the Nisqually Bridge to get the 10,000'+ descent. I remarked with understated humor to Will, "We've done such a great job - all we have to do is make it down alive, and this'll have been an amazing success!" By that, and many metrics, it was an amazing success. By others, it turned out to be a failure.
        We felt like kings, and ripped our way down the Wilson to the Nisqually. The softening snow encouraged us to slow down, and we cautiously scoped each roll for cracks and slide potential. While descending beside a roll, I caught and buried my left ski in the heavy snow. The combination of my heavy pack and momentum overcame the acrobatics I attempted to avoid a fall. I felt two pops, not unlike a normal binding release, but the feeling was accompanied by pain. A look down at my foot showed that the ski was still attached and that my ankle had acquired a new degree of freedom. It was about 5:23 pm.
        Will quickly released my skis, and we took quick stock of the situation. I pulled out my cell phone, and we miraculously go enough cell signal among the rolls of the Nisqually to call 911. Several efficient layers of redirection later, Will was in contact with the NPS at Paradise. We did what we could to get my body off the snow with pads, wrapped me up in some insulation, and tried to make ourselves visible. The trip back to Paradise without the support of the NPS would have been absolutely unpleasant.
        Rangers Philippe and Rachel arrived on skis from the 9200' camp while we were still getting things settled. They worked extremely well as a team to get me fat, warm, and happy. After moving me from the accident position to a slightly lower and more horizontal trench, they fabricated an excellent splint from a pair of ice axes, strips of evazote pad, horse wrap, rain pants, and a climbing skin. Meanwhile, Rangers Phil, Rich, and Tom (with increasing numbers of names, my memory gets increasingly fuzzy), zipped up the Nisqually with a stripped down Stokes litter and packs, making the trip from Paradise to our 8100' position in a little over an hour.
        With a flurry of activity reorganizing gear and packaging me into the litter, we were fully packaged and ready to go somewhat before sundown. Philippe took the initial turn at the horns of the litter, with rangers on control ropes to control the litter's angle and speed. I was surprised at the speed with which we moved down the mountain. Even in exposed and crevassed terrain, traveling headfirst with my view therefore mostly inverted, I had the sense that we were confidently making our way down the hill. Difficulties were dealt with as they arose, and everyone made good time down the hill.
        The lower Nisqually Basin's snow was poor - breakable crust over soft semi-granular snow, making moving the litter along the sidehill traverse toward the base of Glacier Vista extremely arduous for everyone except the patient. The skegs on the litter dug in enough to retard progress in the crust, but insufficiently to hold a good sidehilling angle. I'm still floored that so few people (often just two or three, as the rest of the rangers were consumed by logistical tasks) could drag a litter uphill in such awful conditions. Most of the rangers were on their second rescue for the day, at least one on his day off.
        Another contingent of rangers had constructed a three to one haul rig near the top of Glacier Vista. With the addition of our ropes and at least one spare from a climbing ranger's pack, they were able to reach the ~1000' down to near the bottom of the basin. As there was only enough rope for a single haul line, the rangers bodily provided a belay, struggling upward through the unsupportable crust, occasionally providing a needed lift without mechanical advantage when the haul system had difficulties. It is a testament to how well I was packaged and handled that I actually fell asleep from fatigue for the upper section of the hill.
        I awoke to find a sizable team of rangers finishing up the haul. Headlamps abounded. They slid me onto a stomped or shoveled track for the last few vertical feet to the Vista proper, and lots of hands helped get the litter ready to head down to Paradise. The snow had firmed up considerably, and the usual Memorial Day carpetbombing of bootprints had textured the snow. The conditions made for a very fast, icy, and bumpy ride down the hill, as Philippe and others did what they could to minimize the amount of human effort required to surmount flats and gentle rolls. Not all of the rolls succumbed to straightlining, so Philippe, I believe, slapped on a pair of climbing skins and, alone, dragged the litter up the hill. It wasn't much later that I felt and heard the unfamiliar sensations and sounds of the litter dragging on asphalt outside the ski dorm. It was a little after 12:30 am.
        From there, an uneventful and friendly ambulance ride brought me down to Good Samaritan Hospital in Puyallup. The staff marveled at the components of the splint and tentatively diagnosed me with a spiral fractured fibula and a ruptured ligament. I'm now awaiting surgery to tack it all back together.

        It's not yet time for a post-mortem on the event, but I'd like to add yet another contribution to the perpetual Dynafit lockout question. I originally started skiing in the backcountry with the bindings configured for downhill in the standard release mode. After a couple scary pre-releases while stomping for purchase while sidestepping/slipping bulletproof ice above long falls, I started locking the toe to the third click in consequential terrain. In the partially locked state, I've had a couple of sensible releases when tossed around by breakable crust. My toes were locked to the third click on Sunday, as we were skiing steeper slopes in crevassed terrain. On the one hand, I'm quite confident that my bindings would have released if they hadn't been locked, sparing everyone the ordeal of moving me down the mountain. On the other hand, I'll never know if having locked them in the past has saved me from cartwheeling down a steep icy chute after losing a ski at an inopportune time. I'll have six or so months, probably two without walking, before I decide whether or not to crank the lock again.
Post-mortem:
        At five weeks since the accident, I now feel that I've had ample reflection on the events to clarify my thoughts. I'll work from the break itself outward. Unhappily, I have been unable to pin even a small set of causes, let alone a single cause, for the accident. Rockfall aside, I don't believe we made any major single mistakes. The question becomes: How did I set myself up in a position where it was possible for me to bumble and crash? I believe the accident can be understood in the general contexts of fatigue, snow conditions, gear, Dynafit locking, and bad luck.

The event proper:
       About two weeks ago, I had an epiphany when my brain tacked the disjoint memories of the crash into a single fluid one. While fairly slowly scoping/traversing a roll that descended to my left, I buried my right ski tip in the softening snow. Aware that I was pretty much screwed in terms of remaining upright, I nonetheless shifted my weight to my left ski and began the dubious process of extracting my right ski from the snow as I skied past, with intent to bring it back forward from behind me after skiing on one ski for a bit, a la Bode Miller. I've done this before momentarily (but not on the uphill side), and I believe I'd successfully gotten the ski out of the snow and into the air before I crashed. Now fully on my left ski, it unfortunately carved slightly uphill and buried the tip as well. My center of mass, with my overnight pack, was downhill of the ski slightly, which caused me to fall forward and downhill of the now immovable ski, exerting a torque, in the plane of my ski, on my ankle. The locked Dynafit toes are maximally resistant to release in that direction, so I sustained a boot-top fracture. I'm quite confident they would have released if unlocked (DIN at 7, 180 lb skier with ~30-40 lb pack).

Fatigue:
       Will and I hadn't gotten much sleep the night before our ascent to our camp on the Nisqually, perhaps a few hours each, plus Will's nap in the car. We ascended to our camp fairly slowly, burdened by fairly heavy packs (see Gear, below), but spent several hours before sunset lazing about and trying to nap. Our rockfall-aborted slumber caused us to head up the Finger early and unrested. Our climb up the Finger was slow, climbing somewhat less than 2k in three hours. The desire to stay close climber's left to avoid rockfall forced us onto much steeper terrain than if we'd climbed the gut of the route. Unable to definitively see that we'd climbed out of the hourglass, we continued to climb steeply to the col with the Thumb, further sapping our energy. I was dehydrated, and Will was quite tired, when we established our snow ledge at the col.
        While I had worked through much of my altitude trouble with food and hydration at 12.5k, I definitely arrived at the summit feeling about as bad as I've ever felt at 14k (35+ of Colorado's 'teeners), and worse than I've felt since about age 15 at elevation. Skiing, as always, was theraputic. By the time we had made it down to the top of the Finger, I felt great. Flying down the Wilson, I was aware that I was pushing my luck in terms of retaining enough reserve to handle my skis. I made a conscious decision to stop atop the Nisqually-Wilson divide and focus on skiing slowly and safely through the opening-up rolls of the mid-Nisqually. Will and I discussed it too. Apparently it wasn't enough.
        In addition, my fatigue throughout the trip was compounded by the fact that I've never been able to develop a sense of calm on glaciers. I find crevassed terrain very stressful, though I believe we made safe routefinding choices throughout our trip.
        There is no doubt in my mind that I very much wanted to summit on this trip. Turning around at 13.5k within sight of the crater rim is psychologically quite challenging on a bluebird day with warm, but not too warm, temperatures in the lowlands.

Snow:
        I'd been caught by surprise by a sudden transition in the snow softness. We'd skied good corn from 12-13k down to 9k. It had slowly softened as we descended, but a quick change in aspect at the roll on the Nisqually meant that the snow at the accident site had considerably different properties than fifty vertical feet above. My fairly new (3rd trip) and narrow (102-70-92) Sahale skis don't handle slop as well as others I've used, making deep wet snow more of a challenge. If we'd skied the same slope a few hours earlier, I doubt I'd have caught the tip.

Gear:
         I'm quick to blame the skis as the proximate cause for my troubles, though fatigue was surely a greater factor. I'd consciously made the choice to bring the light and skinny skis after happily skiing them in corn and managing my way through slop with an overnight pack. That said, compared to my Kongurs, they're finicky and don't float nearly as well. I think it's quite likely that I would not have buried a tip in that location with a different pair of skis. I hesitate to scrap the Sahales altogether - I believe there's a lot of good things I've yet to learn from them - but it may be next July before I bring them out to play on volcanoes again.
        While we were fairly lightweight in the overnight gear department (megamid, light sleeping bags), we still carried more gear than I believe many Rainier summit parties do. At present, our two-man crevasse-rescue plan demands that we both carry a 30 m rando rope to prevent the eventuality that, on the descent, the guy with the rope takes a crevasse fall. For the ascent, as we started earlier than planned, we also brought more of our overnight kit, spare stove, and food for the summit trip. Furthermore, we'd packed enough food to support a trip up the Kautz on Monday if we were feeling spry - that extra weight was in the top of my pack as we descended from our camp on the Wilson.
        I don't believe that the extra weight contributed significantly to the fracture itself - body weight was plenty - but it certainly helped with fatigue.
        On the positive side, much of the gear I rarely use came into play along with new uses for everything else. My sheet bivy, ax, second tool (why bring a picket when you can bring something a little more functional?), pad, Cilogear straps, spare clothing, spare fuel, first aid kit, sleeping bags, jackets, warm gloves, shell pants, climbing skins, leatherman, and much more wound up being put to use. Only a few items of the rangers' gear wound up packaged in the litter, and none of it needed to go to the hospital. We had what we needed to stay put, and if we'd had to, to start improvising the rest of the way down the mountain.

Dynafits:
        Without question in my mind, the binding that didn't release broke my ankle. I asked it not to by locking it out. The toe-locking problem has reared its ugly head again. I began locking the toe after having the toe pincers come unclipped atop the South side route from Piker's Peak in April last year. Two turns down from the top on slide-for-life boilerplate in 40+ mph winds, I stomped for purchase while stopped, and my downhill ski popped off. Without the leash, the ski would've landed somewhere near Yakima and I might well have slid to the Lunch Counter while attempting to switch back to crampons, balanced on one ski. That notion was reinforced in November, when a friendly acquaintance took a 1000' ride down the same slope in similar conditions, but not due to Dynafit prerelease. I believe that I've since made similar stomps on icy slopes where the locked toe prevented a dangerous release. I'm not entirely convinced that the Dynafit's non-adjustable toe retention is compatible with my size 13-14 feet, as the leverage on the heelpiece changes with the size of the skier's foot. To Dynafit's credit, when skiing in area, I don't lock the toes, and I've never had a problem. I only resort ski on days so deep that the backcountry is scary, so the snow is quite good. On the positive side, with my locks locked to the third click on my other two sets of Dynafits, I've had perfectly sensible releases when needed. This pair of bindings appears to be made to tighter tolerances, and is new, and therefore less worn.
        When I return to skiing, I will experiment with higher DIN settings and a lot of stomping to see if I can convince myself to ski unlocked again. G3's Onyx binding may also interest me more than it once did, if toe retention is better. There will probably still be times when I lock the lock, but they'll be far more rare.

Bad luck:
        If I hadn't bobbled on my way down the roll, we probably would have skied happily to the bridge and I'd have written a glowing trip report extolling the virtues of a 10k descent on a perfect day in late May. When we play this game, there is a chance that we'll get hurt. If we play long enough, we will get hurt. This experience has let me find out exactly what that's like.

Rescue:
        We were very fortunate to get 911 coverage at the accident, as we were just starting to drop into the glacier's basin. I was very fortunate to have broken the ankle on Rainier instead of essentially any other mountain in the state. With climbing rangers above us and fairly nearby at Paradise, it would've been foolhardy to risk complications in order to attempt self-rescue. I offer so very many thanks to the NPS. While we were carrying enough gear to get ourselves out, it would have certainly involved an overnight stop, refreezing icy slopes, the very real threat of rockfall at the accident site, and uncertain crevasse navigation. It would, without doubt, have been the hardest thing I'd have ever done. If I'm able to successfully walk without pain and return to climbing and skiing the high peaks, a significant amout of the credit will be due to my partner and the NPS climbing rangers, in addition to the Harborview surgical team.
        It is a pleasure to have been rescued by climbers. Their approach to risk management was very familiar; the understanding that some things, irrespective of how much they suck, must be done and done well was very comforting. On the trip down, as we crossed crevasses and dealt with equipment setbacks, I was confident that things were being handled as well as or better than I could expect. The entire team was skilled, smart, and very strong. It is a failure to need their services, but a godsend when they arrive.

Injury:
        The pain from the injury was fortunately very manageable. At no time was I rendered incoherent by the pain. Beyond the two pops and a feeling of breakage, the obvious external rotation of my ski boot guaranteed the fracture diagnosis. The injury was placed under light traction, reoriented to reduce some of the rotation, and splinted well. The splint and the Stokes litter delivered sufficient immobilization for the trip down the hill. To my surprise, while being hauled uphill, the foot ceased to hurt at all, while retaining sensation, wiggly toes, etc. I was quite concerned, as I reached the top of the haul to Glacier Vista, that so many people had ruined their night for a non-injury. For that reason, the first painful jolt as we began the sled trip down to Paradise came as a relief.
        Pain remained manageable for the ambulance ride as well - morphine was offered and declined, for whatever lucky reason, it wasn't really necessary. Furthermore, I wanted a clear head for any surgical decisions that might have arisen at the ER. The choice of the ambulance ride was recommended to me by the climbing rangers for the advantages of painkillers and the very helpful priority treatment at the ER. I was seen within five minutes of arrival at the hospital, and had X-rays within thirty. A further advantage of the ambulance ride was that Will hadn't slept for more than eight hours in the past three days; the ninety mile drive would have been perilous.
        After the diagnosis (which included the wonderful exchange: "How long will it take before I can ski again?", "Well ... let's just say maybe sometime next season", "But my season doesn't stop?!..."), I was placed into a U and L plaster splint by a spirited nurse who informed me that it would probably start to hurt soon after the splint set up. She was correct, and I availed myself of proffered Percocet. I was discharged with a referral to a Puyallup orthopedic surgeon and driven by Will, who had gotten some sleep, back to Seattle Monday morning.
        Memorial Day was a complete bust when it came to arranging an appointment to be seen by a UW affiliated physician (largely necessary for my UW grad student insurance). To my surprise, Tuesday seemed to be as well. The Percocet didn't help, but I got essentially no traction in the red tape until Wednesday morning, when it seemed that some of Tuesday's efforts had paid off. Drugged up fracture victims need friends and family to help handle details- I was lucky to have plenty of support from near and far. A Wednesday appointment made it clear that surgery wasn't necessary, but was strongly advised. We scheduled it for Friday.
        The procedure (open reduction and internal fixation (orif) of the lateral malleolus) was done on an outpatient basis. I earned a plate and five screws (one for the break, four for the plate). I opted for a nerve block in addition to general anesthesia at the behest of the anesthesiologist, which I was initially quite unsure about, but made the trip home and the first night far more pleasant. I was in and out of coherence on the six hour period of Percocet for the first couple days, but was off painkillers entirely by Monday.
        I'm able to work from home fairly easily, so the transition back to work went well. My first full week at work (in a desk chair with a foot up) began 2.5 weeks after surgery. At 2.5 weeks, I was moved from the excellent surgical splint into an Aircast. After a week and a half in the aircast, I've recovered ~60% of my range of motion in thrice-daily exercises. Depending on the X-rays in mid-July, I'll likely be upgraded to partial or full weight bearing status, likely walking out of the aircast in mid-August. With luck, I'll be on skis in December.
        If I were uninsured, the cost of this experience would be approximately $20,000, not including time lost nor the likely early arthritis or any future surgery/therapy. Breaking onesself is best avoided.

Optimism:
        This injury is giving letting me do everything I'd normally have placed by the wayside in favor of the next thousand feet of turns. A lot of those things are pretty great. I'll probably get my thesis done six months earlier. The recovery period for these injuries is simultaneously long and short, and it feels less long every day.

Thanks are again due to Will, the NPS Climbing program, the long chain of medical professionals, and my very kind friends, girlfriend, and family for making the whole process go as well as it has.

Wow, it sucks that that can happen to any of us at any time.  Thanks for sharing your experience.  It is an important reminder that just because I never break myself in the mountains doesn't mean that I will never break myself in the mountains.  It sounds like you are relating to the situation well and may you continue to do so.  We'll look forward to a triumphant return TR from you this winter.  (the skiing from now until the snowpack replenishes sucks anyway.)

Thanks for sharing your story and thoughts during and after the accident.  This is a good reminder to me of the inherent risks we all take while skiing, especially given my own propensity to ski alone.  Best of luck in your recovery.

author=Snow Bell link=topic=13730.msg57356#msg57356 date=1246257429]
(the skiing from now until the snowpack replenishes sucks anyway.)


Except for all that July corn! ;). Seriously though, I've found plenty of fine distractions.

Thanks for your kind wishes. Recovery should be fun and educational :).

Also - Lowell had a succinct reply here that he deleted that focused on fatigue as the leading cause, if there's one to be found. I very much tend to agree.

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6609
may-23-24-2009-mt-rainier-fuhrer-finger-2
Charlie Hagedorn
2009-06-28 21:56:34