George Dunn Rainier Controversy

500 ascents of Rainier? 500 exactly?

But, 14th paragraph of this article:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html…
“He doesn’t remember for sure the year of his first climb. He figures it was in 1969, when he was a student at Renton High School.”

Not only doesn’t he remember the date (month and day), he doesn’t even remember the year. How could he start his counting of his 500 climbs if he doesn’t remember the month, day, or year of it?

http://www.komonews.com/news/local/99…
“Dunn climbed Rainier for the first time in the late 1960s, while attending Renton High.”

If he was counting his climbs, he would have the day and date, or at the very least, the year.

Worse,
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html…
“It means 4.5 million vertical feet and 9,000 miles of climbing”

Not true.
As The News Tribune has reported many times by these two writers
http://blog.thenewstribune.com/adventur ... craighill/
http://blog.thenewstribune.com/adventur ... jeffmayor/
the Rainier guides, and other, guides count a full ascent to be a climb from Camp Muir (10,000') to the summit 14,411', over 4.5 miles. This is a 1/2 ascent in fact. A full ascent is from Paradise 5400' to the Summit 14411' over 9+ miles. (Sadly, these are the numbers used to get the “4.5 million vertical feet and 9.000 miles of climbing.”). It’s false.

RMI http://www.rmiguides.com/contact/contact.php should confirm this also. They have guides go up and down from 1/2 way up the mountain at Camp Muir 10000'. Each ascent is called a "climb of Rainier" even though they are doing only 1/2 of the ascent.

Falsified/exaggerated data for false claims?

I think the main takeaway is he has climbed it a crapload of times, more than most people have. 490, 495, 500 its all really semantics at this point anyway.

There are mountains that I know I've climbed x amount of times because of the people I was with, events on the trip, conditions etc. I might know exact dates from a certain point going forward, but not exactly when I started, but I still know how many times I went up. Does that make me a liar if I say I climbed that peak x amount of times?

peakpost=Dan Howitt?

ExcitibleBoy wrote:peakpost=Dan Howitt?

Undoubtedly.
Get a life Dan.

Bob Burd wrote:

ExcitibleBoy wrote:peakpost=Dan Howitt?

Undoubtedly.
Get a life Dan.

That's pretty damn funny.

George Dunn's other climbs are impressive too
http://mountainguides.com/dunn.shtml

Dunn is an icon on Ranier and deserves any credit he gets. Should we think less of him if his count is 499 or if he can remember the date of his high school climb? Only an envious ass could dispute that and only for the sake of making himself feel better about his limited accomplishments.
Who is this dick?

Outside wrote:Dunn is an icon on Ranier and deserves any credit he gets. Should we think less of him if his count is 499 or if he can remember the date of his high school climb? Only an envious ass could dispute that and only for the sake of making himself feel better about his limited accomplishments.
Who is this dick?

Dan Howitt (aka peakpost) was a fairly fast scrambler/hiker. He claimed speed records up Rainier and Aconcagua, and made the papers and news bulletins. Then others started questioning his claims and presenting evidence that it was not as it appeared. This upset him. Offers were made by his detractors to allow him to redo his record efforts, but these were never responded to, as far as I know. He's seemed to make a life of trying to discredit others now. It's rather sad.

Thanks Bob, I will ignore him from now on.

Bob, you forgot to mention the man-dog speed ascent record.

peakpost, you came to the wrong place to bitch about numbers. Man up son!

Guess he was too late to make Chief's thread regarding "the numbers game."

This rant definitely says more about the ranter than the subject. Sad, really.

I'd never get on someone's case for not remembering details. All that says to me is that he was more focused on the climb than the stat at the time. (Do you seriously expect a high school student to think - this climb is the start of something historic so let's note the details.) At one point when I was being asked frequently about what/when/where I climbed, I finally went and pieced a lot of it together. It took some effort and I was only going 5 - 10 years. (Seriously, I was looking at stamps in my passport to remember dates.) A couple of weeks ago, this guy mentioned he climbed a mountain in South America and I said something like "yes, I might try that someday". Then I realized a week later, I HAD climbed that mountain. Maybe I'm just getting old.

SophiaClimbs wrote:(Do you seriously expect a high school student to think - this climb is the start of something historic so let's note the details.)

Good point. I've only done half a dozen hikes to a particular area in Lapland, but still cant remember the first year. Mostly because it wasn't really that big of a deal back then, even if my more recent history has given it some additional significance later on.

SophiaClimbs wrote: Then I realized a week later, I HAD climbed that mountain. Maybe I'm just getting old.

Nah, you're not.

I've had the same damned thing happen. Seems to happen more with the peaks I've been up in the last couple years, whereas the older ones I have no trouble remembering. A few months ago I said I really wanted to get up the CMC on Moran... and about ten seconds later remembered I'd done it a summer or two ago. D'oh.