Gannett glacier travel
Posted: Fri Jun 28, 2019 4:15 pmHi All. This is the first time I've been on SP in a LONG time. Dunno how much this site is getting used any more. My wife and I are planning on sumitting Gannett Peak in Wyoming around July 20-23ish. My glacier experience is: Hood with guide in 2005, 1 week Mountaineering course on Baker in 2007, followed by me, my son & my wife summiting Rainier on 7/7/7. We've not used ropes much if at all since then and we haven't been on any glaciers either. I know that many people don't protect the snow bridge across the Bergschrund on Gannett. I also know that there are numerous reports of falls, near misses, and injuries around the snow bridge. I want to at least be prepared to protect it.
If anyone has any suggestions on a minimal set of skills & gear for protecting the snow bridge, I'm all ears. We still have the gear we used for Rainier and will borrow an 8mm 30m glacier rope. My thought is that I should be the one to protect the bottom because if there is a fall that is protected from the below the rope might go slack and that would likely result in larger forces than a fall protected from above. But this is something I cooked up in my head, so maybe I am missing something.
If anyone has any suggestions on a minimal set of skills & gear for protecting the snow bridge, I'm all ears. We still have the gear we used for Rainier and will borrow an 8mm 30m glacier rope. My thought is that I should be the one to protect the bottom because if there is a fall that is protected from the below the rope might go slack and that would likely result in larger forces than a fall protected from above. But this is something I cooked up in my head, so maybe I am missing something.