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SPers,

Many of you may have come to know Steph Abegg, night photography extraordinaire and a superb contributer to SP with her trip reports and articles.

Well, I have good news and bad news.

The good news is Steph is alive and intends to climb again.

The bad news is Steph took a serious fall when rock broke out beneath her on Vesper Peak. She's had major surgery, narrowly missing having her foot amputated. I'm at a loss for words about what happened, except to bring this to the attention of the SP community here so we can all support her in her recovery.

Steph, in her typical fashion, has written up a nicely documented report of her accident here

Sincerely,

Mark

tazz wrote:

FortMental wrote:Hey PW.... how'd you find out?

ummm... she posted a Tr here on SP days ago...

actually, I passed by her website to see what she'd been up to for September and saw her report. The accident happened 2 weeks ago. She's making a good recovery apparently, so hopefully she'll be back out again after this winter.

oh, and btw, her quick thinking for wilderness first aid helped to save her foot. That makes me feel even better about giving up the next 2 months and $400 to get my WFR training. And now to practice my rope rescue skills . . .

rebelgrizz wrote:How ironic that a currently featured article by her is about mountaineering accidents!

Was thinking the same thing.

Wishing for a fast recovery.

Man thats too bad...
Looks like a bad week to SP members...

Best wishes for a good recovery to Steph!

FortMental wrote:Sometimes you really can be in the right place at the wrong time.

The North Face of Vesper involves climbing three 5.7 pitches directly off the glacier up a steep, loose, hard to protect gulley which leades to a heather bench then several more pitches on a clean, compact, quartize slab. Many climbers traverse on a ledge system above the gulleys to the heather bench and climb only the upper slab portion. When I climbed the NF from the glacier up the gulley I recognized the potential for a serious accident. I am, however, surprised it happened to Steph; she is establishing herself as one of the top female alpinists and has many solid ascents on her resume.

Considering the recent death of Dallas Kloke (a Cascades legend) on a scramblling route I think it demonstrates the potential for accidents on what many of us consider 'easy' terrain. I'm not sure what can be learned from either accident. Climbing is simply sometimes unavoidably dangerous. I guess just always wear a helmet, and take a WFR course.

I don't know Steph personally but have followed her exploits here on SP, CascadeClimbers.com, and on her personal Web page. She is truly a dynamic and impressive individual. I hope she has a full and speedy recovery.

ExcitibleBoy wrote:Considering the recent death of Dallas Kloke (a Cascades legend) on a scramblling route I think it demonstrates the potential for accidents on what many of us consider 'easy' terrain. I'm not sure what can be learned from either accident. Climbing is simply sometimes unavoidably dangerous. I guess just always wear a helmet, and take a WFR course.

Loose rocks don't care how good you are or how experienced you are. You can use your experience to try to avoid them, but if you continue to go where they exist it becomes a game of chance. The best defense is a good belay.

mvs, Steph, and I (and I assume a lot of other people) are alive today because we were roped in and properly belayed.

Glad she's ok. Yikes.
Reminds me a bit of a story I read in Peter Potterfield's book, In the Zone, wherein he writes of his own accident and rescue on Chimney Rock, in the North Cascades. If you've never read it, tis a riveting story.
Glad everything went right with Steph's rescue and operations, etc. Shows one how staying calm in stressful situations can make all the difference. Alphabet cookies. . .

I was struck by her healthy awareness of shock. Out here, a lot of people will pooh-pooh having warm garments in the pack. Yet a very important issue in shock stabilization is keeping warm.

I'm not a climber, nor do I play one on TV. But my worst close calls have come from loose rock on sub-technical terrain -- just class 4 at worst. One of the most dramatic was witnessed by cp0915 in 2009, when I jumped across to grab a knife edge after my footing gave way. I still have a rotator cuff injury from 3 years ago, when a large (several hundred lb), seemingly stable piece of sandstone broke free.

Never met her, but best wishes for a rapid recovery !

Sorry to hear this and happy that she is ok. Like a lot her work on SP. Hope she will recover fast !

Fred Spicker wrote:

ExcitibleBoy wrote:Considering the recent death of Dallas Kloke (a Cascades legend) on a scramblling route I think it demonstrates the potential for accidents on what many of us consider 'easy' terrain. I'm not sure what can be learned from either accident. Climbing is simply sometimes unavoidably dangerous. I guess just always wear a helmet, and take a WFR course.

Loose rocks don't care how good you are or how experienced you are. You can use your experience to try to avoid them, but if you continue to go where they exist it becomes a game of chance. The best defense is a good belay.

mvs, Steph, and I (and I assume a lot of other people) are alive today because we were roped in and properly belayed.

Fred, count me amoung those alive today because of an attentive belay and good intermediate protection (and almost dead due to a big, loose block).

Setting up a mulitpoint, equalized belay and placing good intermediate protection is obviously safer than soloing. Usually. There are situations, however, when simply being roped does not increase safety and can actually decrease safety. Climbing on loose terrain that does not adequately offer belays or protection may increase the chance of loose rocks being dropped by the rope dragging across them.

Best to Steph for a complete recovery. I had PM'd her a couple of weeks ago about her recent article on AAC accident data and had gotten no response. There's my answer.

She's definitely in a class of her own. Her "descriptive" reports are nothing short of phenomenal.

Wishing her a speedy recovery and continued success..

Whoa, thank God she will be okay. Dang...some painful experiences come early, some late, but they seem to hit all of us eventually.