The Expedition Skills Seminar - Muir led by RMI Guides J.J. Justman and Dan Windham climbed to 11,500' feet this morning and spent several hours working on their crevasse rescue techniques. They will continue their training tomorrow and hope to make a summit attempt if conditions allow.
Today we started the day off with an ascent of Muir Peak while practicing proper cramponing. We concluded with some safety skills with self and team arrest. The team is enjoying the views in the sunshine and it is slowly warming up. Next on the agenda is teaching rope travel and glacial travel principles.
JJ, Dan and Team
may the snow winds blow you safely home!!! we white light you all with huge love and kisses from your family in Belgium…..jasper wants you to kiss the moon for him!
Posted by: arielle croonenberghs on 6/7/2012 at 10:24 am
We are all praying for your summit and that the weather holds out for you..great photo op! love, The Patton’s
The June 3rd Expedition Skills Seminar Team safely reached Camp Muir yesterday afternoon. Here is a video from their ascent to Camp Muir. The team will spend the today training at Camp Muir.
RMI Guide Andres Marin radioed from Camp Muir this morning. The Four Day Summit Climb teams were tucked safely in the bunks at Camp Muir after a windy night. The cold temperatures, new snow and wind prevented the groups from making a summit attempt this morning. At 8:30 a.m. they began their descent from Camp Muir to Paradise. They will return to Ashford in the early afternoon.
The Four and Five Day Summit Climbs turned above Disappointment Cleaver (13,000') due to poor visibility. They were en route to Camp Muir on their descent. After a stop at Camp Muir to re-pack and re-fuel they will begin their descent to Camp Muir.
We look forward to seeing them in Ashford this afternoon.
The Four Day Summit Climb turned at the traverse of the Cleaver (11,500') this morning. They were back at Muir and did some crevasse rescue training before descending to Paradise. The team is back in Ashford at Rainier Basecamp.
The Camp Muir Skills Seminar is back down off the mountain! We had hoped to give the summit one more shot but, as was our luck, the rain returned overnight. The mountain did clear at the mid elevations yesterday giving us hope but the weather fronts were stacked up end-to-end this week so we packed our things this morning and headed down.
Even though we weren't able to summit, Camp Muir provides an excellent high-altitude training site so we were able to train in the complex skills necessary to climb a glaciated peak. And so when the team parted ways everyone was psyched up for new adventures. One of the main things that makes a successful trip for me is if everyone returns as friends. This is no small feat with 15 climbers and 5 guides, but if this is our yardstick we definitely succeeded after our week at Muir.
RMI Guide Seth Waterfall
Seth, Adam, Solveig, Thomas and Zeb were excellent guides and made the trip a worthwhile experience even though the weather did not cooperate for a summit bid. I look forward to other guided adventures with any one of these guides.
Thank you for a memorable trip.
Greetings from Camp Muir. We've had an interesting 24 hours weather wise. Last night we planned on waking up at 1 AM and heading for the summit, but when the alarm went off it was raining hard. We checked every hour from 1 to 6 am but the weather never relented so we called off our summit attempt.
We did make the best of the day though. In the morning we trained with our avalanche beacons practicing companion rescue. After lunch we set up a fixed ropes course with a rappel descent. The sun even poked out for a bit. We have one more night and we're still hoping for a shot at the summit but either way we'll be heading back home sometime tomorrow.
RMI Guide Seth Waterfall
This is Seth again checking in from Camp Muir. After a blustery and cold day yesterday we have been enjoying the warm and calm conditions today.
We began our day with breakfast at 7 and by 8:30 we were heading out onto the Cowlitz Glacier. We then found an awesome set of crevasses for practicing crevasse rescue. Everyone was able to alternately practice arresting a fallen climber, setting up a pulley system and descending into a crevasse. We also had a backup rope set up where we could practice belaying techniques.
After the rescue practice everyone was still feeling good so we lowered folks back into the crevasse and had them ice-climb back out.
It was a great day of training and with any luck tomorrow we'll do the real thing and climb the mountain. We'll check in again in the morning.
It's a beautiful day here at Camp Muir! The winds have died down and we're out practicing our rope work. We've been above the clouds all morning an the views of Mt. Adams, Hood and St. Helens are fantastic. Hopefully the weather continues to hold out for the rest of our trip.
RMI Guide Seth Waterfall
may the snow winds blow you safely home!!! we white light you all with huge love and kisses from your family in Belgium…..jasper wants you to kiss the moon for him!
Posted by: arielle croonenberghs on 6/7/2012 at 10:24 am
We are all praying for your summit and that the weather holds out for you..great photo op! love, The Patton’s
Posted by: Dr. Missy on 6/6/2012 at 6:56 pm
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