|
|
|
Fatal accident on Mount Cook
12:47 p.m. EST Dec 15, 2003
Four Latvian climbers have been found dead on Mount Cook, New Zealand. Everest summiter Teodors Kirsis, and his daughter were amongst the two. Teodors also climbed Dhaulagiri in 1993 and finished the Kosciuszko-version of the Seven Summits in 2002.
The New Zealand Herald reports that the four were tied-in together when they fell at the Linda Shelf, near the summit of the mountain. Another Chinese news agency reports that one of them was found not roped in. It is not known whether that climber was initially not tied-in, or somehow the rope became severed during the fall. While reports are preliminary, it is a possibility that one climber in the rope-team fell, which could have caused the rest of them to follow as well.
Domino effect
When three or four people roped together start to fall, it becomes very, very difficult to self-arrest. A similar incident happened on the Polish Glacier on Aconcagua in 2000. Four Chileans were roped together when one fell, causing the others to take a 300m slide. All of them died from massive trauma much like the Latvians.
Rope teams are not as common any more
Climbing in rope teams is something that doesn’t happen all too often anymore, primarily because incidents like the one above can happen. At the Banff Mountain Film Festival, Dr. Charles Houston, a veteran of early Everest and K2 expeditions spoke about climbing in rope teams.
He said it changed climbing when people stopped doing it. This is because of the trust that was required between the people climbing roped together. Basically, each of you held the lives of the other people in your hands.
Mount Cook is the highest mountain in New Zealand, rising 3754m
ExplorersWeb archive image.
|
