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Peak(s): |
Mt. Yale - 14,200 feet
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Date Posted: |
06/01/2011 |
Modified: |
07/28/2014 |
Date Climbed: |
05/31/2011 |
Author: |
Frontrangeskier |
Broken Leg |
My girlfriend and I decided to climb Mt.Yale (standard route) on tuesday. It was snowing monday night but the weather said it would be clear on tuesday. We camped out and hit the Denny Creek trailhead at 06:00. After a short period of time we encountered the snow. It was early so we easily walked on top of it without snowshoes. It was hard to find the trail as we neared treeline, but we diverted a bit to the west and used the snowfields to gain the lower ridge. My girlfriend opted to wait it out here and I continued to the summit. I climbed the snowfield with crampons/ice axe just to the right of the switchbacks and gained the saddle. From there it was an easy scramble up to the summit. I reached the top at 12:20. I ate, took some pictures and headed back down 25 minutes later. I decided to return down the snowfield from the saddle. While sitting atop the snowfield pondering whether to glissade or not, I lost traction and started to slide. I was able to quickly stop but the force of the slide caused my right crampon to get hung up. It seemed pretty harmless but when my right crampon caught it snapped my Fibula with an audible crack. I was hoping it was a sprain but unfortunately I could feel the bones move. I knew it was broke. I felt like an idiot. It was almost 1:00 and the only three other climbers had already decended. The weather was still clear so I decided to get lower to where my girlfriend was waiting. After hopping and sliding my way down to the lower ridge I reached my girlfriend at 1:30. She was startled but kept her composure. We immediately splinted the leg with a smaller ice axe. I always carry a good first aid kit. I felt I could walk so we headed back to the tree line where we had left our trekking poles and snowshoes. Luckily it didn't take to long to glissade down the couple of smaller snow fields. We secured our gear, drank water and headed out. We were able to get down to the lower valley without snowshoes. Once there we had to put on snowshoes. The sun had turned the easily travelled hard packed snow into mush. We went non-stop until we reached the trailhead at 5:05. Luckily my girlfriend carried all the hardware but I did manage to loose one of my Atlas snowshoes. We were pretty exhausted but glad to be down. We drove to the ER in Leadville. I got X-rays and shortly thereafter I was discharged with a walking boot. Luckily it was a clean break so it should be a quick recovery.
All in all it was a great trip. The conditions were good but I made a dumb mistake that could have been much worse.
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