Outward Bound Couloir Rescue - Sunday 9/13/15

[shizupple]

Hi Everyone,

My girlfriend Alex and I (Sean) were hiking Challenger/Kit Carson on Sunday. We backpacked in on Saturday and camped just below Willow Lake. After summiting them both on the standard route in beautiful weather, we made our way back down KC and planned on taking the standard route back to Challenger and down to Willow Lake. We were in the scree field ascending KC following the cairns and what seemed to be the trail we took up. We ended up getting lost off the trail and dropped too low around 13,000 according to my Suunto. We were nervous as it was getting later in the day and we weren’t sure where we went wrong. After a short time stressing about what we should do, two guys that had just climbed KC came out of nowhere. We talked to them about how to get back down and explained we needed to get back to Willow Lake to the north. They told us that we should climb up the gulley to the east, get to the top of the scree field between Columbia Pt. and KC, and then drop straight down and that route would take us back to Willow Lake. We looked at the map I had and it seemed like it would lead us back. I asked if it was safe and doable, and they told us we’d have “no problem” going that way, even with seeing that we didn’t have any climbing gear or helmets. They had knowledge of the area and had been up there before, so we trusted what they had told us. After 40mins or so, we made it to the top of the gulley and were looking down what we later found out to be Outward Bound Couloir.

Alex was very nervous and scared of going down the couloir. From the top, it looked like there was only a manageable amount of snow and that there was a reasonable route on the west side to take. I, being deterministic and not wanting to show fear, did my best to instill confidence in us both that we could make it down. We started down and she was following closely behind me. We made it about 1/3 to 1/2 of the way down the snow section of the couloir, being very cautious on the really loose steep scree and trying to stay as low as possible while avoiding the snow as we could to avoid getting caught in the cliffs higher on the left. I was on my butt and hands with my right foot on a rock that was just a few feet away from the snow. All of the sudden without any real movements made, the rock gave out and I slipped onto the snow. I instantly started picking up a lot of speed and was sliding out of control on the snow. I started tumbling down on my side, wondering when I would stop rolling, and was sure I was going to die. I hit some rocks at the bottom that tossed me up into the air and spit me out at the end of the snow at the bottom of the couloir into the large scree field. I stopped on my butt, conscious, and instantly wondered how I was still alive.

Alex was still where I was when I had fallen, and was in complete terror. I shouted up to her several times and told her to stay there! I pulled out my phone and miraculously had service (thank you Verizon). I called the Saguache County Sheriff to let them know what had happened (the time was now 5:30PM, getting late and cold but luckily the weather was still great). As I was on the phone, I watched in horror as my girlfriend fell and followed the same route that I had gone down. She hit rocks, bounced to the right and hit more rocks, then summersaulted left and ended up just a few feet from where I ended up. She looked up at me, while I was still on the phone, and her head was pouring blood onto her face. She told me that she thought both of her arms were broken. While trying to hold pressure on her head, still on the phone, I told them that we needed flight for life and told them our location. They transferred me over to Alamosa Police Department. I told them where we were, hung up, then dropped them a pin of where we were. I called back on 911, but my phone died before I could get a word off because of the temperature. We assessed ourselves – I was seemingly okay and dressed her head wound as best as possible with the kit I had. We were able to walk, and headed down the rest of the loose scree field. After an hour or so, we saw the flight for life chopper, but we didn’t think it saw us despite having our headlamps flashing and trying to wave them down (we later found out that they did see us but didn’t think we were the ones that called). They flew out of the area. We continued down and it eventually became very dark. After about two hours, we made it safely all the way down the rest of the scree field.

We started hiking back towards the lake because we had no clue if the chopper would come back or not. After a few minutes, we saw them and flagged them down. They circled the area a few times looking for a place to land. They first took her away to a landing area with an ambulance. I followed shortly, and they took us to the Alamosa hospital.

After some scans and x-rays I somehow, by the grace of god, escaped with only flesh wounds. Alex however, broke both of her arms, had to get staples in her head, stitches on her cheek, bruised a lung, and had a condition with her airways because of the way she held her breath when she hit the rocks. She was transferred to Parkview in Pueblo. A hospice man from the Alamosa hospital graciously took me to my car back at the Willow Lake trailhead so I could drive to Pueblo. Alex had surgery on her right elbow Monday and was able to be discharged from the hospital on Tuesday afternoon. She is doing better now, and is on a long road to recovery.

Everyone we talked to told us we are very lucky to still be alive. I’m honestly not sure how we still are – the best explanation I have is that we both have some amazing guardian angels above watching over us.

So many lessons learned on this day. You may think you’re prepared, but you never know what is going to happen on the mountain. This was my 16th and 17th 14er, and I felt confident in what I was going into. We made the decisions we thought were right at the time based on the situation we were in (running out of food, water, daylight, energy, getting scared, etc.). We are both just so grateful that we are able to learn from our mistakes rather than be punished with something irreversible. Anything so much worse than what happened, could have happened. It’s going to be a while before we’re back on the mountains.

Be careful out there everyone.

-Sean

[RobertKay]

Scary! I'm so glad you are both going to heal up from this.

[mtgirl]

Scary indeed. Wishing Alex a speedy recovery. After your fall, it must have been terrifying to watch her take the same fall and injure herself so badly.

It sounds like you descended too low off of Kit Carson and missed the "Avenue" back to Challenger ? If so, that is a very common mistake. I made it myself years ago, but luckily caught it quickly and backtracked up to the Avenue when I realized I was too low.

[j babu]

Thanks for sharing your story, Sean. I appreciate your candid retelling. I often carry an ice axe just because it's so light, and never know when a detour might be required. Best wishes to you both. I'm glad you came out as well as you did.

[piolet]

Wow. Thank you for sharing. I'm glad you both (and SAR) made it off the mountain.

[Dan_Suitor]

Wow, glad you two are still alive. I too have overshot the avenue on Kit Carson. It’s easy to do, especially if you summit via the North Ridge. Hope Alex gets better soon.

[Bombay2Boulder]

Woah scary stuff! Wishing you guys a speedy recovery!
Guys, if you don't mind, is photo#14 the exit in question that people normally miss? I have read quite some trip reports and this seems to be a bit common.
http://14ers.com/routemain.php?route=ki ... nger+Point" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[mtgirl]

Woah scary stuff! Wishing you guys a speedy recovery!
Guys, if you don't mind, is photo#14 the exit in question that people normally miss? I have read quite some trip reports and this seems to be a bit common.
http://14ers.com/routemain.php?route=ki ... nger+Point" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Yes, that's the common spot that climbers overshoot and don't make the right hand turn back onto the Avenue. It's quite easy to do. I notice Bill's route description has a warning about taking note of this area on the ascent to make sure you don't miss it on the descent. I'm not exactly sure this is what happened to the OP, but I assume so.

[polar]

Best wishes to a speedy recovery (both physically and mentally) to you and Alex! I think there is another take away from your incident: don’t blindly trust those with experience, always make your own assessment of the route/situation. I know it is a difficult thing to do when a person believes someone has more experience than they do; this is especially true for beginners (not saying you’re). But remember that we ultimately hold responsibility for our own safety, not anyone else. These two hikers who told you that you would have “no problem” going down that couloir probably really believed what they said. But what exactly did they base their assessment on? They didn’t know you, they didn’t know your abilities, your experience level, and your comfort level. Maybe they’ve done the couloir before and thought it was easy, or maybe they’ve only looked at it from the top and think it is easy. The point is, people in the mountains don’t usually mislead others intentionally, but always take info from others with a grain of salt. Fuzzy memories, different ability level, different risk tolerance all have a way of distorting the information.

[shizupple]

Woah scary stuff! Wishing you guys a speedy recovery!
Guys, if you don't mind, is photo#14 the exit in question that people normally miss? I have read quite some trip reports and this seems to be a bit common.
http://14ers.com/routemain.php?route=ki ... nger+Point" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Yes, we missed the Avenue coming back. I believe we stayed on the left side of the rock rib in photo #12 (when ascending) instead of the right side.

[TallGrass]

Yikes! Glad you got off with "merely a flesh wound" and more importantly that you were able to reach help for Alex. I remember wandering and looking down part of that route from Columbia Pt. on the 12th mulling tagging KC/CP but thought, "Mmmm, not today" as I didn't feel I had enough decent descent beta. Tell Alex wishing her a speedy recovery to getting back on the 14er horse ASAP. And, hey, staples beats pitons, right!

[LoveThisSite]

Wow, must have been a harrowing experience. I wish you both a very speedy recovery.

FWIW, when I climbed KC, I took a class 3 gully (both up and down) that started earlier in the Avenue. This not only saved me time and distance, it also meant there was no way I could miss the Avenue coming back. For people comfortable with class 3, I'd recommend this option.