What about the Northwest Ridge route? Very rarely climbed and unless an incident were to occur into the amphitheater, everything leads to extremely remote territory towards East Maroon Creek that I mentioned earlier. Not that I doubt that this potential scenario has been evaluated. Just throwing thoughts out there.djkest wrote:I'm not really sure where the focus should be- I think the biggest issue is we just don't know.
1) Cell phone was pinging most likely high on S. Maroon. It makes sense that he summited S. Maroon. (at what time was the ping?)
2) Was PROBABLY seen Tuesday morning by some people- but not 100% sure? But oddly later than his usual pattern.
3) If #2 is correct, that means he made it down from S. Maroon safely. Which leads to 4 possibilities.
-- a) He went to Pyramid Peak
-- b) He went to N. Maroon Peak
-- c) He went BACK to S. Maroon because he did not summit
-- d) He left and went somewhere else / none of the above
I posted these in descending order of likelihood. IE most likely he went to Pyramid Peak. AFAIK no one so far has claimed to have seen him on Pyramid, and Tuesday is going to be a low-traffic kind of day that late in the season.
When we climbed Pyramid, I kept thinking the dangerous part would be if someone decided to climb the ridge directly instead of "traversing" over to the green gully and ascending in that manner. I am assuming (again, dangerous) that the standard route on Pyramid has been thoroughly searched. Which means he's likely not on the standard Pyramid route.
We also now know that he was trying to complete the 14ers, which does narrow down his likely intentions.
I'm not sure if any of my thoughts or helpful, accurate, or useful.
Tuesday being the day in question is also tough. Two of the times I soloed Pyramid during the week, I believe a Tuesday and a Wednesday, I saw no one else at all besides the Crater Lake trail.
