9/17 Crestone Needle Incident

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TehWoopig
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Re: 9/17 Crestone Needle Incident

Post by TehWoopig »

Climber made it down with 2 rescuers. It was almost certainly an altitude issue that caused loss of vision. It recovered quickly on descent and is back to normal today. It was full daylight when the episode occurred. My guess is HAR but I'm no doctor or anything.
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bdloftin77
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Re: 9/17 Crestone Needle Incident

Post by bdloftin77 »

That’s great to hear! Thanks for the update.
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climbingcue
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Re: 9/17 Crestone Needle Incident

Post by climbingcue »

Thank you for the update. It is always nice to hear about a happy and successful SAR mission with someone who has been helped and is now safe.
Last edited by climbingcue on Mon Sep 19, 2022 6:15 am, edited 1 time in total.
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JohnKLovesMtnGoats
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Re: 9/17 Crestone Needle Incident

Post by JohnKLovesMtnGoats »

Glad that the climber is ok!
Sounds scary!
I was on Crestone Peak the previous day, and despite the weather forecast saying it was currently "Sunny", there was so much fog and wind that from dawn until about 11:00 am I could not see the summits of Peak or Needle; at times could not see more than 50 yards clearly.
Weather up there sure can be mercurial.
tecnic1
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Re: 9/17 Crestone Needle Incident

Post by tecnic1 »

mikefromcraig wrote: Sun Sep 18, 2022 11:30 am How does one lose most of their eyesight on a summer summit? Is this supposed to say lost line of sight?
I've had my eyes dry out bad enough that I couldn't focus without closing one, which made depth perception really hard.
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Hiker Mike
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Re: 9/17 Crestone Needle Incident

Post by Hiker Mike »

mikefromcraig wrote: Sun Sep 18, 2022 11:30 am How does one lose most of their eyesight on a summer summit? Is this supposed to say lost line of sight?
My first time on Longs Peak, I was wearing gas permeable contact lenses. Although my lenses were in excellent shape, at 14K+ they were not breathing correctly. So, by the time I got off the top and back to the Keyhole, my eyesight was getting bad. No distance vision and I was having trouble focusing. Switching to my glasses after the Keyhole only made things worse since the barometric air pressure changed the shape of my eyeballs enough that my glasses were not correcting my astigmatism. The contact lenses were designed to help with the correction.

So, now I had no real distance vision and everything beyond say 50 feet was in a milk white fog. I could see where I was but not where I needed to go, if that makes sense.

So, I managed to get down past Storm Pass and I radioed to my wife about my problem. Next thing I know the park rangers are on the radio talking to me and I ended up meeting them at the Chasm Lake junction for assistance. By that point I had shed enough altitude that my vision was about 90%. I felt pretty foolish about the whole thing but the legendary ranger Jim Detterline, told me "don't worry about it. We love these kind of rescues because we don't have to carry anyone out."

Since then, although I use soft lenses now, I always make sure to have a brand new pair when I climb.

Mike
"Just because you love the mountains doesn't mean the mountains love you."
-Lou Whittaker
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