Survivor Guilt & Moving On

[Bakes5]

Powerful stuff indeed. Proud of you for moving on.

Regarding encouragement to folks....I'm sure I have broken many a spirit over the years but hopefully have helped someone turn around before they got hurt. We have all seen the people coming up the mountain or canyon who have no business being on the mountain. On any given weekend, they are the ones you come across who have spent 3 hours getting to the 1 hour mark of a 3-4 hour climb. Usually see them at about noon or 1:30 when you have been descending for a couple of hours. Often in inappropriate footwear (saw a guy from Indiana in those thin neoprene water shoes on Yale earlier this year). Clearly out of shape, etc. Whenever I come across someone in this situation, I am always the harbinger messenger of doom and gloom and encourage them to turn around. Late in the afternoon, exhausted, storms a brewin, etc. Thing is, every one of them continue up the mountain. I hope that me giving them a clear assessment of their chances and risk makes it easier for them to turn around. Mind you, I only do this on the folks who appear to have no chance or when conditions are rapidly deteriorating.

This stuff weighs heavily on me. To the point I rarely invite people on adventures with much risk/exposure anymore. I'm more than happy to join others but I don't like the responsibility when randomness happens and people go over handlebars and lose teeth, break bones and I was the one pushing the trip.

It's the old "I did not cause the accident/injury but if I did not exist then it would not have happened" dilemma. Hopefully, I have given enough people "permission" to turn around over the years that the universe is balanced due to my existence.

Mountains, rivers, canyons, trails and slopes are dangerous places. Even the best of us can get injured at any given time.

[d_baker]

It took me a minute to find this thread....
....maybe it's worth reading to some.

The recent thread from another member building a site to document accidents on the 14ers sparked a little controversy. It also brought up memories.
The accident I talk about in original post (op) is on his site. I have talked about this accident more than once here on 14ers. The 'member' quite possibly just copy/pasted part of what I wrote here, which I guess is ok, but their site doesn't get into the 'how it happened' which I talk about in a later post, which was heuristic traps.

I'm posting this to maybe help convey what it's like for someone to go through an accident in the mountains.
I'm sure SAR members have a lot to deal with too, with recoveries and/or challenging rescues. What I experienced from the SAR team later that afternoon back in Westcliffe was nothing short of pure kindness, understanding, compassion, and, professionalism.

Any death is hard to deal with. We all grieve differently. The one I witnessed was tragic, and violent.
I probably still have lingering issues from that day.
I get stressed if I'm with partners that (mentally) struggle with exposure or loose terrain. I'm a patient person, but over time it can become taxing too.

Anyway, if you read the first post, and some of the later posts/content, I hope you'll understand a little more on accidents in the mountains, and the aftermath.
One detail of the accident I have thought about this week is Linda's helmet and how it came off. Daway, on this site, just posted a thread about helmet securement, which also probably worth a read.

[climbingcue]

Darin, thank you for putting this post back up for people like me who missed it the first time it was posted. I just finished reading every post.

[Kiefer]

Maybe a foot slipped and her hands were not secure enough to hold her.
I'll never know.

Damn. I'm so sorry you've had to go through that, Darin. It's one thing to have friends die in climbing accidents, another thing to witness it and another level entirely being a leader. I'm sure you've analyzed this from every direction possible, what went wrong but I think, based on what you've told us, that the quoted text above is probably what happened.
Other than your snow climb the next week, did you end up taking any time away from scrambling/climbing? Because it does help to digest what happened and to incorporate it. Like it or not, that experience is now part of you. And I'm willing to bet, other than making you more diligent as a climber, it's probably made you more directive when leading groups (CMC). I know it doesn't help to lessen the sting of what you witnessed/experienced, but it is a positive, if so ever small.

I've heard of several other accidents involving CMC groups and SAR over the years. And it seems to me, you did everything right. Even your response was textbook (as weird as that sounds). As a leader, you didn't do anything wrong or instill doubt into your charges. In fact, it seems you actually slowed your normal pace to keep an eye on everyone. That's a leadership quality. This reads as a pure, 100% freak accident. The best climbing guide in the World can't keep risk at 0%.
I also appreciate you sharing the full details of this with the community. It does a lot of good to read about something like this, happening so close to home that most of us know about. Reading about an avalanche that happens 8,000 miles away at 25,000' that kills six people doesn't have the same gravitas.

Are you still leading trips? If not, I think you should start again.