Mission Reports

Winter travel in the mountains is beautiful — and unforgiving.

A mission near Source Lake shows how quickly things can change, and how preparation, fast action, and teamwork make all the difference.

About The Mission

A snowshoer set out alone on the winter route from the Upper Alpental Parking Lot at Snoqualmie Pass while other family members skied nearby. Spending time alone in nature gives our mental health a boost, we have recommended safety tips for traveling in the back county on our website. Along the trail, she reached a creek crossing — a log buried under several feet of snow.

Halfway across, she lost her balance and fell!

She landed flat and was fully submerged, soaking all of her clothing in freezing water. Although she was able to stand up, she couldn’t climb the seven-foot snow wall lining the creek. Standing in the water, she made a critical decision:

She called 911 immediately.

Even though her phone displayed “SOS only,” the call connected to dispatch. Her location data came through — a key factor in speeding up the rescue.

A member of Seattle Mountain Rescue was skiing at Snoqualmie Pass when the page from the King County Sheriff’s Office came out. Luckily he had his rescue gear in his car and arrived first to the command post. A passing backcountry skier stopped, helped her out of the creek, gave her a warm jacket, and stayed with her. By then she was violently shivering, an early and serious sign of hypothermia. Cold water immersion can lead to hypothermia much faster than people expect, even in otherwise mild winter weather. The Good Samaritan began helping her walk toward the trailhead, which is where the SMR team member met up with them. When the command vehicle arrived at base, the base operations leader kept it running to be able to provide the snowshoer with a warm environment. Shortly thereafter family arrived with dry clothing to change into.

A Reminder for Winter Travelers – Even short outings require preparation:
Carry the 10 Essentials, including extra insulating layers
Be cautious at snow-covered creek crossings
Avoid traveling alone when possible
Call for help early if something goes wrong

What Made The Difference
She called early
A Good Samaritan helped
Location data from cell phone
Warm vehicle near by
Dry clothes

When in doubt reach out

Seattle Mountain Rescue is an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit SAR unit that responds under the authority of the Sheriff’s Office providing rescue services free of charge, thanks to community support and donors — and the best rescue is the one you never need.

At Seattle Mountain Rescue, we often meet people who are having a bad day –potentially the worst day of their lives. Unfortunately, for Anna Fisher, a casual trail run through Melakwa Lake ended up being that kind of day.

Anna Fisher is no stranger to the backcountry. As a North Face sponsored ultra runner, Anna spends most of her time running trails, either training or racing distances up to 100km. This July, she and her boyfriend Jimmy traveled from their home in Midway, Utah to Snoqualmie, WA to visit friends and continue her training for an upcoming 100K mountain race in France.

The Melakwa Lake trail is a challenging, moderately used trail connecting the Pratt Lake with Melakwa Lake within Alpine Lakes Wilderness. You’re traversing through forest and open slopes with great views 10 miles down the Pratt River Valley to the Middle Fork River.

No one sets out on an adventure expecting it to go wrong, but nearly every long-term outdoor enthusiast has been in a situation where disaster was just one unforeseen accident away. Many times, an accident is a combination of several factors, some that are impossible to control.

Anna has spent a lot of time reflecting on the days leading up to her accident. There were a lot of coincidences leading up to that day”, Anna says. “The night before, my friend took us to a local brewery – Volition. We ordered “The 11^th Essential”, a beer that benefited Seattle Mountain Rescue. My friend knew a member of SMR, and we had just been talking about what missions are like the night before.” Anna says she didn’t really know much about mountain rescue. She had seen the Utah SAR out on trails at home but was unsure about how they operated.

“I run by myself a lot, but at the last minute my boyfriend Jimmy decided to join me on the run (he is an ultra-runner as well). Everything was going fine, we had just stopped at Melakwa lake and were heading back towards our car at the trailhead. In a particularly technical and overgrown section, I slipped on a wet rock, and lodged my foot. I fell and heard a loud snap. Then the pain kicked in.”

“Both Jimmy and I have taken wilderness first aid, so we did our best to assess the situation. I struggle asking for help, so I tried walking out, but it was clear that I was in too much pain, and I was going to make my injury worse. We were also worried about making it out before nightfall. I had food, my water filter, but no headlamp and no jacket.”

Anna and Jimmy didn’t have cell service and were 8 miles from their car. “He ran ahead to get cell service to call Search and Rescue and told hikers along the way to look out for me. Strangers refilled my water bottle and gave me Tylenol.” Even though she knew she should stay where she was, Anna kept hobbling as far as she could go.

For Seattle Mountain Rescue, this would be the third mission that day. Earlier, SMR was called to Mailbox Peak for a hiker suffering from heat cramps. A team was heading up the Mailbox trail when the call came in for a trail runner with an ankle injury. The trail leading to Anna is extremely rough and takes a large team to get a loaded litter down this mile long section. SMR had packed a climber out of this section of trail with a broken ankle about two years ago and it was an all-night affair. When the team learned that Anna was slowly making her way, limping on the bad foot, they knew it would be an easier evacuation but that she would also be in a great deal of pain.

SMR and King County Explorer Search and Rescue (ESAR) headed in with the litter and first aid equipment and found Anna sitting on a rock at the top of the Olallie Lake trail. It took her several minutes to recover from the shot of pain from touching her foot, so the team knew she would need to be transported in the litter. The team assembled the litter, installed a full vacuum splint on her leg, loaded her in, secured her and soon were off rolling down the trail on the wheel under the litter.

As much as Anna was relieved to see the team, and as much as she knew she needed support, she felt conflicted about needing to be rescued. Often, the more experienced outdoor enthusiasts struggle to make the call for search and rescue. There’s a common misconception that only unprepared and inexperienced people need search and rescue. Seattle Mountain Rescue is called on missions for every level of experience and more times than not we are rescuing someone who knows what they’re doing. Accidents happen.

“I was embarrassed. On top of the pain, it was a hard pill for me to swallow that I was this hurt and that these people were out here for me on a Saturday night.” Anna says that despite her grumpiness, everyone was extremely kind, efficient, and even told her, “This is where we want to be.”

After the team made it back to the trailhead, Anna and Jimmy were ready to head to the ER in Snoqualmie. “I asked if they needed my insurance card or how I needed to exchange information. I was taken aback that they spent all this time helping me and were doing it as volunteers with nothing in return.” The ER confirmed Anna’s fibula was broken and back in Utah, she met with an orthopedic team that told her surgery was needed. If she had continued to walk out on her own it could have been a lot worse. She’s on the road to recovery and is managing the disappointment of not being able to race this summer. Anna is spending the time healing and mentally training for what lies ahead. In addition, she is still processing everything that happened on the day of her injury. “All of the coincidences leading up to it are so interesting. My friend knowing someone in SMR, the beer at Volition, and even Jimmy joining me that morning when I normally go alone.”

Anna is also grateful for the people who came to help her when she needed it most. “They were seeing me at my worst and spending their entire day rescuing me.” Once Anna was back in Utah, she emailed Seattle Mountain Rescue to thank the entire team. If she had not made the call for search and rescue, she could have caused irreparable damage to her ankle. Everyone at SMR appreciates how hard it can be to ask for help, but at the end of the day it’s why we’re here and it’s what we love to do. As the SMR Field Member told Anna that day, “this is where we want to be.”

Two years ago this month, Vertical World and the climbing community lost one of their own: Ross Halverson. Getting him down from midway up Mt. Garfield was one of the most technically challenging rescues we have done; given the recent rock fall that destroyed some of the climbing anchors, rain, and uncertainty of his exact location on the climb.

There isn’t a September that goes by or time we climb at Vertical World we don’t think about those few days.

The mission report from the rescue is included below. It reminds me both how proud I am to be a part of this determined group of rescuers, and how mistakes can happen to even the most proficient climbers among us.

On Monday September 8^th 2014, at 1137, SMR was paged to assist with recovery of a climber that suffered a fatal fall on Infinite Bliss, a 23 pitch rock climb in North Bend. The accident happened sometime Sunday, but the climber’s partner, who was the reporting party, was unable to reach 911 until Monday morning. Larry, Heather, Jason, Garth, Bree, Greg, Wes, Bob, and Taylor responded to Valley Camp around 1230, which served as our base for the operation.

Garth initially spoke with the reporting party, who thought that the fallen climber was on a ledge somewhere between pitches 10 and 15. Given the time of the day, construction on the road that limited travel, and rain forecast for the night, it was too late to start climbing the route. So, they decided to see if they could get a visual on the fallen climber from the base of the route, the climber’s path along the first few pitches, or from the other side of the river to help with planning the recovery.

Team 1 (Wes and Heather) and Team 2 (Taylor, Bree, and Jason) explored the base of the route, while Team 3 (Greg and Garth) explored the route with binoculars from the other side of the river. Larry remained in base as the Operations Leader. Snohomish’s Helicopter Rescue Team (Snohawk) was also called out to see if they could help locate the fallen climber from above. After landing at Valley Camp to get briefed around 1445, they flew above the climb to see if they could locate the subject, with Bob joining them. None of the teams were able to locate the subject, with Snohawk returning back to base around 1630 and teams returning around 1830. Given the weather called for rain on Tuesday, the teams decided to resume searching Wednesday.

Tuesday morning, the deputy contacted Larry to meet with the reporting party to see if he could get more detailed information about the incident and where the subject might be on the route. After looking at the pictures of the climb, the reporting party estimated that the subject was located around pitch 13, based on what she could see in the pictures of the route and where she had spent Sunday night.

Later Tuesday afternoon, Larry and Bree discussed the options for the following day. They decided it would be best to tackle the rescue in two waves. First, a small group would start the climb early in the morning to locate the fallen climber and lower him down the climb. Second, a larger group would deploy around 1430 in the afternoon to help with the steep angle evacuation down the climber’s trail.

Later Tuesday evening, Bree, Garth, and Taylor met to work through the specific details of the climb/lowering system they would use as well as what gear would be needed. Larry worked with Wes, who would be the rescue leader on the ground, as well as Mark, ESAR’s operations leader, to align the plan for the ground evacuation as well as resources for the day.

Wednesday morning at 0615, Bree, Darby, Taylor, Larry, Bob, Bill, Art, and Garth reported to base. The members held an initial brief outlining the plan for the day. Team 1 (Bree, Darby, and Taylor) would climb the route. Team 2 (Bill and a deputy) would try to get and maintain eyes on Team 1 from down below. Larry (Operations Leader), Bob, and Art would remain in base.

Teams 1 and 2 headed into the field at 0700. Team 1 reached the base of the climb at 0830 and headed up. They soon found themselves in the clouds, so Team 2 was unable to get eyes on. Team 1 located at the subject at 1120 near pitch 10, 3 pitches below where they expected to find the subject. They packaged the fallen climber and started lowering the subject at 1215.

Given how quickly the team climbed and located the subject, Larry decided to accelerate bringing in additional resources and asked additional teams to start arriving in base as quickly as possible.

Wes and Karl first arrived at base and reviewed the plan/resource plan for the afternoon. Garth, Brian, Gordy, Rich, Yogesh, and Drew later arrived at base around 1300. They divided into three teams; bringing in additional climbing gear, the litter, 2 rigging kits, and 2 300 foot ropes. They left base at 1330 and headed up the trail at 1430.

Three teams of ESAR members as well as Nick from SMR later arrived at base. They also divided into three teams, with two teams (Teams 6 and 7) heading into the field at 1515 and the other (Team 8) heading into the field at 1615. Teams 5 and 6 brought in the litter wheel and 2 additional 300 foot ropes.

Teams 3, 4, and 5 arrived at the base of the climb at 1520. Team 1 arrived at the top of pitch 1 around 1600, and the teams worked together to get the subject down from there, which was one of the more challenging pitches: there was a long, angling traverse to get the subject back to the climber’s trail. A member of team 4 walked a rope from the start of the route up and over to the rescuers, and that line was used to pull the patient package across to the climber’s access trail. Everyone was back at the base of the climb at 1700.

All teams then worked to transition the subject to the litter and begin lowering the litter down the trail. Eventually, when the slope angle decreased, they were able to put the wheel on the litter and arrived back at the trailhead at 1905.

Photos from the rescue: https://www.facebook.com/seattlemountainrescue/posts/770054739720625

Accident summary from Rock and Ice: http://www.rockandice.com/lates-news/accident-report-tragedy-on-infinite-bliss-rappelling-claims-climber

Early this morning, we wrapped up what ended up being a nearly 30 hour mission that started Friday night as our third mission of that day.