The Real World
Lisa Foster from the Estes Park News
I’ve always said:
“If you look at the victims of accidents in the mountains, they are evenly distributed between the novices and the experts. Neither the beginner nor the expert veteran are excluded from this law of nature.”
Well ok, maybe I haven’t always said that, and perhaps I’m paraphrasing, but this was the most important theme of Colorado 14er Disasters. Lisa Foster, pictured above, is most certainly one of the experts. She and David Laurienti were caught in an avalanche on Mount Ypsilon in Rocky Mountain National Park last weekend. Laurienti was killed while Foster survived but was injured and rescued.
Ypsilon is a popular climb in both summer and winter because it is relatively easy to access and has many routes ranging from easy hikes to technical rock to snow couliors (steep snow routes). Lisa Foster had extensive climbing experience all over Colorado and had climbed both Aconcagua and Denali. She had written one of the most popular hiking guides for Rocky Mountain National Park.
Yet she and Laurienti were caught in an avalanche, something that seems to be completely avoidable, especially by an expert mountaineer. Or was it? Reading this story while sitting comfortably at home with an unstressed (and inexperienced) mind, being lead along by a story that emphasizes, in hindsight, the stupid mistakes made, it could be easy to judge these people to be reckless or at least careless about climbing. But think again. No one, especially a mountaineer so viscerally in love with living, is intentionally so cavalier with their life.
Mountaineers are human of course and they do make mistakes. And just like everyone else, when distracted by exhaustion, thirst, hunger, cold, and the little aches and pains of high altitude winter climbing, mistakes can come more easily. I don’t know what happened on Ypsilon last weekend, but this happens to both the novice and expert.
Foster is most certainly a mountaineering expert. The media uses this word, usually without justification, to dramatize accidents. In Foster’s case there is vast evidence to prove it, a declaration from an ignorant reporter is superfluous. And so these things happen. So next time you hear about a mountaineering accident, remember that we are all human and accidents are part life. The only thing we choose is how we live.
Posted in Journal by Mark with comments disabled.