Accidents and Rescues in the Ritter Range
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The annual publication by the American
Alpine Club, Accidents in North American Mountaineering (shortened
to Accidents… below) logs many mountain mishaps, and keeps
extensive statistics. For example, for the period of
twenty years between 1951
and 1970, Accidents… reports a total of 74 fatalities in the Californa
mountains, or on average, about 4 deaths per year.
This data cover all of California, including, for example, the Shasta
region, where accidents were as frequent in the past as they are today.
Therefore, only a fraction of those 74 deaths happened in the Sierra, and
- not surprisingly - the majority in close proximity of Yosemite Valley.
Two other often visited areas, the
One issue of Accidents… suggests, paraphrasing a proven aviation wisdom: There are old climbers, and there are bold climbers, but there are very few old bold climbers! This reflects the fact that in many accidents, various unsafe acts and errors in judgement by individuals are responsible for injuries and loss of lives. However, mountaineers in the Ritter Range have to deal with another potentially unsafe condition that is not fully under their control. This hazard is related to the geology of the area. The Sierra mountains are relatively young in geological terms, and composed of lightly colored granitic rock. The Ritter Range massif is, however, strikingly anomalous. It is composed of a dark metavolcanic rock more ancient than the Sierra granite, a remnant of a primeval, mile-thick Sierra cap. Its fractured rocks, its dark spires, a complex topography, and a constant rockfall from higher peaks are strong evidence that the mountains in the range are transforming and indeed decaying in front of our eyes. When rock climbers try to put a humorous spin on the risks associated with such a climbing environment, they talk, for example, of portable handholds. But they know (or should know) that climbing in the Ritter Range is not only breathtaking and exhilarating, but also hazardous. Several accidents mentioned below, and possibly the Rettenbacher accident itself, are a result of those unsafe geological conditions.
What follows is a sample of climbing accidents and rescue missionsin the Ritter Range. The list below is accurate, but incomplete. I've checked all available issues of Accidents… in the Stanford Library, but the collection doesn't have the first few volumes, and has serious gaps in both older and newer content. Note also that not all Sierra accidents get reported in Accidents…. Another valuable source of information about the Ritter Range mishaps are carefully prepared online reports by the Mono County Search and Rescue Team (shortened to Mono SAR below). Those reports cover the last ten years. Finally, some of the accounts below are based on newspaper articles. If you know of other climbing accidents in the Ritter Range that should be listed, please send me a note, and I would gladly add them.
PAST RITTER RANGE ACCIDENTS
As reported in Accidents…, and from
various other sources.
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August 3, 1933
Walter A. Starr, Jr (30), killed on Michael Minaret. The
exact date is not known with certainty. A large slab of rock must have
broken away as Starr clung to it in climbing, and
had thrown him clear of the rock face until he struck a ledge several
hundred feet below. Find much more about Walter "Pete" Starr in the
next chapter (Other High Sierra graves).
end of July, or early August, 1934
Anna and Conrad Rettenbacher (both 33),
killed on Banner Peak (this story).
August 12, 1957
False Alarm. Army pilot, Lt. James
Bassett, observed
a distress signal during his night flight from Bishop to Stockton.
The signal was coming from an area
"about five miles north and east of Mt. Ritter" [Thousand
Island Lake?]. The pilot described the signal as a "flashing light,
apparently coming from something larger than a flashlight".
The air and sea rescue squadron at Hamilton Air Force Base has been notified of
the distress signal, and the Mono County Sheriff's office was asked to
make a ground party available. In the next two days,
both the Mono County Sheriff and the Madera
County Sheriff sent smaller planes in the area, but the pilots said they
found "nothing amiss". The search and rescue operation was then canceled.
Apparently, a camper was signaling a passing plane as a lark.
(The Fresno Bee; Oakland Tribune).
September 1, 1957
Bernice Fingerman (34?), from Berkeley,
was hiking near the base of Mt. Ritter
with three other people: her brother Milton
Fingerman (29), an assistant professor of biology at Tulane University,
New Orleans, Junji Kumamoto (33),
and Power Bunmei Sogo (33), both from Berkeley.
Junji slipped and fell against Miss Fingerman, and she fractured
her right ankle. Her companions carried her to Lake Ediza, where they
had their camp, then called for help. A packer took her seven miles on
horseback to Agnew Meadow, where their car was waiting. The next day, she
was admitted to an Oakland hospital.
(Oakland Tribune).
September 3[?], 1958
Charles A. Finnila (21), of Larkspur, a
senior in electronics engineering at UC Berkeley, was scaling
"a peak in the Minaret region" with friends from the
University Hiking Club, when he was hit on the head by a
falling rock. He then fell more than 100 feet, and suffered severe
brain concussion. His leg was lacerated in addition to the head injury.
He was transported by an Air Force [or by a Civil Air Patrol?]
helicopter to the Northern Inyo
Hospital at Bishop, where he underwent immediate surgery. Later that day,
he was flown to St. Joseph's Hospital in San Francisco. More than 40
hours after the accident, he was still unconscious.
(Oakland Tribune; Hayward Daily Review).
[Newspaper reports don't identify the peak. Possibly one of the Minarets.
Charles later fully recovered from his injuries].
September 2, 1962
Robert Elliot (33), used the standard route from
Ritter-Banner col up Banner Peak. The route skirts some high angle rocks
under the summit and reaches the peak via the west side. However, Robert
chose to go straight up the rocks. After he had gone some eight feet up a
crack in the rocks, he put his weight on a large fractured block that came
away almost immediately. Robert fell only the eight feet, but he was
unable to avoid the falling block that hit and seriously injured him.
He was helped by other climbers in the area, and evacuated from Banner
Peak the next day. (Accidents…, 1963).
Early March, 1963
William A. Knapp (21), from Carmichael, California,
was a student at San Francisco Art Institute. That winter, he was working
in a tavern at Mammoth Lakes. He told his friends he would try to
reach Mount Ritter and do some winter climbing. He left on skis
on Monday morning, March 4, 1963. When he failed to return by Friday, his
employer notified authorities, and a massive search began immediately.
Twenty Marines from the Pickle Meadows
coldweather training center joined the search Wednesday,
and when a civil air patrol pilot reported seeing an object on
a Mt. Ritter's snowfield, that could be a man's body or camp gear,
the Marines climbed to the snowfield but found nothing.
A storm covered the area with new snow in mid March,
and the search was first postponed, and then abandoned.
William's body was found at the foot of a Banner Peak glacier
by his brother, John Knapp,
in early August 1963. Apparently, William had
changed his original plan to climb Mt. Ritter, and had opted for Banner
Peak instead. No further details about the exact location, and a cause of
the accident were given in newspaper reports. The body was carried out
by Marine Corps mountain climbers using horses and mules.
(Fresno and Reno areas newspapers).
August 28, 1963
James P. Eslinger (28), from Pasadena, was on a
rock-climbing trip with a brother and another companion. All were members
of the Sierra Club. A Pasadena paper
tells that they were on a rock spire in the Minarets range,
using "ropes and pitons". According to
Sheriff Evans of the Mono County sheriff's
station, James fell 400 feet, somewhere near Iceberg Lake.
The San Mateo Times specifies that the fatal fall
happened on Clyde Minaret.
Marin Corps mountain rescue team from Bridgeport reached the site of
the accident in the evening,
and James' body was flown out by a helicopter next day.
(The Pasadena Star News; The Los Angeles Times;
The San Mateo Times).
[There were no other details in the newspapers].
August 24, 1966
A 17-year old boy died near Shadow Lake from high altitude pulmonary
edema. This is really not a climbing accident, but it illustrates other
types of dangers in high mountains. (Accidents…, 1967).
September 3, 1967
Jared L. Wright (24), fell while climbing Banner Peak, and
died. Accidents… didn't have any other details available.
Contemporary newspaper reports are not helpful either. We learn that Jared was
a student at UC Berkeley. He was camping somewhere in the Thousand Island
Lake area with another Berkeley student
(one newspaper identifies the other student as Gerlinde
Elizabeth Muehlner). It was the Labor Day weekend. On Sunday,
Sep 3, Jared said to his friend he was going on a short hike, but he never
returned. The friend reported him missing on Wednesday.
Jared's body was found several days later by
the Sierra Madre Search and Rescue Team from Southern
California. Searchers attributed his death to a "fall probably caused by
what has been termed the worst hail storm in the last three years".
The weather situation at the time of the accident is described in a report by
the Associated Press agency from Mammoth Lakes, dated Sep 4
(this had been distributed before Jared's disappearance became known):
"The 17th day of lightning and thunderstorms in
the Mammoth Lakes area brought an inch of rain and four inches of hail
here yesterday afternoon [Sep 3]. The U.S. Forest Service lookout on Bald
Mountain counted more than 500 lightning strikes as the storm drenched
Inyo National Forest from Bridgeport to Lone Pine. District Ranger
William J. Murphy
reported some weekend campers were flooded out, others
temporarily marooned, and many tents collapsed in campgrounds, but no
injuries were reported".
(The Fresno Bee; Accidents…, 1968).
[The California Death Index lists the date of Jared's
death as September 8].
August 13, 1969
Jeffrey Cohen (18), from Santa Ana,
fell and suffered injuries while scaling Banner Peak.
He was rescued by a team from Mono County Sheriff's office,
and taken to Mono General Hospital in Bridgeport by
a National Forest Service helicopter, with a possible skull fracture.
After being treated for head injuries, he was released from the
hospital a day later. [Other details about this accident are not available].
(The Modesto Bee; The Los Angeles Times).
July 7, 1970
Bruce Kinnison (23), of Mountain View,
was on the south face of
Clyde Minaret with his friends, Jack Miller
and Bill Worthington. They
were on the eight pitch, with 4 pitches to go. Bruce led the pitch, but he
slipped and landed on a sharp boulder, breaking his right femur [ouch!].
Bruce blames a bad protection pin for the injury.
After moving Bruce to a comfortable position on a ledge, high on the south
face, Jack rappelled, and walked to their Minaret Lake campsite to seek
help. There he ran into Allen Richert, a young climber,
who in spite of his swollen knee hurried down the eight-mile trail
to Devils Postpile to alert rangers. In the meantime, Jack returned to
Bruce's ledge,
carrying three sleeping bags, pads, and demerol pills for pain. Around
dusk, a helicopter landed somewhere in vicinity, and three climbers knew
that help would be coming with morning's light. The first two
rescuers (from the heli) indeed climbed to the ledge early in the morning.
A team of 22 other SAR members came to the area by foot from Devils Postpile
shortly thereafter. In an elaborate operation, rescuers lowered Bruce some
700 feet to the South Notch snowfield, then slid him down 1/4 mile to the
helicopter landing spot near Cecile Lake. The pilot ferried Bruce to an
ambulance, which drove him to the Bridgeport hospital. He reached the hospital
34 hours after the fall.
(Summit, Vol 17, No 1, 1971; Nevada State Journal).
[Post scriptum: Bruce fully
recovered, and made several first ascents in later years].
August 28, 1970
Craig Lunt (19), an explorer scout, was hiking between
Thousand Island Lake and Lake Catherine on Friday, August 28, with a large
group of scouts. He went ahead of the group but missed the lake. When
the group did not find Craig at Lake Catherine Friday afternoon, they
began a search. On Saturday, two scouts were sent to Red's Meadows
to alert authorities. On Sunday afternoon, two sheriff deputies were
packed into Lake Catherine to help with the search,
and the Eastern Sierra Rescue Team was alerted on Sunday evening.
A large group of searchers was assembled early Monday morning at
Red's Meadows, when word came that Craig had already been found and was in
good condition. Apparently, he retraced his steps for some distance after
he realized that he was lost. Then he sat down and waited, for almost 2
days, until the other scouts found him.
(The Talus Pile, CLMRG newsletter, October 1970).
May 30/31, 1971
Glenn Welsh (29),
Gordon Howe (30),
Bob Smith (31), and
Dick Schroeder (30),
members of the Sierra Club, died on
July 4, 1971
Diane Godbe (23), from Boulder, Colorado, tumbled down a
2,000 feet chute somewhere near Garnet Lake, breaking an ankle. The
accident occurred late on Sunday, July 4th. Airborne rescuers reached her
on Monday at 12:30. She got medical attention at Mammoth Lakes.
(The Fresno Bee).
July 5, 1971
Ellen Pinter (19), was involved in a separate accident
in the same area near Garnet Lake, at about 10,000 feet. She too fell
down a snow chute, suffering a five-inch gash in her left leg and
possibly other injuries. Officers received a report of Miss. Pinter's
plight at 4:24 pm. Apparently, the same crew that was helping
in Diane Godbe's rescue (above), flew Ellen Pinter in a heli borrowed
from the Yosemite National Park to Minaret Summit. Ambulance then took her
to Mammoth Lakes. (The Fresno Bee).
July 7, 1971
William H. Eaton (23), from San Marino, California,
was killed when he fell 1,000
feet down an ice-filled crevice on
September 4[?], 1972
James Bond (17), from Fullerton,
fell 60 feet to a cliff on the Mount Ritter eastern slope. He was hiking
with a group of friends. Rescued by a helicopter crew, he was hospitalized
in Bishop with a concussion, back injuries and a broken leg. Madera
County sheriff's deputies said Bond was the fifth injured person to
be rescued in the Mt. Ritter area since August 30, 1972.
[No further details about this and other four rescues are available].
(Nevada State Journal; The Los Angeles Times).
June 22, 1975
Karen Johnson (21) and her brother
Brian Johnson (16), both of Canoga Park,
planned to spend the first days of summer in vicinity of
Thousand Island Lake. Shortly after they had left for the mountains,
on Sunday, June 22, an unusually strong storm that featured
high winds and several inches
of snow at the lake level, hit the area. The Johnsons were
scheduled to be out by Tuesday, but when they failed to return,
a massive search was organized. The search included personnel from
Mono, Inyo, and Madera County sheriff's offices, and SAR teams from China
Lake, Sierra Madre, San Diego, and San Francisco. More than 40 persons scoured
the Ritter Range on foot, supported from air by helicopters,
fixed-wing aircraft, and California Air National Guard crewmen.
On Friday, June 27, the pair was found, some distance from their planned
route, but in good condition. They were reunited with their parents
at Silver Lake. (The Los Angeles Times; The Talus Pile,
CLMRG, July 1975). [Snow from the storm stayed on the ground at the
lake level well into July].
August 14, 1975
Ted Thompson (17), from Los Angeles, broke his left leg
on Banner Peak. That Thursday, he and two friends from Los Angeles,
Dave Ingram (19)
and Gregg Rutter (18) had already scaled
Mt. Ritter, and were well up Banner Peak when they decided to give it
up. On the descent, Thompson slipped on the melting ice of
a glacier between the two mountains, and slid about 150 feet. His crampon
caught and snapped his leg. Three friends stayed together over night,
and on Friday morning, one of them, Ingram,
hiked out and notified authorities. Inyo National Forest employees,
Richard Paust and Bryan Bell
reached the two youths on Friday afternoon,
carrying first aid supplies and a radio transmitter. On Saturday, a
medevac helicopter piloted by
Randall H. Weatherhead evacuated the injured
hiker from the saddle between Mt. Ritter and Banner Peak. Helping in the
helicopter were Lt. Walter Smith, and Madera
Sheriff's detective, T. R. Allison.
(The Fresno Bee).
August 7[?], 1977
Reed S. Boswell (52), of Tustin, was rescued by a helicopter
on Clyde Minaret after he had fallen while climbing. Madera County
Sheriff's deputies said Boswell and
an unidentified companion were both picked up by the copter from
Lemoore Naval Air Station. Boswell slipped and became wedged
between two rocks but was pulled out by his companion. He suffered only
minor injuries and the companion was uninjured.
(Hayward Daily Review).
June 22, 1991
Bruce G. Parker (45), of Los Angeles,
and
Kathy Moore (30) [Cathy Moore?] set out to do the
fourth-class "Starr's Route" on Clyde Minaret. They were
about 50 meters below the summit ridge, when Kathy decided she was too
slow, and chose to start down while there was still daylight. Bruce
continued, but then he noticed an apparent easier route down, and
decided to climb over and scout the route for Kathy. Shortly, she heard a
rockfall and turned to see Bruce in the air along with a large boulder. He
had fallen 250 meters down the cliff, and his body was found a day and a
half later. Bruce was a competent and experienced climber.
(Accidents…, 1992; The Talus Pile, December 1991).
August 16, 2003
Justin Schwartz (40), of Southern California,
was descending from the summit of Clyde Minaret when he dislodged a large
stone block onto himself and tumbled 20 feet down the cliff landing on a
narrow ledge. He suffered serious injuries.
His friend used a cell phone to call for help. Justin spent the night
on the cliff, and was safely airlifted out the next day.
(The Fresno Bee; Mono SAR; Accidents…, 2004).
August 30, 2003
Doug Nolan
and Marcos Brundall
(ages unknown), were climbing near the Ritter-Banner col.
Doug slipped on the snowfield east of the
saddle, fell 30 feet down the slope, then an additional 15 feet
into a moat at the edge
of the snowfield, and was seriously injured. Marcos stayed with Doug, but
soon he got sick. Another climber, Michael Habicht,
who had
advanced wilderness first aid training, came to their aid, stabilized the
victims and kept them warm with his sleeping bag and warm clothes until the
SAR team arrived early next morning. Doug and Marcos were airlifted out
after numerous weather related delays.
(Mono SAR).
September 1, 2003
David Houston (age unknown),
was descending from the Minaret Crest above Iceberg Lake, when he slipped
on the ice/snow, and slid down to rocks injuring a foot.
He spent 3 nights out in wet weather with only shorts and a T-shirt,
and no food or water. SAR team located the victim at the edge of a
glacier. He was safely airlifted out.
(Mono SAR).
August 8, 2004
Otto H. Loenneker (59),
hit an ice field at 11,500 feet and tumbled at least 75 feet to his death.
He was found at the base of
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September 7/8, 2006
Mt. Ritter was a scene of a dramatic helicopter
rescue of five young men, Aaron Sherman,
Pierce Chaney,
Josh Chaney, Caleb Noble,
and Levi Noble,
all from Mariposa, CA, ages 15 to 21.
The group decided to climb Mt. Ritter on Thursday,
September 7, 2006, in spite of a forecast that was
predicting a strong push of a cold air
over the area. They successfully summited, but when trying to descend
toward the Banner-Ritter saddle, they took a wrong gully down and got
cliffed out. With frozen rain and snow falling, they called for help via
cell phone. The SAR team started hiking in at 4:00 am Friday to help get
them off, but their location was so inaccessible that a helicopter
had to be called to pluck them off. The climbers spent almost 24
very cold hours on the cliff, until they were rescued.
No injuries were reported.
(Courtesy of Doug Smith, Dave Michalski, and Mono SAR).
August 19, 2007
Charles Degenkolb (57), of Putney, Vermont, was
attempting to climb the north face of Mt. Ritter with his son. He fell on
a snow portion, and his crampons dug into the snow causing him to
cartwheel down the slope for 150 feet, severely injuring his ankle.
The two men spent the night on a bench off the snow and were joined in the
morning by Degenkolb's second son. They all slowly moved down the glacier
to Lake Catherine and their camp site. The next day, one son left for help,
encountered a party with a cell phone, and was able to call for assistance.
Mono SAR team and a helicopter from Yosemite were dispatched.
Degenkolb was extracted via a short haul system below the helicopter,
treated for his injuries in Mammoth Lakes Hospital on August 21,
and released. (The Record-Courier, Gardnerville, Nevada;
Mono SAR).
July 26, 2008
Olena Shmygelska (30),
a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford, climbed Mt. Ritter with a full
backpack, and chose a different descent route. She made slow progress
and spent the night near 12,000 feet. The next morning she continued
down but became stranded in loose rock and cliffs, and called 911 about
0900 for help. The Team responded, and four members were flown by a CHP
helicopter to a spot below her, and climbed up to her location at
11,220 feet elevation, finding her uninjured. She was belayed down and
escorted out via trail to Agnew Meadows, and taken to her car at Mammoth Mountain.
(Mono SAR).
September 22, 2008
A hiker, an adult chaperone for a school group, was injured somewhere in
the Ritter Range, at about 10,000 feet level. A report mentioned the hiker
having chest pain and unknown injuries. Early next morning, at about 4:30 am,
a helicopter with an Air Force Search And Rescue team from Fallon, Nevada,
landed on a small
flat bluff about 400 feet above the hiker, who was resting on a ledge. The
hiker wasn't suffering a heart attack but did have possible broken ribs
from a fall and was in danger of hypothermia. The injured hiker was
flown to Oakhurst. The Air Force team was called because no other rescue
helicopter services had the capabilities of maneuvering in the dangerous
nightly mountain flying setting.
[Based on a newspaper article from the Lahontan Valley News.
Other details are sketchy at this time].
NEXT: Other High Sierra Graves
If you have any reliable
knowledge about the Rettenbacher accident or other accidents
in the Ritter Range, please drop me a line at