emmons june 25th

Our annual attempt on Rainier worked out for us this year with a successful summit on Wednesday June 25th at 7:50 am. We decided to go back to the Emmons/Winthrop route which was our 3rd overall attempt there. We were 1 for 2 on the previous attempts and got turned around at about 13,000 ft due to a storm that socked us in from above and below. This years Habaneros included Shawn McDonough, Chris Stangler, Kris Solvang and Andy McDonough.

We began our trip on late morning Monday June 24rd. It took us almost 8 hours to get up to Camp Shurman from White River. We did take a while and got caught in 3 hours worth of rain/sleet/snow on the Inter Glacier. Upon our arrival at Shurman, we realized a set of tent poles and a therma rest were left on the Inter Glacier so it was four of us in a 3 man tent for the first night. Kris?

Tuesday was spent practicing our crevasse rescue skills. Another team picked up our tent poles and therma rest so we did have the 2nd tent set up at about 7:00pm. Our plan was to wake up at 11:45 pm so sleep was to be minimal again.

We began our our attempt at 1:30 am from Shurman and heading up the corridor. It was a very clear night with only wind as our concern. A summit team from the night prior reported winds of 70 mph at the summit. We made great time and only broke a few times to relieve ourselves as we tried to limited breaks to eating/drinking on the move. At 11,600 ft, we met another couple of teams and noticed the boot tracks to the left. Remembering previous trip reports, we did go right. The trail was very well marked all the way to the top with many wands throughout. We arrived to the summit just before 8:00 am, signed the register and hung out at the true summit. After an hour, we began to head down at 9:00 am.

It was slow going as the steeper parts required focused attention between the summit and the corridor. The problem was the quality of snow began to deteriorate dramatically. Our crampons were continually balling up with the soft snow. I can't imagine how it is the days following as the temperatures increased quite a bit. Snow bridges are becoming more exposed and at risk. I recommend getting up and down quicker. The corridor was fine but the upper mountain was not fun as the temperatures warmed.

Our summit day can be summarized as follows:

woke up at 11:45 pm Tues, started climbing at 1:30 am Wed, summitted at 8:00 am, left the summit at 9:00 am, back to Shurman at 1:30 pm, left Shurman at 3:30 pm, reached the White River parking lot at 6:45 pm....17 1/2 hours total including rest and packing up from when we started hiking to when we got back to the parking lot.

Dres - team habaneros