Climbers at the 17,200-foot high camp on Denali’s West Buttress witnessed an un-roped mountaineer take an almost 1,000-foot tumbling fall from Denali Pass (18,200-feet) at around 6:00 PM on Monday, May 24. Several guides responded to the motionless climber from high camp. Meanwhile, the park’s high altitude helicopter was already at the Kahiltna Basecamp conducting glacier monitoring surveys and was able to quickly mobilize for an evacuation. Pilot Andy Hermansky flew to the 14,200-foot camp, picked up mountaineering ranger Chris Erickson, and flew to the site of the fallen climber - landing at the site in less than 30 minutes from initial notification.
The climber, Adam Rawski, age 31 of Barnaby, British Columbia, was alive but unresponsive due to multiple traumatic injuries. With assistance from one of the responding guides, the ranger got the patient loaded into the helicopter. They evacuated the patient direct to Talkeetna, then transferred care to Matanuska-Susitna Borough ambulance paramedics who provided immediate life-saving measures until a LifeMed helicopter transported the patient to an Anchorage hospital in critical condition.
Source: U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service
