Denali's Howl
The Deadliest Climbing Disaster on America's Wildest Peak
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5.0 • 1 Rating
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- £9.99
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- £9.99
Publisher Description
In 1967, twelve young men attempted to climb Alaska’s Mount McKinley – known to locals as Denali, ‘The High One’ – one of the most popular and deadly mountaineering destinations in the world. Only five survived.
Journalist Andy Hall grew up in the mountain’s shadow, the son of the ranger on duty at the time of the tragedy, and has spent years tracking down survivors, lost documents and recordings of radio communications to piece together the chain of events. In Denali’s Howl, Hall reveals the full story of an expedition facing conditions conclusively established here for the first time: At an elevation of nearly 20,000 feet, these young men endured an “arctic super blizzard,” with howling winds of up to 300 miles an hour and wind chill that freezes flesh solid in minutes. All this without the high-tech gear and equipment climbers use today.
As well as the story of the men caught inside the storm, Denali’s Howl is the story of those caught outside it trying to save them - Hall’s father among them. The book gives readers a detailed look at the culture of climbing then and now and raises uncomfortable questions about each player in this tragedy. Was enough done to rescue the climbers, or were their fates sealed when they ascended into the path of this unprecedented storm?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Everest gets the publicity, but Alaska's Mount McKinley also known as Denali can be equally nasty, writes Hall, former publisher of Alaska Magazine, in this exciting account of a 1967 climbing debacle. McKinley's arctic location guarantees year-round snow, frequent avalanches, unpredictable storms, and winds well over 100 m.p.h. Joe Wilcox, a Utah college student with modest mountaineering experience, gathered 12 fellow climbers with varying degrees of skill and little money; they drove the Alaska Highway to Denali Park. Despite nearly 24 hours of daylight, it was an exhausting climb requiring repeated trips to stock seven camps while trying to safely navigate dangerous crevices, avalanches, and blizzards. Hall recounts their mistakes and in-group bickering, but adds that these were not exceptional. What they lacked was luck, a factor essential to any successful mountaineering endeavor. After one team reached the top, a brutal, week-long, once-in-a-century storm caught and killed seven others as they prepared to ascend. Matters might have ended differently, but Hall is less interested in affixing blame than telling the story. It was not Krakauer's Into Thin Air (1997) but Maurice Herzog's Annapurna (1952) that launched the genre of mountaineering expeditions that end in disaster, and Hall delivers his own skillful, heartrending contribution.
