YOSAR, Yosemite’s Search and Rescue Team, by Lincoln Else 28 July 06
While stuffing battered climbing gear into a backpack, Tim and Scott watched from the summit of Washington’s Column as the famous post card face of Half Dome glowed orange in the setting sun. They had climbed for two days to get up the vertical granite wall that now stood under their feet, and it was with a mix of exhilaration and exhaustion that they started down the famous North Dome Gully toward Yosemite Valley below. Moments later, off balance under the weight of his load, Tim slipped and disappeared over the edge. He tumbled two hundred feet before landing on a precarious ledge a thousand feet above the valley floor. As he yelled up to Scott that he was badly injured, it started getting dark.
Most climbers have heard of YOSAR, Yosemite National Park’s famous, or infamous, search and rescue team. Its origins are the stuff of legend, and some of the team’s early members are central characters in America’s climbing history. But how does it actually work? Who’s on YOSAR today, and how do we know there’s a hurt climber in North Dome Gully wanting our help?
When the pager in my pocket squawked something about an injured climber, I had just turned on the stove to cook dinner. Lucky for Tim and Scott, another climber came down the same descent just behind them, and after hearing what had happened he hurried to the Valley for help. By the time he stumbled into the Ahwahnee hotel an hour later it was well past dark. So much for dinner.
We deal with between 150 and 200 rescues each year, everything from blisters and tired hikers to injured climbers half way up the three thousand foot face of El Capitan. Figuring out the basics of “what’s wrong” is usually the first challenge. Tim tells Scott he’s hurt, Scott tells a passing climber, who tells the concierge at a hotel, who calls a dispatcher at 911, who radios a patrol ranger… and before long the telephone game turns a hang nail into a heart attack, or the other way around. What about cell phones? Sure, they can be lifesavers, but they cause problems of their own. “I didn’t bring a jacket because I had my cell phone.”
When I arrived at the rescue office a few minutes later, John Dill had already grabbed a megaphone and was pulling aerial photos of North Dome gully off the shelf. Once the basics were clear, we sent a page out over the radio, and other YOSAR team members started showing up. Jack pulled off his gun and uniform shirt as he ran through the door, Jamie was still chewing a burrito when she jumped off her bike, and as everyone put on yellow t-shirts Werner walked in, “North Dome Gully again?”
The branch of the National Park Service dedicated to rescues in Yosemite is known as YOSAR, but the team is often misperceived as a separate group from the NPS. We’re a constantly changing group of rangers, volunteers, medics, guides, interns, locals, and “other warm bodies” who might be around when we need an extra hand. This crazy mix of people is what makes the group so versatile, fascinating, and sometimes downright hilarious.
In the late 1960’s more and more climbers were flocking to Yosemite, and the rangers realized they needed extra help with technical rescues. To get that help, they organized a “SAR Site” where skilled volunteers could live in a campground in exchange for rescue work and sporadic pay when their help was needed. Over the last three decades hundreds of people have spent time on the site, and its alumni include some of the world’s most famous climbers. Jim Bridwell, Ron Kauk, John Long – many climbers grew up reading tales of these larger than life characters. Add a mix of skilled “SAR siters” to the already diverse YOSAR group, and you’ve built quite a unique rescue team.
Paramedic Keith Tampa and I grabbed our packs and blitzed for North Dome Gully while others gathered the equipment needed for a night rescue high above the Valley floor. Adrenaline, blaring radios, people dashing around – the beginning of a rescue resembles what a Hollywood screenwriter might hope for. As usual though, Hollywood quickly evaporated as Keith and I began the slow slog through an endless boulder field at the base of the gully. Guided by headlamps we inched our way upward, sweating in the summer heat and cursing at each wrong turn we had to admit.
Though Yosemite is a wilderness area the size of Rhode Island, the Valley known from post cards and SUV adds is small enough to let the sound of a garbage truck bounce back and forth off its walls. As Keith and I scrambled up the gully we heard John’s voice echo through his homemade megaphone from the meadow below. “Climbers in North Dome Gully… if you can hear me flash your lights twice!” No lights. No answer. John has yelled similar words into the dark on countless nights, and decades of rescue work have made him famous in the climbing world. In a place where egos fly and adrenaline runs thick, John’s quiet methodical style has helped save many lives. A second try with the megaphone, still nothing.
After more cursing and scrambling Keith and I reached a high point where we could see west along the rim of the Valley. As John’s voice bounced off the starlit face of Washington Column we saw a faint light flash in response. Success, now the challenge was to reach them. Half an hour later we rappelled two hundred feet down a system of ledges to find Tim pinned in a corner, Scott looking nervous at his side. Only a week before a climber had died after falling a similar distance, so we were astounded to find Tim alive and speaking to us.
Statistics vary drastically, but close to a dozen people die in Yosemite each year. The causes vary from drowning to heart attacks to car accidents, and climbers make up only a small number of these deaths (about two on average). Some of the accidents are just that, accidents, tragedies that seem hard to explain, but many could be avoided. With its picturesque landscape and four million visitors a year, people often forget that Yosemite can be a true unforgiving wilderness. Gravity works, water is cold, and yes, you really can get lost in the forest. Though technical climbing rescues earned YOSAR its fame, a hiker lost in the backcountry can take hundreds of thousands of dollars and weeks to find, or not find, and a loose boulder field at night in the rain is sometimes far more dangerous than the overhanging face of El Cap.
By the time Keith and I had Tim stabilized, or at least laughing at our jokes, a dozen other rescuers had a raising system rigged on the cliff above. We use all the new-fangled equipment we can, but most of what YOSAR does is still built with the most basic of materials. Ropes, pulleys, knots, webbing – these simple tools are versatile with the right experience, and lower tech means less to go wrong. By just before dawn we had Tim secured in a metal stretcher and resting comfortably on a larger ledge.
“Comfortably” might be a bit of an exaggeration. Like most other emergency medical workers, we often strive to simply keep patients from getting worse while rushing them to “real” medical attention. We can do a lot for an injured person, but what that person often needs is a hospital with a surgeon. In Tim’s case some morphine at least helped keep him smiling. A climber with a broken pelvis once said to me after getting a dose, “I was going to say ouch… but by the time I got around to it… I was like… f%ck it.” Maybe not comfortable, but better than nothing.
At first light we heard the unmistakable low thumping rhythm of Yosemite’s helicopter as it floated into the Valley. Framed against the face of Half Dome, it hovered just above us and with a cable was able to lift Tim directly off the ledge and out from the wall. Ten minutes later and after the ride of his life, Tim was in an ambulance on his way to the medical clinic in Yosemite Valley.
As for the rest of us, it was time to head down North Dome Gully. One of us had some horses to deal with, and another guy had paperwork to do. One had to be at the jail later for work, others were hoping to climb, and I really wanted a nap. The morning sun sparked energy in everyone, and laughter bounced through the boulders as we stumbled down the gully. It sounds cheesy, but as we scrambled our way toward breakfast and watched the sun rise over that same post card view of Half Dome, I was truly proud to be part of the wacky, duct-taped, professional team of rag tag friends called YOSAR.
A note on Tim:
After taking a spectacular two hundred foot tumble with a fifty pound haul bag on his back, in the end Tim came away with only minor injuries. Luckiest guy I’ve met. And no, he’s not actually named Tim. Neither is Scott.
Who’s Lincoln?
Lincoln grew up in the coastal mountains of California and learned to climb in Yosemite when he was twelve. After getting a philosophy degree from Yale he went back to the park to climb for “a summer.” That was nine years ago… and he’s still saying this is his last season
Previously:
Next: Managers Viewpoints
