Mountain Climbing

A Dutch survivor of an ice avalanche that killed nine climbers atop the world's second-tallest mountain over the weekend described a desperate scramble for self-preservation, with panicked mountaineers abandoning one another in the search for a way down the steep rock face. Some of the victims were swept away by a column of ice that snapped near the summit of K2 -- widely regarded as the world's most treacherous peak -- in northern Pakistan near the Chinese border.

The last survivor of a mountaineering disaster on K2 limped into base camp on frostbitten feet. Italian climber Marco Confortola, 37, was among those stranded on the world's second-highest peak by an avalanche of ice. Eleven mountaineers died when the avalanche swept some away Friday and left others stranded just below the 28,251-foot summit. "I am happy to be alive," Confortola said in by phone. A copter later took him to a nearby town, a spokesman said.

When Nicholas Rice awoke just before midnight July 31, he was confident that the next day he would stand on the summit of K2, the world's second-highest mountain and the most challenging to climb. The forecast was for good weather, and after some earlier health issues, Rice was feeling strong. The 23-year-old climber from Hermosa Beach planned to climb K2 as he had other Himalayan peaks, alone and without supplemental oxygen.

THE Alpine Club of England is celebrating its 150th anniversary this year, an occasion of interest not only to climbers but also to travelers, geographers and lovers of glorious scenery. The club, founded in 1857 -- five years before the Austrians and Swiss started their own climbing organizations -- played an important role in opening up some of the most vertical parts of the world, including the Alps and the Himalayas.

Clint Willis dreamed of pursuing the kind of extreme mountaineering pioneered by a ragtag band of climbers, most of them British, who brought their sport to a new level in the three decades following the conquest of Mt. Everest. To help reconcile those unfulfilled yearnings, he detailed the astonishing accomplishments and heart-rending losses of Chris Bonington and his circle of climbers whose high-altitude expeditions in the Alps and the Himalayas have become the stuff of legends.

Three climbers on Oregon's highest peak fell off a ledge Sunday, but survived and were being rescued, local officials said. The accident comes two months after a December incident on Mt. Hood in which one climber died and two others went missing and were presumed dead, raising questions about whether winter climbing should be more closely regulated on the 11,239-foot-high mountain.

Three climbers can thank their black Labrador for keeping them warm until their rescue from Oregon's highest peak Monday, a day after they had slipped and fallen into a crevasse. One rescuer said the dog, Velvet, had played a critical role in keeping the man and two women warm enough in "hellacious" winds and heavy snow on Mt. Hood.

From Earth's tallest point, the message was understandably breathless. "We made it to the top!" Samantha Larson told her mother via satellite phone Thursday after reaching the summit of Mt. Everest. "Now all we have to do is make it back down." Larson, 18, of Long Beach, became one of the youngest people to scale the 29,035-foot peak, reaching the summit with a group that included her father, David Larson, 51, an anesthesiologist at Long Beach Memorial Medical Center.

Samantha Larson of Long Beach, who at 18 became one of the youngest people to summit Mt. Everest, safely arrived Saturday with her father at a base camp on the Nepal mountain, her relieved mother reported. "The most dangerous part of climbing is the descent," said Larson's mother, Sarah Hanson of New York.

"I feel really incredible," Samantha Larson, 18, said Sunday night, describing her sense of accomplishment after having conquered Mt. Everest -- the tallest place on Earth. It was about 9:30 a.m. Monday, Nepal time, and the Long Beach teenager was waiting below a base camp on the side of Mt. Everest for a helicopter to take her trekking group, including her father, to Katmandu.