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Avalanche Poodles Launch
Thursday, June 15, 2000

A Season on Denali
Darsney
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Hi there, this is Scott Darsney, with the Mountain Zone, checking in again on Thursday for Wednesday — I don't think Wednesday's transmission went through. This is our third full day at 17,000 feet here. Still waiting for a good summit day.

Finally, it's a good 17,000-foot day. It's finally cleared up here, but the wind is raging up on the summit and there's kind of an avalanche danger going up the Denali Pass. Fortunately, some avalanche poodles have launched. A couple of climbers who didn't know any better started making their way up the Denali Pass and they're almost at the top of Denali Pass right now. There's a big lenticular over it and I'd say it's blowing about 40 to 60 knots up there right now. So it is not the greatest.

Lynn and our team says 17.2 is just a walk in the park, I don't know if I got that out last night. Also want to mention my new photography website there on the Mountain Zone, make sure you folks check that out. It's been revamped and you can also check out my new photo website mtnworld.com, you got to check that out. Anyway, we had a wild game of hearts today; it was pretty cutthroat in the tent for several hours. And we've got a nice, big circus tent set up here, so we're kind of ready to weather any storm that may come along.

Hopefully tomorrow, weather permitting, and if the winds die down and it stays clear, now that the avalanche poodles have been launched, we'll try to trudge up the Denali Pass and see if we can get up to the summit. The weather forecast has been pretty dismal and a lot of teams have turned down after being up here eight or nine days.

Right now, I'm at the edge of the ridge looking down 3,000 feet below me down onto the 14,000-foot camp and the edge of the earth, and the glacier spilling down into the northeast fork of Kahiltna (Glacier). Mount Foraker is popping up and Mount Hunter and a few other peaks in the range, but there's a line of clouds at about 10,000 feet...11,000 feet right now kind of rolling, rolling on to the north. Anyway, that is all that I have for you for now and we'll check in later. Scott Darsney for the Mountain Zone, checking out.

Scott Darsney, Alpine Ascents International, MountainZone.com Correspondent


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