One climber is still out in Denali National Park, steadily making his approach to the third-tallest peak in the Alaska Range. Japanese mountaineer Masatoshi Kuriaki has been steadily making his approach on Mount Hunter since December 14^th. It is his 6^th attempt to summit Mt. Hunter alone in Winter, a feat never before achieved. Lonnie Dupre reportedly spent a morning with him at base camp as Dupre awaited his flight off the mountain.

The two climbers have different objectives and used different approaches to undertake their challenges.

Dupre came at McKinley with a fast and light Alpine style, carrying only enough supplies and gear to last the month. His ambition was to get up and down McKinley with lightning speed, and be home by the end of January.

Masatoshi’s approach is a more methodical expedition-style approach, where the climber plans on making several trips between each successive camp as he works his way up the mountain. From base camp to camp 1, Masatoshi planned on making 5 trips, one trip per day, where the walking is fairly flat and he will be able to pull his gear on a sled and ski. Between Camp 1 and camp 2, Masatoshi planned on 10 trips, because the pitch is much steeper, and he expects he won’t be able to use a sled.Dupre says that Masatoshi has a good shot at reaching his objective.

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In 2010, Masatoshi spent 83 days on the mountain, including 53 days hunkered down in snow caves waiting out bad weather. This year the Japanese climber says he’s prepared to pursue his goal for 100 days. Masatoshi’s equipment and supplies weighed 570 pounds. Dupre’s supplies weighed in at under 100 pounds.

For both climbers, the decision to abandon their goal and turn back is never easy. Dupre spent seven days in a snow cave, and after evaluating the likelihood of the storms persisting, decided he didn’t have enough supplies to wait out the storm and still make a push for the summit.

Masatoshi says, the hardest part about doing what has never been done before is not the climbing.

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1:36”   Outcue “… decision to give up”

Although Hunter is only 14-thousand, five-hundred 73 feet, it has never been ascended in winter by a solo climber.

The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner says after reviewing public comments, the park service has decided to eliminate a $20-a-vehicle entrance fee and instead charge a flat $10-a-person entrance fee for visitors age 16 and older. That means a vehicle with four adults in it will have to pay $40 instead of $20. The Park Service says the vehicle fee was eliminated because the park does not collect the fee at an entrance station like the majority of national parks around the U.S. The change took place on Sunday.

National parks in Alaska also reported a 2 percent increase in visitors in 2011, according to preliminary figures. The National Park Service says there were about 2.32 million visits to Alaska parks in 2011, an increase of about 50-thousand from 2010. Final numbers should be released next spring. Five parks — Denali, Kenai Fjords, Glacier Bay, Klondike Gold Rush and Sitka — account for about 90 percent of those visits. Kenai Fjords National Park is on the Kenai Peninsula. Glacier Bay National Park and Klondike Gold Rush and Sitka national historic parks are in southeast Alaska and are popular stops for cruise ship passengers.

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engagement process regarding a proposed increase to the Special Use Fee

that directly supports management of climbing activities on Mt. McKinley

and Mt. Foraker. After a lengthy examination of current program costs,

analysis of public comment, and collaboration with national climbing

organizations, Denali National Park and Preserve will increase its

Mountaineering Use Fee from $200 to $250 for youth ages 24 and under, and

$350 for all other Mt. McKinley and Mt. Foraker climbers. The fee increase

will go into effect for the 2012 mountaineering season. In future years,

fees will be adjusted periodically based on actual costs, not to exceed

changes in the cumulative consumer price index.

Denali National Park’s mountaineering special use fee was established in

1995 when the National Park Service (NPS) was charged with developing a

program to reduce the accident rate and loss of human life on Mt. McKinley

and Mt. Foraker. At that time, an NPS regulatory notice announced that a

$150 fee per climber would be used to “help offset mountaineering

administrative costs associated with prepositioning and maintaining the

high-altitude ranger camp at 14,200-feet on the West Buttress route,

mountaineering patrol salaries, education materials aimed at reducing the

number of accidents, transportation of supplies.” Over the years, the fee

has also enabled the park to start and sustain effective human waste and

garbage management programs on Mt. McKinley.

Despite a 2005 increase in the fee from $150 to $200, fee revenue covered

only 17% of the cost of this specialized program in 2010, whereas the fee

initially covered approximately 30% of the cost. Climber numbers over the

past decade have remained essentially flat, as has NPS staffing. Excluding

costs of the high altitude helicopter portion of the program, operational

expenses have gone up significantly, due mainly to inflation.

In an effort to find a more sustainable funding model, park management

began informal discussions in 2006 with leadership from the American Alpine

Club, the Access Fund, and the American Mountain Guides Association, as

well as park concessioners and other stakeholders in the climbing

community. In October 2010, the park formally initiated a proposal to

increase the fee.

The public was invited to comment on the proposal last year during a formal

public comment period. During that period, five public open houses were

held in Alaska, Washington, and Colorado as a forum for park staff to

present information on the program and answer questions. Almost 500 public

comments were submitted, the majority of which indicated they would support

some aspect of a climbing fee increase, as long as the increase was

reasonable and equitable. Other comments submitted called for the

elimination of the use fee altogether, while at the opposite end of the

spectrum, several comments suggested full cost recovery including a fee

increase up to $1,500 per climber.

According to Park Superintendent Paul Anderson, “Mountain climbing

represents a longstanding tradition at Denali National Park dating back to

the first ascent of Mt. McKinley in 1913. Climbing fulfills one of our

park’s fundamental purposes. As such, we are committed to sharing in the

cost of the program and continuing to allocate appropriate levels of the

park’s base funding to the climbing program.”

Based on input collected during the public process, the National Park

Service has determined to implement a basic fee increase from $200 to $350,

as well as a discounted fee of $250 for all climbers age 24 and younger.

This recommendation supports both NPS and Department of the Interior youth

initiatives and responds to public concerns about the potential impact of

fee increases on young and less affluent climbers, students, and families.

In a statement by Phil Powers, Executive Director of the American Alpine

Club said, “This is an example of the kind of considered process that

results in policy we can support. I want to applaud Paul Anderson and the

National Park Service for opening up their process and listening to the

concerns of the climbing community.”

Superintendent Anderson indicated the park’s mountaineering program will

strive to institute many of the suggestions for operational efficiencies

gathered during the public process. “We are grateful to the various

climbing organizations for investing significant time and resources into

learning more about Denali’s climbing program, and for helping to inform

the general public.”

For additional information on the mountaineering program or cost recovery

special use fee visit the park website at www.nps.gov/dena/. Contact South

District Ranger John Leonard for questions about the fee at (907) 733-9105

or john_leonard [at] nps [dot] gov.

____________________________________________

Kris Fister

Public Affairs Officer

Denali National Park and Preserve

P.O. Box 9

Denali Park, AK 99755

(907) 683-9583

Kris_Fister [at] nps [dot] gov

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Tranel has been in the park service since 1985 and was at Denali Park from 1993 to 2008.

He’ll take over the superintendent position from Susan Boudreau, also a former employee at Denali National Park.  She is now superintendent at Glacier Bay.

Now the state of Alaska is planning a master interpretive plan for the stretch of highway from milepost 132 to Fairbanks.

Bill Kiger is the planner in the process and reminds people that the byway is not regulatory but rather is a way to build community voice in the area and it’s the community that can provide input for the regulation for what they’d like to see along the highway.  He also said it would be nice to see the byway extended to include Trapper Creek, the Susitna area and even Willow, but that won’t happen unless letters from community councils request that the Byway be extended.

Other scenic byways in the state include Glenn Highway, which includes Hatcher Pass Road and the Seward Highway, which includes Hope as a spur road.

Kiger says the interpretive plan process sets goals and objectives as to what people want to see along the highway.  He says the plan is a funding mechanism that can bring kiosks, waysides and bike paths to the area along the byway.  Meetings are being held in Trapper Creek, Denali National Park, Nenana and Fairbanks to gather cultural and natural resource information as well as obtain a list of stakeholders.

The project is funded through the Alaska Scenic Byways Program and administered by DOT.

The first round of meetings will be held mid April.  The Trapper Creek meeting is scheduled for April 18^th at 6 pm at the Trapper Creek Community Park.   After public input, the state will compile a draft plan.

The proposed route is the shortest route for a pipeline through or around the roughly 10-mile bottleneck of the Nenana River Canyon and Denali National Park and Preserve following the existing highway, which passes seven miles through the park.

NPS spokeswoman Kris Fister said that the park service is in support of the project and has been coordinating with other federal agencies to make recommendations. She said that the route through the park is the environmentally preferred alternative.

If the project comes to fruition, the park could benefit from the natural gas to power park facilities at Denali.

Alaska state regulators and financial markets will ultimately decide if this pipeline project will go forward.

The average age of climbers in 2010 was 38 years old, and 150 climbers were women.

While Denali usually gets all the attention, one team reached the summit of Mount Foraker via a new route. The international duo of Colin Haley and Bjorn-Eivind Artun climbed a previously unclimbed line. The climb involved 10,400 feet of elevation gain on the southeast face of Mt. Foraker. Haley and Artun spent a total of 37 days in the Alaska Range on this expedition.

Only one other team – of two that tried -  managed to reach Foraker’s summit via the Sultana route.

Most climbers from the US came from Alaska, trailed by climbers from Washington, Colorado and California.

The five nations most represented on McKinley were the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Poland and Russia.

The National Park Service released the 2010 climbing statistics last Friday.

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The comment period now ends December 13^th.  The park website was undergoing server maintenance and it left the site inaccessible for several days.  NPS public spokesperson, Kris Fister, wrote in an email that they wanted to ensure that the public has adequate time to comment.

The environmental assessment will examine the level of commercially guided climbs on Denali versus independent climbers and what impacts there would be if amount of guided climbs would increase.  The backcountry management plan provides for an exact number of guided groups versus those that go up the mountain on their own.  Guided climbs have grown in popularity over the years and the park service, by law, in order to change the backcountry plan, needs to examine the rules and open it for comment before the plan changes

The craft lost contact with air traffic control Tuesday evening. A search was initiated that continued throughout the night.  Wreckage was found Wednesday that fits the data and description of where Air National Guard officials thought the crash occurred.

The search area was initially the size of Connecticut, between Talkeetna and Cantwell.  The aircraft apparently did not go down inside the boundaries of Denali National Park and park officials at Talkeetna Ranger Station are not involved with the search efforts.

The search for the missing pilot is continuing today.

The pilot has cold weather gear and is trained to survive in sub arctic and Arctic conditions.

The pilot’s name is being withheld until the pilot’s status is determined.  There is still hope that the pilot is alive as the wreckage area is searched.

Residents near Cantwell report that the Denali Highway is being plowed to the gravel by the military.  Recreationists using the highway have been turned around and plows are busy on that road.  Mushers and skiers should be aware of the possibility that they will not be able to use that area.  The owners of MacClaren Lodge at milepost 42 of the Denali highway say the military is plowing the road only to the Susitna River and that snow conditions are good for recreational travel beyond that point.  The Air National Guard has NOT confirmed that the Denali Highway is actually closed to traffic.

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Mail scoping comments to Superintendent, DNP &P, Attn. Climbing EA, PO Box 9, Denali Park, AK 99755

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House Bill 244 would have given 3,500 acres of land to the Denali Borough in order to build a commercial railroad along the Stampede road corridor all the way to Kantishna.  Its sunset date was fall of 2010.

Current Borough mayor, Dave Talerico, says locally, there were about 4 people supportive of the bill.  However, most other local residents were against the idea.  He says that most of the hunters, snowmachiners, skiers and backpackers saw the potential right of way as a destruction of their historical access.   The deal would have given an exclusive contract to one company, Kantishna Holdings.

Over the years, he says the Denali Borough Assembly has tried to come up with another bill that seems more equitable.  The year before last, a Stampede Recreation Area proposal was introduced to the legislature and thrown out.  Last year, the bill was re-introduced.  Talerico says he thinks it is fair to every user group and takes nothing away from the state land area.  A state designation would preserve it for future generations of hunters, skiers, hikers, berry picking enthusiasts and local trappers, he said.

As of September, the idea of the railroad along Stampede Road is dead.  However, Talerico says he wouldn’t be surprised if the same interested individuals would come back with a new proposal.

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A NEW NAME— Congress passed legislation to rename South Hunter peak to Stevens Peak in honor of the late Senator Ted Stevens. Photo by Diana Haecker

WASHINGTON D.C. — The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill today  that honors the late Senator Ted Stevens by naming a peak on Mount Hunter and part of an ice field in Alaska after him. The Senate earlier this week passed a similar bill.

In the next 30 days, the US Geological Place Names board is supposed to christen a feature on Mount Hunter that was simply known as South Hunter peak as “Stevens Peak”. The peak stands almost 14-thousand feet tall and it was the highest unnamed peak in Alaska.

Senator Lisa Murkowski has introduced the legislation to name the peak and the ice field after Stevens. The northern and eastern half of the Chugach Mountains will become the Ted Stevens Ice Field.

According to her spokesman, she selected that peak since it is the highest peak in Alaska that has not yet been officially named. He said it was selected since it is visible from the Parks Highway and because it is in Denali National Park which Senator Stevens had a key role in expanding in the 1980 Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act.

Ted Stevens died in an airplane crash near Dillingham on August 9. His remains were buried this week at Arlington National Cemetery. Governor Sean Parnell was there to represent Alaska at Stevens’ funeral and he proclaimed Stevens’ birthday on November 18 as Ted Stevens Day.

The proposed Stevens Peak is commonly known as South Hunter Peak.

The peak is located in Denali National Park and Preserve and is visible from the Parks Highway. At almost 14,000 feet, the mountain is the tallest unnamed peak in Alaska.

Murkowski has also proposed naming the northern half of the Chugach ice field after Stevens.

Stevens died in a plane crash near Dillingham on Aug. 9. He represented Alaska in the U.S. Senate from 1968 until 2008.

She was well known in dog mushing circles as well as within the National park and conservation communities.  Kogl was instrumental in starting the present-day Denali National Park dog kennels and the winter patrols in 1974.   The kennels were brought back to life with Sandy as the manager after an extended period of the park not having a dog kennel.

Sandy was an author of the first edition of  ‘Sled Dogs of Denali’ and the co-author of ‘Ballad of the Wild Bear’.  She, along with other Talkeetna residents, started the Bear Necessities Coalition.  She is one of many women highlighted in the book ‘National Parks and the Women’s Voice’.  She lived in the Denali Park area for over 20 years before moving to south to Talkeetna.

Kogl lived with ALS, or Lou Gehrigs Disease, for the last year or two.

She leaves behind a brand new grandchild, a son Leif and his wife, daughter Renge’, and her husband, George, as well as countless friends across Alaska.

A memorial will be held at the Sheldon Community Arts Hanger at 5 pm on September the 26^th.

Listeners can stay tuned for further stories on Sandy in the future.