Death in the Snow

As thousands reveled in the gaiety of Calgary's annual stampede one night last week, three black hearses rolled across the city to a downtown funeral home. Past oblivious, whoopee-making crowds, the hearses bore the bodies of seven U.S. schoolboys, victims of the worst mountain-climbing accident in Canada's history.

The trip to tragedy began last month when 22 teen-agers left Philadelphia with Wilderness Camp, a summertime hike-and-climb outfit. Led by Oliver D. Dickerson, 29, a University of Pennsylvania instructor, and William Oeser, 29, a Baltimore schoolteacher, the Wilderness Campers (at $270 a head) drove out West in a Ford station wagon and a made-over secondhand hearse, stopped in Montana's Glacier Park, then moved on to Banff, 85 miles west of Calgary, for high adventure in the Canadian Rockies.

Tough Terrain. Abiding by Banff National Park regulations, the group registered with authorities to climb Mount Rundle (9,675 ft.). When the boys and their leaders saw Mount Temple, 11,636 ft. high with its craggy, seamed and snow-capped summit towering above Moraine Lake, they decided to climb it. But this time they did not tell the park authorities of their plan--if they had, they probably would have been denied permission because of the dangerous snow conditions of summertime. They did not ask guidance on the route or conditions for scaling Temple's tough terrain. They were not properly dressed or equipped. The boys wore jeans or khakis, sport shirts, windbreakers. Instead of mountain boots, they wore sneakers, baseball shoes, track shoes. They had only one ice ax and only one inadequate lifeline.

With William Oeser to lead them, 16 of the boys started up the southwest face one morning at 11. In four hours they reached 8,500 ft., just above the snow line. Oeser, bothered by blistered feet, decided to go back down; five of the boys followed him. The remaining eleven wanted to go on, and Oeser raised no objection. Lightheartedly, they set out for the summit, 3,000 ft. above, planning to come down before nightfall.

The only boy with a smattering of experience (a few climbs in the Swiss Alps), Tony Woodfield, 16, of Rye, N.Y., led the others to the 10,000-ft. level, but at that point he noticed a couple of small avalanches break off to one side. After talking it over, the boys decided to start back down. Suddenly apprehensive, they slipknotted themselves onto a length of quarter-inch Manila line. It was another error--mountaineers never use slip knots, lest the ropes tighten around their midriffs.

"I Heard Willie Yelling." It was too late. As the climbers negotiated an ice-filled "funnel," the snow mass whispered 700 ft. above them. Tony Woodfield glanced up and saw a mass of powdery snow break downward. "I yelled 'Avalanche!' and dug my ax into the ice and hung on." The avalanche thundered down. The rope tying Woodfield to the others tightened painfully, then broke, leaving him safe while his friends were swept 1,000 ft. down the mountain. Peter Smith, 13, of Paoli, Pa., managed to leap to one side, and was saved. "When it passed, I unwound the rope, which had slid around my neck, almost choking me. I heard Wil lie Wise yelling for help, and went over to him. There wasn't much I could do."

An 18-man rescue party from Lake Louise struggled up Mount Temple, worked all night to find the nine victims. Only Townsend Balis had been killed instantly; four had died slowly of exposure. Two were found dead in a snowbank. Two others, still alive, were brought safely down the mountain. Said Dr. P. G. Costigan, park medical officer: "If the boys had even been dressed in suitably warm clothing, probably most of them could have come out all right."

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