Abstract
Background
Mountaineering has seen explosive growth since the early 1970s. The population climbing Mount McKinley, within Denali National Park, Alaska has almost doubled between 1977 and 2006. We compared injuries encompassing two 10-year periods, 1977 to 1986 and 1997 to 2006, hypothesizing that injury characteristics may reflect both a growth in involvement in these activities as well as changes in technology. We identified the total number of climbers attempting to climb Mount McKinley and compared this to the total number of injuries sustained over the timeframe.
Purpose
To evaluate incidence and epidemiology of climbing injuries and fatalities sustained on Mount McKinley. We hypothesized that we would identify an increase in overall injuries. However, given advances in safety technology and education, we hypothesized that rates of injuries would decline.
Methods
We performed a retrospective data analysis evaluating all reported injuries and environmental-related illnesses sustained on Mount McKinley encompassing two 10 year periods from 1977 to 1986 and 1997 to 2006. We identified 201 climbing accidents during the 20-year interrupted timeframe. Data were extracted from Accidents in North American Mountaineering journal and an internet search of National Park Service websites and were analyzed using the proportional Z test and chi square method. All of the data collected were public record; all HIPPA information was removed from the extracted data.
Results
From 1977 to 1986, 103 incidents were identified, and from 1997 to 2006, 98 incidents were sustained by climbers on Mount McKinley. In spite of increased climbing rates, the overall injury rate declined between the compared periods, (103 vs. 98; p < 0.05). There was a significant decrease in the rate of falls on snow/ice/rock (0. 23%; p < 0.05), altitude medical sickness/high altitude pulmonary edema/cerebral edema (0.26%; p < 0.05) and environmental injuries (0.35%; p < 0.05), and fatal accidents on Mount McKinley between the compared time frames (20 vs. 9; p < 0.05). The incidence of falling snow, rock, and ice increased between the compared timeframes (0.041; p < 0.05). In spite of increased climbing rates the injury declined 0.9% between periods. There were no significant differences found in other injury patterns.
Conclusions
With the ever-increasing popularity of mountaineering and ice climbing on Mount McKinley, one would expect to see a corresponding increase in overall injuries and incidents sustained on Mount McKinley to coincide with this increased number of climbers. The data available to this study actually revealed a decrease in overall accidents accompanied by a significant decrease in fatalities sustained by climbers. The decrease in the overall rate of injuries and fatalities likely reflects an increased awareness of the hazards facing climbers, enhancements in climbing technology, and improved technical ability of climbers attempting the summit of Mount McKinley. Increasing rates of falling snow, rock, and ice may be influenced by exposure of increasing number of climbers on Mount McKinley and the global effects of climate change. However, this also exposes an area on which wilderness providers may want to focus future prevention and education efforts.