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SplitPants
Social climber
LA
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Aug 26, 2013 - 02:45pm PT
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NEW UPDATE FROM CRAGMAN/DEAN
In spite of the tragic nature of all of this......I believe this is my calling....I'm having the time of my life. So....dang....spectacular!"
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Aug 26, 2013 - 02:49pm PT
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Here are two Google Earth images I annotated.
Shady Rest CG to Minaret Summit.
Minaret Summit: Road from summit to Agnew Mdw TH and Reds Meadow TH
Trails from TrailHeads to Minaret Lake and Cecile
and to Ediza, Iceberg and Cecile
BLUE: Minarets Road
YELLOW: Official trails
RED: cross country or rough tracks.
My traverse from Cecile to Ritter in red. I did it with significantly more snow than this.
Image is Sept 2008. From Cragman's photos there is currently much less snow than in this pic.
Corrections welcomed
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LAhiker
Social climber
Los Angeles
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Aug 26, 2013 - 02:50pm PT
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Thanks for the clarifications, HighTraverse! ETA: and thanks for the very helpful annotated satellite images!
I take your point that someone giving Matt a ride is likely to have driven him to the trailhead, though could they have been a ski resort employee who was late to an early shift? I have no idea when such a workday begins. Is the narrow part with the drop-offs the part west of the ski resort?
What I'm getting from people's comments is that there's a good chance that Matt might have planned a big day but not mentioned it to family and friends. Based on his earlier trip report, it sounds like he did strike up a lot of conversations with people on his trips, but that he also may sometimes have just gone off on his own without telling anyone.
Does anyone know whether Mat would ever leave a note about his plans when he was going on a big climb? If one drives somewhere, it's logical to leave a note on or in one's car, but given that Matt didn't have his car, not as clear where to put a note -- pin it to the tent? Put it just inside? Clearly such a note wasn't found, but because his belongings were placed in storage by the campground host before his friends knew he was missing, it could have gotten lost in the shuffle, as people have noted.
I wish more info could be gotten from the campground. I think the police interviewed the people at the neighboring campsites, but those campers had left before the 17th anyway, right? If Matt hated campground noise, he would have tried to leave quietly, so it would be telling if there had been some sort of commotion. Or an innocent commotion might have woken him up and thus confused our timeline.
Ideally, it would be good if more people in the campground could be interviewed, especially those who were there on days between the 15th and the 18th and who were near Matt's campsite or in sites between it and the bathroom and it and the way he might have gone on the morning of the 17th.
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phylp
Trad climber
Millbrae, CA
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:00pm PT
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I have refrained from comment up to this point.
When you get up at 3 am and turn your phone on, it's most likely because you have set your wrist watch alarm to get an alpine start on a big day. When you're camping, without your car, and you're going to the library for your internet and phone charging, you most likely turn your phone completely off to save the battery when you don't need it. It's common for many people to check their phones for messages in the AM. Turn it on, check for messages, turn it off.
From Shady Rest to the ski area is 5.5 miles. From there down Minaret Rd to the Agnews Meadow Trailhead is another 4.3 miles. I tend to agree with all the reasoning that makes Ritter/Banner/Minarets a likely day trip destination, but you don't start a day like that by walking 9.8 miles. You try to hitch-hike. If he had had a rental bike the security deposit would have showed up on his credit card account(s).
Non-climber friends who want to search in the area could find out which of the local business on the strip between the campground and the ski area might have staff coming to work at that time of day. The only kind I can think of might be restaurant personnel at places where they have breakfast service, or on site baking.
The road from the ski area down to Agnew is narrow, windy and with steep, treacherous, steep dropoffs. If Matt was walking down that road when it was still dark, he could have been hit by a car. It would be dangerous to walk the road to search with binocs from the side. I don't even know if it would be allowed. But it could be done.
From Shady Rest to route 395 is only 2.8 miles. There is always traffic on 395 even in the middle of the night. But given that going with this hitchhiking scenario to parts unknown opens the search up to an impossibly wide number of scenarios for locations and criminal and accidental mishaps, it doesn't add an value to pursue anything concrete.
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phylp
Trad climber
Millbrae, CA
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:01pm PT
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Fred and LA hiker posted as I was typing... similar ideas.
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LAhiker
Social climber
Los Angeles
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:07pm PT
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Klimmer, while I increasingly think the glasses are likely to have been a red herring, I do think it's worth finding out whether Matt ever wore reading glasses (e.g., whether in addition to being nearsighted, he was beginning to have presbyopia -- a decreased ability to see things close up).
I looked on Rite Aid's website but didn't see any Personal Optics reading glasses. In any event, it will be good when we know what Matt purchased at Rite Aid on the 16th!
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jeg
Social climber
center valley,Pa
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:13pm PT
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The people at his camp site were interviewed.
Summit post was contacted early on, no leads, he had no PM,emails,etc..
Crampons are definitely Step in...
No cameras at booth or shuttles, or shuttle pick up area
2:53am was a text received, can not be determined where(texts are not pinged), also does not mean he was awake, just that his phone reeived a text.
High Traverse...Thanks for all the comments, they are always right on!!
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jeg
Social climber
center valley,Pa
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:21pm PT
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Still working in Rite Aid purchase.
Matt did not need or use reading glasses.
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LAhiker
Social climber
Los Angeles
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:26pm PT
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MGuzzy -- As far as I can tell, Rite Aid doesn't sell those reading glasses online, but I don't know whether they have other things in-store.
Jill -- thanks for clarifying that Matt didn't use reading glasses. Sounds to me as if the glasses are a red herring.:(
Regarding the people at the campground, I thought that (in addition to presumably the campground host), only the people in the adjacent campsites had been interviewed, and that they had not been there on the 17th. (I thought that was in some communication from the police.)
I'm also confused re the text. I thought the phone had to be on for the tower to know a text had been received. If the text really was received at 2:53am PDT, is that when it was sent? That would be 5:53 EDT and 2:53am PDT -- neither seem that likely. Also, I had thought it was a text from the PA climbing gym guy the night before... Maybe I missed something here.
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synesthesiac
Trad climber
Davis, CA
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:29pm PT
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Unfortunately the SummitPost access logs are a dead end, their log files were autodeleted by the time anyone knew Matt was missing.
Dang. It was a long shot anyway, but thanks for following up on that!!
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SplitPants
Social climber
LA
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:29pm PT
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HighTravers as always +2!
All,
Thinking/typing out loud here. Does anyone think it would be of value to have some boots on the ground in town to help research some of this stuff? Perhaps a group of people that can at least check the alternate approaches into the Ritter/Banner area (since cragman approaches from different area). A part of me thinks that if we have some folks that can work/research leads in town, canvass MM employees (obviously with permission/help from MLPD). What I am getting at is covering the town and other possible "easy" entry points (e.g. road from Mammoth to Agnew).
Also, the Rite-Aid transaction, campground registry and the family access to Matts Hotmail account is bugging me a bit, especially after his friend just yesterday mentioned Matt often gets partners from forums. If he located a potential partner on one of those forums I would think the conversation went through PMs which in turn went to Matts email.
If they don't find Matt soon one window of opportunity might be the weekend of Sept 6 perhaps. MM is having the Kamikaze games so most all staff will be working. Wouldn't hurt to float pics and do a bit of canvassing.
Anyone have any thoughts??????
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SplitPants
Social climber
LA
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:41pm PT
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UPDATE FROM CRAGMAN/DEAN
"Beginning our decent. Feel we've achieved high POS......at least 70 percent. Wind is coming up again......completely brutal."
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LAhiker
Social climber
Los Angeles
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:42pm PT
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Regarding the Hotmail account, I gather it's the security questions that are the obstacle. (I'm assuming that this implies the password is known. It's possible that several tries at the password are what made the account start coughing up security questions.)
Two thoughts: might a slightly wider circle of friends of Matt be able to come up with the answers to those questions? Or can the family get some kind of injunction to get into the account?
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:47pm PT
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Updated Google Earth map. Closeup of my traverse from Cecile to Ritter.
Cragman is right on it. Added Red pin for the location of his pic "Looking down into the throat of the main gully below the glacier.....a treacherous place!!!!"
The gully is just to the right of the pin
EDIT: I hesitated adding my traverse route. I rate it a dangerous place even for experienced climbers. I'm sure Cragman will have more to post about it soon.
Awesome view from Cragman looking down the gully to Iceberg Lake. Chasm still full of snow/ice at its root. This didn't show in Tom Cochrane's aerial pics.
The steepness and height of the cliffs and the loose rubble all along that traverse are evident.
Note that there's another cliff band up and to the left, just past the long ridge coming down towards Iceberg.
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tdg119
Social climber
Northampton, PA
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:53pm PT
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Per Matts hotmail. the security question answer is an obvious one that anyone in the family would know. but for some strange reason its not working. we tried caps, etc...No way Microsoft will give us access without a subpoena. i have some friends that went to MIT, lets just say looked into it and came up empty. ~Ron
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SplitPants
Social climber
LA
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:54pm PT
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MGuzzy
Good thoughts 'Pants. I've wondered more than once if there is anyone local in MM that could be used to chase down leads. It seems they are mostly in the coulairs and pinnacles where I'd rather be.
Thanks. We are not "local" (though we used to live there.......LOL actually about 50 feet from the verizon center/tower on pinecrest. I often parked my truck there because the snow plows create large berms on that street in the winter blocking me from getting to the mountain lol).
We usually go up every other weekend for 3 days during the summer and every weekend in the winter. Sucks not living up there anymore. Part of me thinks that we need some representation for Matt in town that can research stuff and work with MLPD and also do some basic hiking on the trails leading up to the big stuff that cragman/dean and crew. Basically a small army of regular people that can handle the basics and hiking and checking trail heads. Really the best weather window is between now and mid Sept...been an unusually mild summer and in talking to my friends up there it is turning to an early fall.
Dunno. thoughts?
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
mammoth lakes ca
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:55pm PT
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The agnew road has plenty of places for a pedestrian to dodge cars and Matt would have seen headlights and heard any approaching car with time to sidestep..IMHO
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SplitPants
Social climber
LA
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Aug 26, 2013 - 03:56pm PT
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Ron
Per Matts hotmail. the security question answer is an obvious one that anyone in the family would know. but for some strange reason its not working. we tried caps, etc...No way Microsoft will give us access without a subpoena. i have some friends that went to MIT, lets just say looked into it and came up empty. ~Ron
Have you tried accessing the email account from Matt's computer at home or his work? The reason I am asking as browsers give users options to save their passwords. It is a long shot. There are other "alternatives" you could try. Also, have you asked MLPD if they can issue a search warrant to Microsoft (who owns Hotmail I believe)? With a valid search warrant I think you can get the information in about 48 hours or so.
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HighTraverse
Trad climber
Bay Area
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Aug 26, 2013 - 04:01pm PT
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Minarets area should be open into mid October. Storms before that might bring some snow but not likely too much for travel. Mid to late October is often the very best time in the High Sierra. IF you don't let a storm catch you. Then you could be in real trouble.
I might be able to get up there the weekend of 6 Sept to have a look around.
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