Mountaineer on the mend

R.J. Secor is hiking again after Mt. Baldy accident

Reprinted with permission from the Arroyo View, the newsletter of the Pasadena Group.

Mountain climber and author R.J. Secor is famous for his classic guide book, The High Sierra: Peaks, Passes, and Trails; his climbing guides for Aconcagua, Denali, and the volcanoes of Mexico; and internationally for his mountaineering exploits around the world.

Now he can add another remarkable achievement: his recovery from an uncontrolled slide 1,200 feet down Baldy Bowl on April 16, 2005.

photo by Bob Cates R.J. Secor with his mother Leta Secor at the recent Sierra Peaks Section's 50th Anniversary Banquet.

Secor doesn't remember much about that day. He knows that he drove to Mt. Baldy and hiked up to the Sierra Club's Ski Hut and then hiked up the bowl toward the summit. He spoke to people who remember him there, but he has no memory of leaving the summit. Skiers, snowboarders, and other mountaineers were at the bowl that day, taking advantage of a favorite local slope to practice their skills.

Witnesses saw Secor don glissading pants, start down the slope in the classic sitting glissade position, and then lose control of his speed. He was not wearing a helmet. Using his ice ax, he tried to self-arrest but was unable to slow down. He hit some rocks and rolled to the bottom, ending his slide close to the ski hut where he was treated immediately by ski patrollers and a trauma nurse who luckily were on site.

He was still conscious and speaking on the helicopter ride to a local hospital and then ambulance ride to Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Hollywood. He was found to have a broken shoulder blade, broken ribs, and skull fractures, and spent months in the intensive care unit, fighting episodes of low blood pressure and pneumonia.

Friends who visited Secor in those first weeks were shocked to see him weak and thin, heavily sedated, on a ventilator to reduce the pressure on his brain, and unable to speak or recognize them.

But he remained in stable condition and needed no operations. Slowly he began to recover. Friends put up posters of his favorite mountains on the walls-Mt. Whitney, Aconcagua. He remembers 'waking up' in Kaiser's Northridge hospital in the summer, spending a few weeks in a nursing facility for physical rehabilitation, and finally returning to his home in Pasadena at the end of August.

Secor, 49, began his first walks around the block, but kept looking from his house up toward the Mt. Wilson Toll Road to Henninger Flats in the Angeles National Forest, a hike he has done more than 2,000 times. Now he is hiking the road again, four miles round-trip with a 1,200 foot elevation gain.

Secor has his driver's license again, and is working on the third edition of his High Sierra guidebook. He plans to return to the Mt. Baldy Ski Hut this winter, where he expects to be the hut host the first weekend of March. He welcomes visitors to hike up to see him there.