Greg on the summit of Mt. Princeton, CO. Photo: G. Huey
Greg is an experienced mountaineer, and this was his third trip to the Alaska Range. He has extensive experience working and traveling in cold environments including Greenland and Antarctica. On his 2025 trip to the range, Greg decided to continue solo after his partner fell ill and flew back to Talkeetna.
Besides this early roadblock, Greg had an uneventful trip up the West Buttress to 14,200’. After acclimatizing and waiting out weather, he made the summit early in the morning on May 29.Three days later, he was evacuated from 14,200’ by the NPS.On July 7, he had three toes surgically amputated at UC Health in Denver.
Greg’s feet after surgical intervention in July 2025. Photo: G. Huey
Greg generously agreed to share his story in the hopes of educating other climbers and preventing future cases of frostbite.
Every year, an average of 10 cases of frostbite are reported to the NPS with varying levels of severity. At least one or two of these tend to be more serious cases that will eventually require surgery. We suspect that an even larger number of climbers sustain some level of frostbite and either don’t report it or don’t realize that they have it until they return to town and their tissues finish defrosting.
Frostbite is a difficult injury to see. People come to the Alaska Range because they love spending time outside, and many of them earn a living guiding and working in the outdoors. Cold injuries make this difficult or even impossible for months following the injury. Even mild frostbite takes a long time to heal and will require careful wound management from a patient for several months following the injury. Though it may not result in amputation, frostbite destroys the vasculature in your extremities, making management of cold hands and feet more labor-intensive in the future, and making you predisposed to further cases of frostbite. Not only can what seems like minor frostbite tank someone’s summer plans, it can make mountaineering difficult for years to come.
More severe frostbite can have life-changing effects. A patient must wait several months as their extremities heal to see what tissue is viable and what tissue is dead. At the end of this process, amputations of fingers and toes necessitate relearning how to walk or how to do everyday tasks once considered simple.
The people who get frostbite range from climbers brand new to high altitude mountaineering, to world class athletes and mountaineers. We expect to see it every year, and generally can anticipate the conditions in which people will sustain severe frostbite: calm, clear periods with cold temperatures and high winds. Especially following periods of unsettled weather, people may be willing to push conditions in which it’d be wiser to wait, particularly if they are nearing the end of their trip. They may not know what to be on the lookout for, or may simply ignore numb extremities in the hopes that they will warm up if they continue climbing.
Greg left 14,200’ around 3 pm on May 28. He was solo, feeling good, and excited to head up and explore the mountain and see how far he got—he didn’t have any particular intention to go summit. He wrote of his trip:
“It was a beautiful sunset from 17 camp, and I didn’t decide to go higher until my teammate at home sent me the all clear for the weather report. I was definitely the only person above 14K at this point.
“Right then I should have put on my big socks and overboots that were in my pack. I never did that, because later it would have meant getting my hands real cold.Greg “summit[ted] at 4am – I lingered up there for a long time, euphoric. [I had n]o sense of urgency and later on wandered all around Archdeacons and Zebra Rocks, meandering down the mountain....at 17 camp....[I] had breakfast. Again, no sense of urgency.
”As for his feet, “I can’t tell you when they froze or thawed – they were cold but the rest of me was fine so I shrugged it off. There was no pain ever, and I didn’t know anything was wrong until I got to camp and took off my socks.... [there was n]o pain in the freezing process. I thought there were more significant indications, but either I’m just tough/dumb, or the signs are less severe than I expected.”
Seeing Greg’s feet in the med tent at 14,200’ after his climb, it was immediately clear that he had serious frostbite that would likely require eventual surgical intervention. As with any frostbite patient, we examined all of his extremities and took about thirty minutes to finish thawing out his toes in a water bath. After you do this, a clear line of demarcation will appear between injured and uninjured tissue, and you start to get a sense of what a patient’s next few months will look like.
The demarcation between healthy and injured tissue clearly visible after a warm water bath. Photo: G. Huey
Greg had this line on four of his toes—the big and “index” toes on both feet. He had Grade 3 frostbite on his big toes (frozen to the bone closest his foot), and Grade 2 on his index toes (frozen to the middle of the toe). Grade 3 puts you at a high risk of amputation.
Greg’s feet in the hospital post-evacuation, about 5 days after injury. Photo: G. Huey
As a provider, it is always hard to see this line show up. We know pretty immediately that the patient is in for a long road of doctor’s appointments, wound care, staying off their feet, not being able to use their hands, and eventual surgery. While there are some treatments that may improve a patient’s prognosis, there is no magic wand that will truly make dead tissue come back to life. Once someone’s fingers or toes are frozen, they are frozen.
Several times, I have sat with patients over several days while we’ve been unable to fly them out due to weather. I’ve watched them process their injury, moving from a space of jubilation and triumph from reaching the highest point in North America, to trying to wrap their mind around the fact that they have sustained an irrevocable injury, and that they will be navigating the rest of their lives with amputations.
Debridement of dead tissue a few weeks after the injury. Photo: G. Huey
Many people, like Greg, process this challenging reality with the same positive mindset and problem-solving attitude that got them to the top of the mountain in the first place: ok, this is where we are now, what are we going to do about it next? I’ve really appreciated staying in touch with Greg as he goes through the healing process. Almost a year later, he wrote about enjoying his first powder day without his big toes at Alyeska.As we head into the high-altitude climbing season, we have already seen a climber from the Ruth Glacier who has sustained severe frostbite and may need surgical intervention. It seems inconceivable that we won’t see more from the West Buttress.
Necrotic tissue prior to amputation. Photo: G. Huey
Please don’t let that person be you. Don’t ignore cold or numbness in your extremities, and make conservative decisions as you head up higher on the mountain. While we are always excited to meet and get to know fellow climbers up on the mountain, we prefer these meetings to be outside the med tent.