Climbing and Outdoor News from Here and Abroad - 1/10/13

Northwest:

--A 43-year-old Oklahoma man was killed after he fell off a cliff at the Whistler Ski Resort. To read more, click here.

Sierra:

--On Friday the National Park Service elected to limit the number of Half Dome Hikers. The new plan will limit the number that uses the metal cables on the "standard route" to the top to 300 a day. To read more, click here.

Colorado:

--Vail Resorts claims that a teenagers own negligence lead to his death in an avalanche last year on Vail Mountain. Taft Conlin was 13 when an avalanche on Prima Cornice killed him. His parents sued the ski company claiming that the resort created an "avalanche trap" which killed him. To read more, click here.

--Neptune Mountaineering, the iconic climbing shop in Boulder, Colorado, has been sold to Backwoods. Neptune will keep its name and its very cool climbing museum. To read more, click here.

Alaska:

--Arctic explorer, Lonnie Dupree, has just embarked on his third attempt to climb Denali in the winter. Dupree flew onto the glacier earlier this week. To read more, click here.

--The United States Senate recently approved a bill that would allow a natural gas pipeline to be built in Denali National Park. The pipeline will have right-of-way passage through the park for seven miles along the Parks Highway. To read more, click here.

--The State of Alaska has postponed decisions regarding helicopter ski operations in South Central Alaska. To read more, click here.

Notes from All Over:

--Not much good can be said about Tropical Storm Irene. The storm damaged infrastructure throughout the east.  But as climbers and skiers know, storms do interesting things in the mountains. They often cause landslides and blowdown, things that can lead to good skiing once snow covered. Check out this article on the aftermath of the storm.

--The American Alpine Club has announced the winners of the Lyman Spitzer Cutting Edge awards for completing difficult new alpine routes. To read the list, click here.

--So there was this guy who fell walking up low-angle ice above an ice route he just led who slid back over the edge of the climb, taking a eighty-foot fall...! And he walked away completely uninjured to tell the story. Check it out, here.

--Relatives of a five-year-old girl killed at a Wyoming ski area are suing. They claim that the 23-year-old man who collided with the child and her mother was intoxicated and should have been removed from the hill. To read more, click here.

--This is a terrifying story about some climbers attacked in Peru while camping...

--Search crews rescued two skiers after one was partially buried in an avalanche on Tuesday in Glacier National Park. To read more, click here.