The National Park Service on Saturday identified the climbers and guide involved in this week's dramatic high-altitude rescue bid on Mount McKinley, North America's tallest peak.
Suffering frostbite to his hands, legs and face as well as a broken leg, Jeremiah O'Sullivan, 40, of Ballinhassig, Ireland, was pulled off the mountain at 19,500 feet on Thursday by helicopter pilot Andy Hermansky, who lowered a basket from 200 feet above the injured man while flying his Eurocopter AS-350 B3.
The rescue tied the highest ever by a helicopter in North America.
"It was a big deal," Hermansky said.
But a member of O'Sullivan's party, 38-year-old Beat Niederer of St. Gallen, Switzerland, died from unknown causes near 18,000 feet. Niederer's body was recovered late Thursday by helicopter.
On Friday afternoon, guide Dave Staeheli, 56, of Wasilla and client Lawrence Culter, 45, of Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y., were evacuated by helicopter. Both men suffered frostbite to their hands and feet after a night spent in brutally cold temperatures worsened by gusty winds.
Staeheli, who also broke a rib in a fall, is among Alaska's finest climbers. He works for the company Mountain Trip, and is renowned as the first climber, in March 1989, to complete a solo winter ascent of McKinley up the West Rib route.
In addition, Tony Diskin, 33, of Westmeath, Ireland, a climber who had turned back earlier before the four-man team made its summit bid, was evacuated from the National Park Service's camp at 14,200 feet on Thursday.
After being plucked off the upper reaches of McKinley, O'Sullivan dangled in a basket beneath a 125-foot rope as Hermansky eased down the mountain no faster than 1,000 feet a minute to ward off additional frostbite.
At the Kahiltna base camp at 7,200 feet, park service rangers transferred O'Sullivan to a waiting LifeMed air ambulance that flew him to an Anchorage hospital.
Only one other helicopter rescue in North American has been conducted as high as 19,500 feet. Hermansky's is the highest on Denali using the short-haul technique, the Park Service said.
Some 282 climbers have attempted to climb the 20,320-foot Mount McKinley so far this season, with eight reaching the summit.