When I first saw these photos, I thought, "These are nice photos of a crevasse. Someone has been lowered down into the crevasse and has taken a wonderful artistic photo of the view looking up." Little did I know that these were photos of the crevasse that almost ate the Rupley family. John had taken the photo looking up after he had fallen into the crevasse and almost drug Ila and their son Eric down into it.
From the interview with John and Ila:
"John fell into a crevasse seriously in Alaska. Our son Eric and I were both on the rope. We were pulled flat and went skidding along. Because the rope sawed into the edge, Eric stopped about 3 feet from the crevasse Lucky, as John had not hit bottom. There was a large man on a second rope who came back to help get John out.
After I initially posted the photos of the crevasse, Ila sent me an e-mail with additional descriptions of the photos:
"That Mt. Bona crevasse is the one John fell into pulling Eric and me along until the rope sawed into the edge enough to stop him. I thought it was 'cool' of John to take photos before starting to prusik up. He couldn't see the actual bottom. The extra rope going down is the 'rescue' line, thrown in for him to prusik on. "
I would have to agree with Ila. It is incredibly 'cool' to be able to take a 75 foot fall into a crevasse and have the nerve to pull out the camera and take a photo. It says a lot about John.
