Rescue of 25 yr old at Upper Bridal Veil Falls

[Iceaxe]

from Ed & Jeanie Baker

As we watched the 10 o'clock news last night and heard about the location of the ongoing search and rescue at Upper Bridal Veil Falls in Provo Canyon we feared that our son might be involved, especially when we were unable to reach him on his cell phone or at work. We left messages for Rob to call us no matter what time he picked up the message. I finally dozed off about 1am. I

[Iceaxe]

Dear Friends,

I want to express my appreciation for your prayers and support for Jon's climbing accident. Here is an update on his condition:

Jon was released from the University of Utah hospital for the Memorial Day weekend on Friday May 26th in stable condition to wait for the swelling to recede before surgery on Tuesday May 30th. The orthopedic surgeons determined that the puncture into his patella should heal without surgery. He was scheduled for facial reconstructive surgery at 3pm. The surgeons expected to spend 5-6 hours reconstructing the bones in his face and about 30 minutes cleaning up his left wrist. He didn't get out of surgery until nearly 2am. He has about 6 metal brackets and lots of screws holding the cheek bones and jaws back together. One fracture that separated the roof of his mouth and teeth from his upper jaw miraculously went above the roots of all his teeth. The surgeons repaired the nerves and wired his jaws shut and believe that everything will heal properly.

When they started cleaning up his left wrist they found a piece of slate embedded into the nerve bundle and the carpal tunnel was partially crushed. They spent almost 3 hours working on his hand and were able to repair all of the tendons and nerves to the fingers. The primary nerve to the thumb had nearly 2" completely crushed. The surgeon had to remove the crushed section and bend the hand as close to the wrist as possible to connect the two good ends of the main nerve. They expect that Jon may regain partial feeling in his palm and thumb, but it is going to take a long course of physical therapy to restore mobility to his hand and especially his thumb.

Yesterday afternoon Jon was moved from the Surgical Intensive Care Unit to a regular bed in the hospital. If everything continues normally he should be out of the hospital by the weekend.
Having seen where and how Jon fell, I believe that it is a miracle he is alive. If he had landed on the back or side of his head instead of taking the brunt of the impact on his face he probably wouldn't have survived. The fact that the search and rescue team had two EMT-I's to stabilize him for the six hour extraction was a real blessing. Combine that with superb surgeons at an excellent trauma center and you know the someone is watching out for him. His new nickname is "Gumby".

I've had time to review the entire episode with my son, Rob. Jon made a serious mistake by unclipping from the belay line before he was safe and secure at or above his belayer. They all made a mistake of climbing without a helmet. However, Rob did a good rapid assessment with basic first aid at the scene before going down the mountain to lead the Search and Rescue team back up. He told me that he was calm and knew what to do from our practice and medical discussions at home. You never know how much your children are learning at home especially from practice assessments for OEC (Outdoor Emergency Care) Refreshers.

Thanks again for all your support!

Ed & Jeanie Baker