Deadly peakbagging

I just read on the Net something that could interest peakbaggers and mountaineers on this board:

Patrick Berhault, a French alpinist who tried to break a new speed record for the Alp's 82 summits above 4000 meters, killed himself in the Mischabel group (a five-summit chunk of mountains in the Swiss alps) yesterday. He was walking on an arete at 4400m when a cornice broke. He was not roped.

Patrick was at #66 in his quest when he died.

RIP. That is some bad news!

He knew the risks he was taking and died doing something he loved. While an untimely death is always tragic, he left on his terms. I respect him for that.

If he was taking risks in order to gain speed and break some record then his death is a useless tragedy that serves no purpose and devastates his loved ones. Oh well...

Couldn't help but notice:

Meo said:

. . . killed himself . . . yesterday. He was walking on an arete at 4400m when a cornice broke. He was not roped. . . .

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Interesting phraseology there, don't you think?

G.

Yeah, I wasn't sure what Meo meant by that. Je pense que mon Francais n'est pas parfait!


spencer

Whatever Meo meant by that, his translation of the French-language news article is correct. "L'alpiniste français Patrick Berhault s'est tué à 47 ans sur l'arête nord du Täschhorn en Valais." I don't think we should read anything into the use of the reflexive verb form.

By the way, M. Berhault was an exponent of free climbing who then turned to mountaineering.

http://www.hispeed.ch/fr/information/nachrichtendetails.htm?MessageId=30&Channel=1

(Quote) "He knew the risks he was taking and died doing something he loved"

Never could understand that sentiment.

Tell you what folks, I'd rather not die doing something I love. I'd rather finish.

Frankly, I'd rather die doing something that I really hate doing. One, I wouldn't know anyway and, two, instead of my family saying "isn't that a shame that he didn't finish that hike that he really wanted to do", they could say "boy, I bet he's glad he got out of that".

Wouldn't want my survivors to have bad memories about something that I loved to do.

Cliches are useless which is why so many people use them (to avoid having to face the harsh reality that the man died well before 'his time')

While no death is welcome, I certainly learned something from his (and ultimately he did too).

Bottom line -- he should have been roped...

While I agree that chasing numbers/stats is useless, it mayhave been the excuse to keep him going outdoors. I often find my trek for 46 to help me make it to the top (but not if I feel in danger, just when I feel defeated physically/mentally).

el-bagr said:

Whatever Meo meant by that, his translation of the French-language news article is correct. "L'alpiniste français Patrick Berhault s'est tué à 47 ans sur l'arête nord du Täschhorn en Valais." I don't think we should read anything into the use of the reflexive verb form.

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Actually the phrase “killed himself” is an old-fashion and now seldom used expression (in English) to describe a circumstance in which the victim’s demise came as a result of his own action or behavior. It is used rarely now, probably because the expression appears to be “judgemental” in assigning responsibility. But it is a phrase my parents would have used in the context of this story without batting an eye. “Back when” this particular phrase did not necessarily connote or imply deliberate intent on the part of the victim.

I interpreted the phrase in its traditional way and thought it quite appropriate but unusual enough to warrant a remark.

G.

As usual, Grumpy comes through. Thanks for that interesting tidbit.

spencer

el-bagr said:

"L'alpiniste français Patrick Berhault s'est tué"

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It's a translation issue. "s'est tué" can mean both "died" (accidentally as opposed to from an illness) and "killed himself".

Mad Townie the Franco-Mainer

Mad Townie said:

It's a translation issue. "s'est tué" can mean both "died" (accidentally as opposed to from an illness) and "killed himself".

Mad Townie the Franco-Mainer

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My French-Canadian speaking wife says that "s'est tue" means he was killed, not killed himslef. Killed himself would be "y sa tue."

Frosty

My 2 soles

"s'est tué" can best be translated as "killed himself". The reason is in the "s'", which points to the subject, the self. If it would have been written "est mort", then died would have been the correct translation. In any case, it does not make any difference as to the end status.

Frosty, "y sa" is simply the French Canadian pronunciation of "il s'est", so we agree. The French Canadian pronunciation of "tué" would be something like "tsué".

There are lots more examples, and different French dialects (even within Canada and the US) can feature vastly different pronunciations. Think London English vs. San Antonio English vs. downeast Maine English.

Mad Townie said:

Frosty, "y sa" is simply the French Canadian pronunciation of "il s'est", so we agree. The French Canadian pronunciation of "tué" would be something like "tsué".

There are lots more examples, and different French dialects (even within Canada and the US) can feature vastly different pronunciations. Think London English vs. San Antonio English vs. downeast Maine English.

Click to expand...

Tell me about it. My high school French is worthless in her family. For some reason, when they talk aobut Shepard's Pie in English, they say "Chinese Pie" and her father called her something that translates into cabbage head, which was a term of endearment.

Frosty

I have a good story:

I was about 13, visiting Montreal for the first time. My father, who was a high school French teacher, was talking to a man on the subway... commenting on the difference between the French he taught and Canadian French. The man said that he had just come back from a vacation in France. When checking into the hotel, he obviously spoke French. The girl behind the desk had a hard time understanding him, so he spoke slower. Still confused, she asked him, "Do you speak English?".

Well, back to the thread... I guess if anything positive comes from this, it's that no one else died in the accident. I don't know if he had a family but I bet he did. To me it's selfish to do something risky and stupid like that and leave a void in the family. This is a reason why I don't ice or rock climb. Accidents are more prone to happen in these pursuits and the last thing I would want is to leave my kids without a father while I was off pleasing myself... just my .02

Risks

Jason, allow me to disagree. According to this winter's statistics, winter hiking in New England is way more dangerous than ice climbing.

Stats show rock climbing actually causes largest # of injuries

Check out:

http://www.bml.umn.edu/~peter/climbing/ANAM/ANAM.html

By clicking on the various choices you can graph the data by type of terrain, cause etc.

I was surprised that most accidents were on the ascent. But if you include rock and ice climbing I guess that would be so.