Wyoming guide whose father died on the Grand Teton, believed to have died on the Nepalese peak

From Angus M. Thuermer Jr.

Talented Wyoming guide Michael Gardner, who honed his world-class mountaineering skills in the Tetons, is missing from a Himalayan peak and presumed dead. Gardner’s father, also a legendary mountaineer, died in a fall from the Grand Teton in 2008.

According to alpine news sites, friends and employers, Gardner fell earlier this week while attempting to climb Jannu East, a 24,501-foot peak in eastern Nepal. A French team retreating from the north face of the unclimbed peak saw Gardner’s partner Sam Hennessey alone on the face and waving on Monday, Explorersweb and AlpineMag reported.

Hennessey told the French climbers that Gardner had fallen, news outlets reported. The three Frenchmen and Hennessey then rappelled together 2,300 feet to the bottom of the rock face, where they found articles of clothing but no sign of Gardner.

Gardner, 32, lost his father, a guide with Exum Mountain Guides, in an accident on the Grand Teton in 2008. George Gardner of Ridgway, Colo., was 58 when he set off up the Lower, alone and without a rope Climb Exum Ridge.

Search workers found his body the next day. The cause of his fatal fall remains unknown.

Michael Gardner was 16 years old at the time, but his father’s death did not stop him from climbing and skiing in the mountains, and he also became a mountain guide in Exum. “His training as a mountain guide began informally with his first mountaineering trips at the age of eight with his father, making him one of the youngest mountain guides in the United States,” says his biography on the Exum Mountain Guides website.

However, his talent extended beyond a series of outstanding alpine achievements in North America, Antarctica and the Himalayas. Friends said he had a flair for connecting with customers, a skill that served him well in the 150 climbs of the 13,775-foot Grand Teton.

“He smiled no matter how busy it was,” said Dan Corn, another Teton guide. “He just had the ability to connect with people on an equal level [that] I don’t think many people did that.”

Life changed suddenly

News of Michael Gardner’s fall shocked the mountain community of Teton.

“Our lives changed in an instant,” said Renny Jackson, a former Grand Teton National Park climbing ranger and Exum guide who climbed several routes with Gardner. He, Gardner and Jackson’s daughter Jane had shared the ropes at Triple Direct on El Capitan in Yosemite and the North Ridge of Grand Teton.

Jane Jackson traveled to Kathmandu, Nepal, this week with Gardner’s friend Elena Hight, an Olympic snowboarder, to deal with the loss, Renny Jackson said Thursday. Plans are underway for a search or other effort in the remote Kanchenjunga region of eastern Nepal, he said.

Hight opened up about the couple’s too-short love on Wednesday in an Instagram post addressed to Michael but visible to the world. Belonged to you, she said: “[a] Kind of love that felt so true and real and otherworldly. I have often asked with complete sincerity, “Where are you from?”

“All the beautiful memories we made will keep me going for now,” she wrote. “Light up Mikey.”

Alpinists knew Gardner for his courageous climbs, rounding out a list of great peaks: an ascent and descent of Mount Foraker in Alaska; a quick climb of the south face of nearby Denali; and even a “backyard” climbing and skiing tour of seven Teton peaks that covers 24 miles and 20,670 feet of elevation gain in 20 hours and 15 minutes.

“He almost preferred to be identified as a skateboarder first,” said Chris Figenshau, another Exum guide. Figenshau told Gardner that Figenshau’s son was learning to skate, and Gardner offered to help.

“Of course, Michael Gardner came shirtless and dominated,” Figenshau said of a day at the skate park. “He kind of hung out with my kid — just because.”

His tour guide colleague Corn was also impressed by Gardner’s driving brilliance. “When he was on a skateboard, the world stopped for him,” Corn said.

Unfathomable

Friends said Gardner wasn’t a brooding fame-seeker who carried banners to peaks, but he was famous among alpinists. He lived at the foot of the Tetons, had an address above the range in Idaho, and was from his family’s hometown of Ridgway, Colorado.

His father oversaw Corn’s development as an Exum leader. When George Gardner died at the Grand, “Michael and I became close friends,” Corn said.

“I tried to be kind of an older brother — whatever you can be to someone who has lost their father,” Corn said. But soon the younger group of climbers, including Michael Gardner, “exceeded everything your generation had done,” Corn said.

“This is tough for us at Exum,” Corn said of the loss. “I just can’t imagine what his family is going through.

“You shouldn’t have to bury your husband – and your son – in the same way.”

Michael Gardner is survived by his mother, Colleen, and his sister, Megan.

“I saw him climbing in Squamish,” Corn said of their last meeting. “I have to hug him. He was on his way to Nepal.”

This article was originally published by WyoFile and is republished here with permission. WyoFile is an independent, nonprofit news organization focused on people, places and politics in Wyoming.

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