Thursday, April 3, 2008

Moonlight Buttress Free Solo

I heard this afternoon that Moonlight Buttress in Zion had been free-soloed by Alex Honnold. Very impressive and very dangerous. 13a and much 12 on friable sandstone. No doubt Climbing will have more on this very soon.

My piece about climbing past 40 is up at FRB. You can find it here.

(I want to add that the source for the Moonlight Buttress story is very reliable but it is still unconfirmed by other sources.

For a topo of this incredible route go here.)

7 comments:

luke said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
luke said...

Great article!

It really applies to climbing past 20 as well as 40.

Peter Beal said...

Momentum Video has posted this news as well as people at Mountain Project, including Chris Wiedner who knows Alex well.

Luke,
Thanks for the positive feedback concerning the FRB article

Adam said...

this is perhaps the greatest feat in rock climbing since...

Peter Beal said...

It's hard to say exactly but it's definitely up there. The audacity of the climb is difficult to comprehend. Alex Huber's 2002 solo ascent of the Brandler-Hasse Diretissima, a 1500 feet 12a, and HansJorg Auer's 2007 ascent of Via attraverso il Pesce on the south face of the Marmolada, a 3000 feet 12c, are certainly in there.

Peter Beal said...

And also Michael Reardon on Romantic Warrior (V 12b) in 2005

Peter Beal said...

The Alpinist website has the full story at last..