The Falling Season: Inside the Life and Death Drama of Aspen's Mountain Rescue Team

In The Falling Season, Clifford opens a window on the cliquish world of the "adrenaline junkies" drawn to the dangerous and heroic work of mountain rescue and offers first-hand accounts of actual emergencies. "I keep climbing, up toward a pile of rocks that is the 12,430-foot summit. I look up again and see a body, 50 yards ahead. It is lying head downhill, face turned up to the sky...." In crafting his story, Clifford reconstructs tension-filled events and mixes them with a chronicle of the team's long and colorful history. He focuses on the formerly unfettered group's ongoing struggle with the constraints of a litigious society, increased media exposure, and ballooning government bureaucracy. He attempts journalistic impartiality, but his personal involvement and emotional attachment show through, giving the story a powerful sense of urgency. Clifford possesses the technical skills, conditioning, and experience it takes to belong in Mountain Rescue-Aspen; fortunately for the reader, he happens to be a compelling writer as well. --George Laney

Product Description
An inside view of the dangers, emotions, and politics of a mountain rescue group, detailing what it is like to be on a rescue and covering one of the most publicized mountain rescue operations of the decade: Express Creek.

In an engrossing read, Hal Clifford takes you behind the scenes of Aspen's mountain rescue squad. This isn't simply a journalist's view, Clifford had to join the team to get his story.

In The Falling Season you'll be introduced to people from all walks of life who bond into extraordinary teams and who, on a moment's notice, will put themselves directly in harm's way to save you in the mountains. The season Clifford covers was a time of great change in the Aspen team, and he writes about the cohesiveness and the conflict with balanced insight. In a series of incisively written stories, he discusses some particularly difficult rescues; the death of one of their own; the Sheriff's attempts to control their operations; and a dramatic rescue operation that made national news for three days. Clifford gets you inside a mountain rescue team you won't soon forget.

I also think that he portrays a realistic look at the tensions that arise between the NEEDED paramilitary Sheriffs department and the free-spirited rescuers. The facts are that the SAR Teams are going to become more and more under the direct aegis of the Sheriff departments. That means more liability issues will be raised and in turn more Certifications will be needed to be a member of any SAR team. While this may be a noble objective it also had the direct dilemma of ostracizing the competent members on any SAR team. I have seen it happen, so sometimes the net result is a SAR team will lose some competent people only to be replaced by individuals that have passed the minimum sheriffs department certifications. While technically these individuals are qualified to perform a rescue they are as inept as any mountain neophyte is and in most cases a liability to the team. But this is the wave of the future and a reason why the author sees SAR teams being staffed only by paid people.

One caveat for the any Non SAR person. This book does glamorize the work and makes it seem as non-stop action. I understand that the book has to do this otherwise it would be a bore to read. But real SAR work can be tedious and hard, no limelight, many days spent traipsing through buckthorn or on the side of some rattlesnake-infested ridge. You will come home on many days, dirty and tired, with fresh scrapes on your hands and faces oozing blood, just wondering just why you were assigned to search that area? But in the end it's always worth it.


The Soap Opera   August 3, 2001
 2 out of 3 found this review helpful

This book starts with a great, well painted rescue. Most of the remainder of the book then focuses on the egos and personal conflicts of the team and sheriff. "He said this and she said that and I said this." As a member of a busy SAR team, I was amazed at (and saddened by) how poorly the team and Sheriff got along. I also question the pseudo-conclusion that rescue teams will become paid services.

If you are looking for insight into the personal relationships the make up a rescue community, you will like this book.


Good read, but a few inaccuracies   July 6, 2001
 1 out of 1 found this review helpful

I read this book when it first came out. As someone who's familiar with Aspen's team, and who's been involved in mountain search and rescue in Colorado for many years, I found Hal's book to paint a pretty good picture of what it's like to be involved in mountain rescue work.

However, like a previous reviewer, I feel it's rather arrogant. Hal pumps-up Aspen's team while putting down other agencies, and I feel there are some questionable comments in the book related to this. There are many fine EMS agencies and rescue teams in Colorado (..and elsewhere) of the same caliber as Aspen's team. This book should have been more humble in that regard.

Otherwise, I recommend it for anyone interested in this topic.


An excellent account of the operation of SAR   July 16, 2000
 4 out of 4 found this review helpful

Tha Falling Season gives readers an inside look at the operations of one of America's best rescue teams, Aspen Mountain Rescue. This fast paced book also lets us inside the personal lives of several key team members and shows us the triumphs and conflict that inevitably exist in such groups. Truly an excellent book for anyone interested in search and rescue and outdoor sports or mountaineering.


the "art" of integrity is almost lost, but Hal found some   January 9, 2000
 2 out of 2 found this review helpful

in Search and Rescue and this could have been any SAR team, any County, USA. The general press gets us wrong every time but Hal got it right. Thank you for a sometimes tearful, often funny and believable read of one of the many sides of a multi-faceted SAR team. PS: the past pres. should get over it!