Photo By John Pennell | Staff Sgt. Joshua Sedivy poses with the peak of Mount McKinley looming in the...... read more read more
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FORT WAINWRIGHT, Alaska - According to Staff Sgt. Joshua Sedivy, and infantryman and instructor at the Northern Warfare Training Center, hunting, fishing and doing things outdoors is the way to go.
Sedivy, a South Sioux City, Neb., native, said he joined the Army to go to war and to fight for his country.
He said he joined the NWTC after a deployment because wanted to continue working in the outdoors and he said he didn’t want to “get stuck in an office.”
Sedivy’s love of the outdoors and the training at the NWTC will now be put to the test.
This month he and several other Fort Wainwright soldiers set out to conquer one of the largest mountains any of them ever attempted.
Eight NWTC staff members and soldiers from the 1st Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 25th Infantry Division, will attempt to summit North America’s highest peak, Mount McKinley, also known as Denali.
The team started the train up for the climb in back in February.
“We’ve been doing a lot of movements and (utilizing different) camping techniques,” said Sedivy. “Everything becomes harder in the cold and more so at extreme altitudes.”
With each team member carrying nearly 140 pounds of equipment either on their back or in their individual ahkio sled, Sedivy said they would cache items no longer needed along the way to the top and retrieve them on the way down.
“We are taking enough for three weeks with a little bit in reserve,” he said. “When we get up to a certain point where the skis are no longer effective, (they) will get cached at camp and we will continue on with crampons and boots.”
“Crampons are basically ice cleats with an inch or so long spike to allow you to gain traction on ice and snow, “he said.
“We must be extremely efficient with everything from moving gear on skis to setting up a safe campsite to melting snow and boiling it,” he added.
Even with all the vigorous training, Sedivy said he expects the climb to be challenging. He said the most challenging are combating the weather, altitude adjustments and just pure mental and physical exhaustion.
Sedivy said his plan for overcoming each challenge was to “just deal with it and keep going.”
“I like the cold,” he said.
Sedivy said he heard it takes 12 days to reach the top with good weather.
“(The weather is) what stops most people from being able to get up there,” Sedivy said. “As long as the weather holds we’ll be fine.”
| Date Taken: | 06.06.2013 |
| Date Posted: | 06.13.2013 19:09 |
| Story ID: | 108637 |
| Location: | FORT WAINWRIGHT, ALASKA, US |
| Hometown: | SOUTH SIOUX CITY, NEBRASKA, US |
| Web Views: | 112 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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