Harrowing Yosemite effort at crisis point for 2nd climber

Tommy Caldwell hangs suspended in mid-air while using a video camera to document his and climbing partner Kevin Jorgenson's ascent of the Dawn Wall of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, California, on Saturday, January 3, 2015. less Tommy Caldwell hangs suspended in mid-air while using a video camera to document his and climbing partner Kevin Jorgenson's ascent of the Dawn Wall of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park, California, on ... more Photo: Corey Rich/Aurora Photos Photo: Corey Rich/Aurora Photos Image 1 of / 8 Caption Close Harrowing Yosemite effort at crisis point for 2nd climber 1 / 8 Back to Gallery

The harrowing attempt to scale the smoothest, steepest cliff in Yosemite has become a grueling struggle with pain, cold, fatigue and the human will.

Climbers Tommy Caldwell of Colorado and Kevin Jorgeson of Santa Rosa were more than halfway through their grueling attempt to free-climb the Dawn Wall on Yosemite’s El Capitan Thursday, but the effort has now reached a crisis point.

The assault on the southeast face of El Capitan is being called the “climb of the century,” and for Jorgeson at least, it is living up to the moniker.

Caldwell has climbed past the impossibly blank, vertical 14th, 15th and 16th pitches, which are generally considered the hardest sections, and now seems poised, given his tremendous ability, to cruise to the top. Jorgeson, however, has stalled on 15 and is now engaged in a man-against-nature struggle that has mesmerized the climbing world.

'New levels of patience’

By Thursday morning, Jorgeson had made four attempts and fallen four times, the last time ripping the athletic tape and remaining skin off his fingers trying to hold onto a tiny, razor-sharp edge.

“My battle with Pitch 15 continues. After 6 years of work, my Dawn Wall quest comes down to sending this pitch,” Jorgeson wrote Wednesday on Facebook and Instagram, using “send” as climber lingo for a successful effort. “Last night, I experienced a lightness and calm like never before. Despite failing, it will always be one of my most memorable climbing experiences.

“As disappointing as this is, I’m learning new levels of patience, perseverance and desire,” the climber added. “I'm not giving up. I will rest. I will try again. I will succeed.”

Worldwide interest

Caldwell, whose left index finger was sawed off in an accident several years ago, and Jorgeson have endured icy-cold nights since Dec. 27 trying to complete what climbing aficionados say is the hardest big-wall free climb that has ever been attempted.

The feat requires the two men to clamber up the immense 3,000-foot-high granite face using only their hands and feet, with ropes and anchoring devices only to catch them when they fall. The two men cannot go down until the 32 pitches, which can be as long as 150 feet, are completed in sequence, according to free-climbing protocol. The climbers have to go back to the belay, or anchor point, and do the entire pitch over when they fall, which is often. After climbing each day, they sleep in slings on hanging portaledges in below-freezing temperatures, sometimes dodging chunks of ice tumbling from above.

The two men are essentially doing pull-ups with their fingertips wedged in cracks the size of credit cards, with the sharp edges often cutting through the skin. The footholds are mere indentations on glacier-polished granite.

“This climb has sparked the interest of climbers all over the world,” said Tom Evans, a photographer who follows El Cap climbers with telescopes and is writing about the Dawn Wall attempt on his blog, ElCap Reports. “To do this climb in this manner was considered impossible right up until this day and just may turn out to be impossible.”

Jorgeson is in the middle of the most technically difficult section, a sideways traverse to the right of the famous Nose route on the prow of the monstrous granite rock. His nemesis has been what are called “crux holds.”

Ignoring intense pain

Caldwell posted a photograph online of Jorgeson clinging with just his fingertips to this crux, which is literally just a flake of sharp rock. The awkward climbing maneuver — which requires immense strength and the ability to ignore intense pain — makes it look like Jorgeson is trying to play a piano in the air instead of hold up his entire weight.

The holds on Pitch 15 are “some of the smallest and sharpest holds I have ever attempted to hold onto,” wrote Caldwell, who knows what Jorgeson is suffering through. It is “crazy to think that the skin on our fingertips could be the limiting fact toward success or failure.”

Caldwell has now completed Pitch 20, and was planning Friday to assist Jorgeson and provide moral support in his crux hold struggle.

“What they are doing is really, really hard. It’s so hard that it is difficult for even climbers to grasp,” said Alex Honnold, of Sacramento, who is famous for climbing without ropes or protection, called free soloing.

Nevertheless, he said, Caldwell seems to be on a roll. “It seems like it’s pretty much a sure thing for Tommy, barring something crazy happening,” Honnold said.

Evans said: “One of the most important things on this kind of climb is for the climbers to be determined and have the tenacity to face failure on a daily basis and still continue with a positive attitude. Plus they must be compatible and able to spend long stretches of time in very close quarters and still maintain their psyche and sense of humor.”

Unseasonably warm weather had recently forced the two men to climb mostly at night, when they aren’t likely to sweat and the rubber on their shoes sticks better to the rock. It is tough on the hundreds of spectators and media because it is apparently much colder thousands of feet down in Yosemite Valley.

Peter Fimrite is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: pfimrite@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @pfimrite