FARMINGTON -- A weary Keith McPheeters returned to Farmington from Anchorage, Alaska, Tuesday evening. McPheeters weighed 14 pounds less than when he started the attempted ascent of Denali earlier this month, but clearly was still exhilarated by the effort.

After personally advancing to 17,389 feet in the group attempt to reach the 20,320 summit of Denali in the Denali National Park, Alaska, McPheeters is glad to be back and is looking forward to a few days of relaxation with his family.

Severe weather conditions forced the expedition to abandon their efforts. McPheeters, 35, a
sergeant with the Farmington Police Department, said the group couldn't see a window of
opportunity to reach the summit due to severe weather conditions. McPheeters credited his fellow
climber, Kent O'Donnell, a Farmington firefighter, with doing "an outstanding job" during the climbing effort. "He (O'Donnell) went above and beyond," McPheeters said.

"Kent was suffering dehydration from an intestinal infection and also from altitude sickness,"
McPheeters said. The danger of cerebral edema developing into a possible coma is very real and
can occur very rapidly under such conditions, according to McPheeters.

McPheeters went to add that the physical conditions of climbing at that altitude are quite severe.
"You wake up with a pounding headache at those altitudes, and your heart rate may be 110 or 120 instead of a normal rate of 60 (while at rest)."

Saying that the learning curve "was very steep," McPheeters said that the experience has left him
confident that a future effort will meet success.