December 2025 –
There are few people who have contributed as much to the sport of ice climbing in the state of Alaska as the late Brian Teale. For decades, BT was a fixture in Valdez. He held a wealth of information on the history of the region maintained in his ever growing “Planet Ice” guidebook. He was quick to share his knowledge with Alaska Ice Climbing as we sought out the truth and details on the areas around Valdez. We are forever grateful and indebted to his generosity. He was also well known for his numerous and bold first ascents on ice that at the time of writing this article are 50 deep and none are documented yet in the AIC guide.
We want to share a little about his legacy here. We are honored to have Matt Kinney, Charlie Sassara, John Weiland and Kirsten Kremer sharing some of their own thoughts so that his memory can live on. We welcome others that want to contribute to this growing story to leave their own perspectives of Brian.
From Matt Kinney
It was the winter of 1984 when I met Brian. I arrived in Valdez in 1979 and discharged in 1982 from the Coast Guard, a year after Chuck Comstock was discharged in Valdez. We served 2 years together. Chuck and I both arrived in Valdez and were mesmerized by the surrounding Chugach Range. He was from Nebraska and I was from Oklahoma. This was nirvana. Chuck became consumed with ice while I favored backcountry skiing.
When Brian arrived in winter 1984, he certainly felt the climbing vibe stronger than most as he drove south through Keystone Canyon for the first time hoping he had found a home. After a season of construction he bought a mobile home trailer on Hanagita Street. While Embick’s house was ground zero for alpinist, his house became just as much of a hostel for climbers and XC skiers from around Alaska streaming to Valdez’s new nordic trails. It also was his base for his construction and snow removal business for the next 35 years. He was all in on Valdez. I think I met Brian through Chuck.
Brian mentioned he knew how to tele ski and this became our initial bonding effort. And, he was really good having learned on lifts in Colorado. He was the first tele skier I met who had it down, so I watched and learned. I was also fortunate to ski with Harvey Miller and Brian Becker when they came to ice climb with Brian and they were very good telemark skiers.
In 1998 I met, Brian, Harvey and Becker at Monarch Mountain in CO. It was a full on powder day and one of the best ski days I’ve ever experienced as I chased them in and out of glades on the same slopes they learned to ski.
A year after we met, Brian and I were caught in an avalanche along with 3 others on Snow Dome, south of Port Valdez. It was the defining starting point in our long relationship. Alaska had just dealt Brian and I a stern warning. Loving the Chugach was not going to be easy. There were no guide books. There was no ski history. We felt like pioneers on every objective of the day. Throughout our history we were constantly discussing some new objective over coffee breaks. Eventually we took a Level One Avalanche Course together at Hatcher Pass by Fesler and Fredstone in the early 90s.
We only toured together a dozen times or less. When we did it always ended up the same. Once into the high alpine zone, Brian would silently leave me and head out to follow his own way. But he was never far enough that I couldn’t hear his short yodel or him mine, each different and distinct, to let each other know all was good.
Brian once again amazed we with his transition from free-heel to snowboarding. As snowboarding evolved, Brian went all in. Off he went with a snowboard and ice axe strapped to his back and taught himself to snowboard in Thompson Pass. He wore his white Koflach climbing boots and carried a single axe in one hand. He either used Verts or super-short approach skis.
I recall seeing him boot 2,500 feet of 40-45 degree snow right to the summit of Brads Peak at 27-Mile. Never seen that before on that peak. I doubt it will be repeated. As the snowboard evolved to split-board he dismissed the technology and stuck to carrying his board through his last winter.
He called one day from his cell phone when he was up the Valdez Glacier after I left Valdez. He bought his board and decided to tour versus climb. He was solo and traversed the Valdez Glacier and was taking a break before heading down. He was so jazzed on scenery, talking about how special that place was at that moment.
He was a versatile athlete. We road and mountain biked together. I spent hours skating behind him under full moons as he prepared for the Iditaski along with 100’s of laps together in Mineral Creek or the Valdez Glacier Lake under full moons if they beckoned.
We broke the rules and expanded the ski trails in Mineral Creek with undercover chain saw work. Ski skating was a huge thing for Brian and pushed for it. He was President of the Valdez Nordic Ski Club during construction of the nordic trails and Salmonberry Ski Area. He also served for years on the Parks and Recreation Commission and always fought for trails. He volunteered countless hours coaching the HS nordic team. His dedication to the sport was like his dedication to ice.
He was also a companion of Alaska Olympian Sue Forbes during her time on the team. She trained in Valdez and Brian supported and trained with her, even attending the games in Canmore.
I recall the first summer on our road bikes in the mid-80s.’ Embick had organized a road race in Valdez. When Brian and I showed up in shirts and tank-tops, we were surrounding by the fashions of the cyclist from Anchorage and Fairbanks. We had no strategy or any understanding of road racing. After about five miles we were solid with the group of “pros”. We looked at each other and mentioned the pace seemed slow. We went for it. We broke away and had a substantial lead. We couldn’t believe it! Then we learned what a peloton was. With five mile to go, they flew by us, and dropped a rider to slow us down and separate us from the pack. He then bolted away and caught the group leaving Brian and I gasping for air. We finished way back.
One lasting memory was at the Rock Gym in Valdez. I wanted to learn more about technical climbing so took a three day course at the Community College at the age of …. 60. After the course I started getting on the wall once or twice a week. The Gym had been opened for some time and Brian had never used it. I kept teasing Brian to come and check it out.
One night he shows up in Carharts and a paint-stained sweatshirt along with worn climbing shoes and chalk bag. While I had watched him climb ice many times, I’d never seen him rock climb except sharing some minor boulder problems at Dock Point with Comstock and others. Valdez rock was bad so he didn’t poor much effort into it. (The exception was Tsaina Wall north of Thompson Pass, a route he spotted while kayaking the Tsaina.)
Brian clipped into the auto-belay system and began moving. Over the next 30 minutes he simply amazed me. Pausing at times as if his heart beat was still low, he meticulously played his way to the top. Then he did what I saw no else do, he down-climbed the wall. Not one slip. Perfect. He sat down next to me as I was smiling. “That was pretty good BT. I’m totally impressed”. We chatted a bit and his sage advice was to always down climb on a Wall as it will make you better. That was the only time I saw him at the wall. I started down-climbing all the time.
My respect for his climbing abilities went off the charts during the session. He had the touch.
My last coffee talks with Brian always came around to our ongoing risk of our separate paths on ice or snow. We were over 60. We moaned about being more careful, but a day later were on the Pass riding old mountain bike over bumpy tundra past blue ponds lined with snow that survived the summer. We weren’t done.
At some point Brian went up the Valdez Glacier on a sled with some locals. He found his gold mine just off the glacier where the ice had melted away from the foot of Mt. Abercrombie exposing unlimited pioneering. From that day all of his climbing focused on that zone. The next winter he bought a used sled and would ride solo from his home in Robe River five miles to the ice and spend hours solo or mentoring others much younger than him.
I’ve skied by this zone a few times. I would describe it as one of the most beautiful mountain zones of Valdez from the glacier at its base. I understand his obsession for something new or bold after 35+ years in Valdez. It’s remote. Routes get old. It’s an exclamation point on his legacy that he spent so much time there at the twilight of his climbing career banging out new lines on frozen ice that reached high, smearing the newly exposed ice from the glaciers rapid thinning.
When I left Valdez I left a brother behind. We had disagreements but we always came back around to just being good friends and survivors of all those days rooted so long ago.
Our relationship was established by 1989. Over the many years that followed, we lost friends who lived in Valdez, specifically Andy and Chuck. Brian took the loss of Sue Knott on Mt. Foraker particularly hard for years. While adventurers came and went, few if any stayed in Valdez. By 2010 we were the old guard. I left Valdez in 2018 but we still maintained contact working through his recent incident with Kaley in which she died. Really hard on him.
Brian’s nickname of BT came from me. In the USCG, official teletype messages began with BT or “Begin Text”. So I used that has a memory aid when I first met him. Some years late he began calling me MK. Both monikers stuck with us.
In the mid 1980’s John Weiland and Brian were nearly killed when crushed by a chunk of ice that broke on Hung Jury just 50 yards across the Lowe river in Keystone Canyon from their car. The struggle to self-rescue with major trauma is one of true stories of mental toughness. I can’t imagine them wading the frigid river to save their lives with broken bones. But they did.
Photos courtesy of Matt Kinney
Before I knew what happened they were both medevacked to Anchorage. Brian came home first. I was astonished at how bad he looked. Skinny to the bone with his muscle tone gone. He was walking and his recovery was amazing. The following winter he was back doing what he loved to do in Keystone Canyon. I honestly didn’t think he would fully recover but I didn’t really know Brian I guess. A few years later he’s skiing the Iditaski.