Rodda Roland Arnold

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Biografie:
Roland Arnold Rodda (1917-1993)
Dr Roland Rodda, who died in England on 17 October 1993, was a New Zealander and a well-known and much respected member of the New Zealand Alpine Club for 54 years.
If there are two words which characterised Rodda's mountaineering career they are enthusiasm and perseverance: once he got a mountain in his sights he did not give up. But for all that he showed discretion. And you could be sure that, whether forced to retreat by unfavourable rock, snow or weather conditions, he would be certain to return and complete the climb.
Rodda did most of his mountaineering in the years between the mid1930s and the end of the 1970s when there were still some virgin peaks in the remoter corners of the Southern Alps. It was in quest of such mountains that Roland Rodda did his best work and he became well known for his exploits among the peaks of NW Otago, the Central Darran and Milford Sound mountains of the Fiordland National Park. In his medical student days he made first ascents of peaks at the head of Lake Wakatipu. Later he climbed Mt Aspiring by the NW ridge and took part in the first ascent of the steep N buttress. These were only some of his Otago climbs. He led a party on a new route, predominantly snow and ice, up the Earnslaw Burn face of Mt Earnslaw. Perhaps the Darrans were one of his most favoured places, for there he climbed with Dr Lindsay Stewart, the doyen of the Southland Section of the NZ Alpine Club, on virgin Mt Patuki. In addition to the peaks such as Mt Christina in the Upper Hollyford valley, Rodda first ascended Mt Grave (named after the celebrated explorer of Western Fiordland) and made a pioneering ascent of the W face of Mt Tutoko, the highest peak in the Darran group. Roland Rodda did many climbs on New Zealand's highest peaks, among them Mt Cook and Mt Tasman, and in winter he ski-mountaineered on the Franz Josef and the Upper Tasman glaciers.
During the Second World War Rodda served as a medical officer with the Royal New Zealand Air Force in New Zealand and in the South Pacific, several times flying with RNZAF aircraft on bombing missions. At the end of the war he climbed on Bougainville, the largest island in the Solomons group, where he made the first complete ascent of Mt Balbi (8888ft) and Mt Bagana (5730ft). On his return to Dunedin, Roland Rodda not only went back to the hills but also served on the atago Section Committee, the Central Committee of the NZAC, and on the board of the Fiordland National Park.
After graduation from the University of Otago Medical School, Dr Rodda specialised in pathology in which subject he gained a post-graduate degree and was a senior lecturer before he left Dunedin to become the foundation professor of pathology in the Medical School in Hobart. While in Tasmania he tramped and climbed extensively.
Retiring to Sale, Cheshire, Roland Rodda still kept up his interest in mountaineering through the Alpine Club, the NZ Alpine Club, the Alpine Ski Club and his frequent trips to the Lake District and the peaks of Snowdonia.
Roland and I were contemporaries and friends from our high school and university days; and we shared many mountains. We climbed together on the first ascent of Mt Grave in Fiordland. A remote rock peak of some consequence, we were overtaken on it during our descent by a nord-west storm. J Ede, Rodda and I survived our enforced night out perched on the illusory and proverbial ledge.
To me, Roland Rodda's greatest attribute was his steadfastness under difficulties: I never knew him to flap. I was mindful of this when I wrote of him in one of my books: 'Rodda was a wonderful man for giving you strength on a mountain and you never had anything but the greatest confidence in him.'
Paul Powell
Dunedin
Quelle: Alpine Journal Vol. 99, 1994, Seite 333-334


Gestorben am:
17.10.1993