A Cold, White Season of Death on Mt. McKinley : The continent’s tallest peak has been doing its worst this year. Still, mountaineers flock to take up the challenge.

This is the season the climbers come to town. Speaking French and Korean and half a dozen other tongues, they come by the hundreds to the bunkhouses and dusty streets of this little town to begin treks up the mountain towering on the northern horizon.

Mt. McKinley, at 20,320 feet, is the highest and coldest peak in North America. And, this year as never before, McKinley is delivering death to those who try to reach its summit.

Eleven climbers have died on the mountain since the climbing season began a month ago--the most deaths ever in one year--and 14 others have been plucked off the slopes in dramatic, expensive helicopter rescues. And the climbing season is only about half over.

The most recent casualties occurred last weekend when four Canadians, roped together and descending after having reached the summit, tumbled 3,000 feet from a ridge high on the mountain. Other climbers camped below watched them fall. In earlier accidents, two Italians and three Koreans plunged to their deaths. A German climber died of acute altitude sickness. A well-known American guide, Mugs Stump, was swallowed by a dark ice crevasse.

“This has been a particularly bad year in terms of weather--the mountain was absolutely ferocious during the month of May,” said Peter Hackett, an Anchorage emergency room physician and mountaineer who often attends injured climbers.

“It’s like that sometimes,” Hackett said. “It can be outrageous. McKinley is consistently underestimated.”

While no one died on McKinley last year--and nearly 1,000 people a year try to climb it--death is hardly a stranger there. Since 1932, when the National Park Service began keeping records, 75 climbers have perished. They died in avalanches, plunged off rock walls or simply disappeared into holes in the glaciers that cover much of the mountain. About half of the bodies are never recovered.

“The accidents this year haven’t really followed a pattern,” park service spokesman John Quinley said. “It’s been a mixture of bad weather, bad judgment and bad luck.”

Nothing in Talkeetna, a town of about 200 people nestled in a thick forest, prepares climbers for the environment of Mt. McKinley. Just to start the climb, most mountaineers are ferried by ski plane to a base camp on Kahiltna Glacier, 7,000 feet up--a world of ice and snow. Climbers wear layers of high-tech clothing and tote huge packs of gear.

Sudden snowstorms, even in June, can bury camps, create whiteout conditions and trap climbers in their tents for days. Wind gusts of more than 100 m.p.h. have been recorded. A trip up and down the mountain can take a month. The mountain often disappears into the clouds, making air rescue impossible.

The number of climbers rose consistently through the 1980s. On Wednesday afternoon, 425 climbers were scattered over McKinley, with more arriving every day. They range from world-class mountaineers to the relatively inexperienced. About half are Americans.

Among climbers starting this week there was lots of talk of the accidents. Most of those killed or badly hurt have been foreigners, and some speculated that they tend to be more pinched for time and may take more chances.

There has been no serious talk of setting minimum standards; even experienced mountaineers say there is no way to prepare for the dangers the mountain can hold. That is part of the appeal, they say. That and the fact that McKinley is the tallest peak on the continent.

“We’ve been making preparations for this for months, and we’re still wondering if we’re ready,” said Chris Holder of Fairbanks. “We take this very seriously. Some people are coming up here who have no business being here. But no matter how careful you are, you’re ultimately in the hands of the mountain gods. I mean, no matter how much experience you have, when it comes down to it, you’re in their hands.”