In reply to ford23:
Anything on the N Face can be potentially dangerous unless there is good consolidated neve. Generally its just frozen lumpy earth and grass with a thin veneer of ice. Pretty well impossible to belay safely on it without long metal stakes which would need a lump hammer to drive them in and would weigh a ton. I climbed it in the 1980s in these conditions with 3 friends, we had no adequate protection, and if one had fallen he would have dragged the others off so we decided, about half way up, that we were committed, retreat was just as dangerous as to go on. In the circumstances it was more sensible to unrope and continue to climb solo thereby reducing the risk of a mass fall.
One of my most scary climbs and I've never done it again.
Post edited at 20:57