The Climb

by Anatoli Boukreev

  Another athlete having past experience with mountain skiing was Klev Schoening, who had extensive preparatory experience on lower-elevation peaks such as Kilimanjaro and Aconcagua. His uncle Pete Schoening I respected as a mountaineer. I sympathized with his wish to be the oldest person to summit Everest and admired his ambition, but his age did provoke some guarded feelings in me.

  For Dale Kruse, I understood, his greatest achievement was an ascent on Baruntse, a 7,000er in Nepal. Baruntse is an uncomplicated peak neighboring Makalu and is located in the Everest region, but Baruntse’s level of difficulty is significantly lower than what was ahead of us, and it does not pose the same altitude challenge as Everest.

  The last of the participants in our expedition, Martin Adams, I knew from our experiences on our Makalu expedition. A determined climber, I knew he was highly motivated to climb Everest, and I assured him of my best help and advice.

  After meeting with all the participants, I returned to Base Camp that same day. Along the way I analyzed all the participants. I was most concerned about the people who had no high-altitude assault experience: Tim Madsen, Klev Schoening, Lene Gammelgaard, and Dale Kruse. Above 5,000 meters the participants’ good form was reassuring. They had a fighting spirit and, from their external appearances, didn’t look as if they had any serious problems with their health or samochuvstvie.* However, I knew I could draw a final conclusion on their preparedness only by observing all the participants while at Base Camp and during their attempts to attain higher altitudes.

  About the team’s overall level of readiness and ability I had concerns. I could only count on the professional flair of Scott Fischer, whose success on his first, large-scale commercial expedition to Everest was very important. I understood that he had worked hard to establish himself and had put much effort into bringing a good team to Everest. In a short time it is very difficult to successfully select a uniformly strong group of clients and to find qualified guides. I felt that Scott should be given his due for his sincere aspiration.

  With Scott’s, Lopsang’s, and my Everest experiences I felt we had a good reservoir of talent to offer the clients on this expedition who, for the most part, were reasonably conditioned. But, for me, on a commercial expedition there was always a critical adjustment to make. I had trained in the tradition of the Russian High-Altitude Mountaineering School, where a collective effort and teamwork were always emphasized and personal ambitions had a second-level place. Our practice in training and developing climbers was to build their experience and confidence over a long time, starting with lower-level mountains and graduating them to 8,000ers when they were prepared. Here, I understood, as had been the situation on other commercial expeditions, I had been hired to prepare the mountain for the people instead of the other way around.

  *Dr. Hunt, thirty, a physician from New England, had been recruited by Fischer. Her job, as Fischer had outlined it, would be to serve both as team doctor and Base Camp manager.

  *Nazir Sabir, who had been advertised as a guide, had withdrawn just before the expedition, citing family obligations. Fischer, who had wanted four guides on the expedition, now had only three: himself, Beidleman, and Boukreev.

  *Fischer went on to explain that, as a safety precaution, an emergency reserve of oxygen would be provided on summit day in the event Boukreev chose to draw upon it.

  †Fischer was, by many accounts, used to making up the shortfall for friends with whom he wanted to climb. His loyalty to friends and generosity toward them was legendary.

  *Acute mountain sickness (AMS) in its moderate form causes headache, nausea, disturbed sleep, fatigue, shortness of breath, malaise, dizziness, loss of appetite, and poor sleep patterns. It has two more serious and often deadly manifestations: HACE, high-altitude cerebral edema, and HAPE, high-altitude pulmonary edema.

  *Rob Hall’s Adventure Consultants expedition flew from Kathmandu to Lukla to begin their trek to Everest Base Camp.

  *A Russian concept. An impression of a person’s state of being, the combined and observable aspects of a person’s mental, physical, and emotional state.

  CHAPTER 7

  BASE CAMP

  The Mountain Madness team continued to hold in Gorak Shep when Boukreev returned to Base Camp on the evening of Saturday, April 6. They were waiting for the expedition’s yak caravan to complete its supply runs. To that point the majority of the supplies necessary for Base Camp had come in on the backs of Sherpa porters, and their efforts had been sufficient to keep Boukreev and the advance team of Sherpas supplied, but not until the yaks could move ahead with the balance of their supplies could the clients move into Base Camp.

  Progress of all the expeditions’ yak caravans had been excruciatingly slow. On the day before their arrival in Gorak Shep, the Mountain Madness team had departed Lobuche after lunch and shortly thereafter had encountered a few of their yaks up to their necks in snow, their Sherpa drivers furiously at work trying to dig them out.

  To kill time in Gorak Shep and to promote their acclimatization, Fischer’s team took a day trip and summited Kala Pattar (5,554 m), a “subsidiary feature” from which the climbers had an unobstructed and dramatic view of the Khumbu Icefall, the first serious obstacle they would encounter in their effort to summit Mount Everest. On the top of Kala Pattar, several of the climbers experienced a transition from the “going there” to the “being there” and the simultaneous sinking and soaring that many climbers feel when they encounter the physical presence of the objective ahead. This was what they had written their checks for.

  Finally, on Monday, April 8, Fischer’s team made their push. A few hundred meters north of the sandy flats of Gorak Shep, they picked up a trail that took them down a moraine wall and onto the Khumbu Glacier. In about three hours, following the trail that had been packed down by the porters and the yak teams that had finally begun to move, the team reached the Everest Base Camp.

  Working their way over the lunarscape of strewn rubble, stepping carefully from rock to rock to avoid broken ankles, they found the site of their camp. Pitching a tent that for the next month would be their home was the first priority of many of the climbers, and with the help of the Sherpas they set about clearing sites and establishing what would be their home for the next six weeks.

  The Sherpas who had been my coworkers were transformed when the clients arrived. In the morning the Sherpas would go to the clients’ tents and wake them with tea and coffee, and a cheerful “Good morning!” In the mess tent there were always thermoses of Starbucks coffee, sports drinks, PowerBars, beef jerky. The meals were often rich, things like pizzas and stews. I much preferred the Sherpas’ food—maybe more boring, but easier to digest and more appropriate I thought for high altitude. There was a hot shower and mail service. We even had a communications tent outfitted with Sandy Pittman’s gear, satellite telephones, computers, solar panels for power. Base Camp had more services than many of the hotels in Kathmandu, certainly more than the Skala, where I often stayed.

  The creature comforts, though, didn’t take all the edges off. Several of the clients were struggling with their adjustments to altitude, and many of the climbers, especially the first-timers to Everest, began to seriously obsess about every bodily function. One base-camper remarked, “People became totally self-absorbed, monitoring their bodies, whether they’re peeing or not, what their urine looks like, whether they’re pooping every day, whether they’re nauseous, whether they have a headache or not.” Nobody was without concerns about the status of his or her health. Something as simple as a gastrointestinal problem or a respiratory infection could keep you off the mountain, and that was not an indignity any of the climbers had come to suffer. As one climber said, “Even hypochondriacs get sick.”

  Neal Beidleman was an early concern at Base Camp. Shortly after arriving he developed a “Khumbu cough,”* and according to one Base Camp resident, “Neal was coughing his brains out. He would cough all night long, so he couldn’t sleep. Dr. Hunt treated him with everything, ste
roids to stop the inflammation, bronchodilators to make the muscles relax. Nothing was helping.” While other members of the team such as Pittman developed a similar problem, Beidleman’s difficulties were more of a worry. Beidleman had responsibilities to get clients to the top. Already the expedition had one less guide than had originally been planned. It was doubtful, if Beidleman didn’t recover, that Fischer, Boukreev, and the climbing Sherpas could carry the load.

  As there were people issues, there were equipment issues, and one concern that arose early was that of the two-way radios Fischer had brought for use by the expedition. A critical item in an expedition inventory, a radio creates a link between Base Camp and climbers as they wend their way to the summit and provides a conduit for information on developing problems, emergencies, equipment needs, the weather, and medical matters. An experienced climber considers the state of his expedition’s communications capabilities, and Martin Adams did. “These days you have these great little radios that weigh next to nothing that every one of the climbers should have, because the cost of carrying them is zero. They’re easy to use—two buttons—it’s black-and-white. And Scott pulls out a few of these old radios with ten channels, and I said, ‘These are the radios we’re using?!’ And he says to me, ‘Yeah, this is all I got.’ The radios, in my opinion, were a joke. It was a major misstep for him to go over there with those antiquated models.”

  One of my first priorities in Base Camp was to formalize an acclimatization plan. The demands of properly acclimatizing required that team members stay in Base Camp for at least a few days until their bodies had adjusted to that altitude, and then we would begin a series of excursions that would take our climbers higher onto the mountain, climbing from Base Camp to successively higher camps that our Sherpas would establish. The idea is that you gradually allow your body to adjust to higher and higher elevations, so that on the day of the summit bid you can dash to the highest altitude and then retreat to an altitude to which you have acclimated.

  The plan Scott and I worked out called for four acclimatization excursions. Our first would be to 6,100 meters, which is where we would establish our Camp I, but on the first excursion we would not overnight there. On this excursion, and on all those that followed, the clients would carry only their personal belongings and personal equipment, so that they could save their strength. Our climbing Sherpas, working under Lopsang Jangbu Sherpa, would carry rope and whatever supplies we might need.

  After the first excursion to 6,100 meters, we would return to Base Camp on the same day and not push the clients. Afterward we would rest to allow the team to recover and give us an opportunity to observe their conditions.

  On our second excursion we planned to again reach the height of Camp I, spend the night there, and then, on the next day, do a training excursion to the altitude of 6,500 meters, where our Sherpas would be working to establish Camp II, our Advance Base Camp. This camp would be a smaller version of our Base Camp and would be completely outfitted with mess tent,* facilities for cooking, and tents that climbers would share when we overnighted there. On this excursion we would not overnight at the Camp II elevation, but descend and again take a multiday rest during which time our climbers could restore their strength and we could again see our climbers up close, to observe them for potential problems and to discuss with them their conditions and preparedness.

  Our hope was that after their rest the clients would then be ready to do a third excursion, which would take us first to Camp I, where we would spend the night, and then on to Camp II, where we would overnight for the first time. On the third day we would try to reach an altitude of 6,800 meters, the elevation at which we would eventually be moving onto the face of Lhotse, where we would be establishing our Camp III at 7,300 meters. On that same day it was planned that we would descend through Camp II and return to Base Camp.

  Before the fourth and final acclimatization excursion we planned three days of rest. After this we would attempt to go from Base Camp straight through to Camp II. After spending the night there and assessing the team members’ samochuvstvie, we would continue to Camp III and spend our final night, then the next day attempt to go a few hundred meters higher before descending. This excursion, we agreed, would be mandatory for all members, because this would be the highest we would climb before our summit bid, and it was necessary that all our team members make their adjustments to those altitudes before subjecting themselves to the ultimate challenge.†

  Boukreev took the acclimatization excursions very seriously, and he felt that the routines that had been established should be strictly followed. Fischer had hired him, he understood, to bring his experience to bear and was relying upon him to help insure client safety. Boukreev shared his thoughts about the expedition’s potential for success with Fischer.

  I said if the clients use oxygen, and if we are lucky in getting a successful confluence of circumstances, our clients can have success, but it is critical that we adhere to our acclimatization plan and allow the opportunities for our clients to get sufficient rest. We cannot make up now for lack of training or experience, but we can maximize the opportunity of our clients if we do these things.

  Our job is to get our clients the necessary acclimatization with a minimal number of nights at high-altitude camps. From my experience I know that by staying at high altitude strength quickly disappears and that it will not be possible to restore it during the short rest intervals at Base Camp. Sometimes you can be deceived; you begin to have less serious problems with the increases, and you feel relatively good, but, then, on summit day you do not have the strength for the final assault. So, my opinion was that after our excursion to 7,300 meters we should descend and rest for at least a week at an elevation lower than Base Camp, somewhere in the forest zone around 3,800 m. There we will have more oxygen and relaxing distractions away from our Base Camp routine, which can help with the psychology of our clients.

  Fischer had no problems with the plans for the acclimatization excursions, but he was not receptive to Boukreev’s plan for a deep descent and rest before the summit bid. Why he opposed the idea Boukreev was not certain.

  *At high altitude the dryness and coldness of the air can irritate the lungs, which, all things considered, would prefer the damp and humidity of a Caribbean beach. And the lungs, when they get irritated, get inflamed, and a serous fluid drains into your lungs causing you to cough, and cough and cough.

  *This tent, a smaller version of the Base Camp mess tent made in the Urals, finally made it to Nepal and had been delivered to Base Camp.

  +Acclimatization is unique to each climber and, even though Boukreev and Fischer hoped to move the clients through it together, they understood there would be a varying response to their recommended routine and tried to build some flexibility into the regimen.

  CHAPTER 8

  KHUMBU TO CAMP II

  Before first light on the morning of April 11, the Mountain Madness clients crawled from their tents and began preparations for their excursion into the Khumbu Icefall. The day Fischer had chosen for his expedition’s first trip through, Boukreev recalled, was clear and promising. It would have been an ideal day for a summit bid, because the weather had been stable for several days and the winds moderate.

  What the conditions would be on the mountain when Fischer’s clients were finally acclimatized was anybody’s guess. Weather on the mountain, like the people with the hubris to climb it, cannot be predicted with any reasonable degree of accuracy. It was possible that when the climbers were ready, the mountain wouldn’t be, and if that was the case, there would be no ticket refunds. They would go home without the summit in their pockets.

  Most of the Mountain Madness expedition members had not reacted dramatically to the slight increase in elevation they had made from Gorak Shep to Base Camp. Their resting respiratory rates had returned to normal, but any exertion caused a rapid and disconcerting shortness of breath for most team members. One of the members has said that at Base Camp, with only half the
oxygen available to her at sea level, she felt as if she were working on one lung and walking around in a two-martini fog.

  A few of the team members were still struggling with nausea and headaches, but none were complaining too loudly, wanting to put the best picture on their condition, not wanting to “talk about the fact that they felt like shit,” as one base-camper described the situation.

  Fischer, who was often heard to say to his team members, “It’s attitude, not altitude,” seemed to most of them to be strong, without any apparent difficulties. But according to Jane Bromet, there was a considerable difference between those perceptions and Fischer’s physical reality. “He’d get up in the morning and … it would take him about five minutes to finally stand up… . Scott was exhausted.” And, she said, he was taking Diamox, 125 mg every other day, which suggests he was addressing the challenge of acclimatization.*

  For Beidleman, and all of the clients except Sandy Hill Pittman, this would be their first trip into the Icefall. As casual and relaxed as everyone tried to appear, most of them knew the history of the obstacle ahead. Since people had begun keeping score, nineteen people had died in the Icefall.

  A perilous, jagged mass of blue ice set on an incline that slants toward the Everest Base Camp, the Icefall is constantly being transformed. Its descending mass, perpetually pulled upon by gravity, fractures and separates like ice cubes cracked from a tray into freestanding towers called seracs, some of them more than ten stories high. Interconnecting the seracs is a network of fissures, or crevasses, that can be more than three hundred feet deep.

  To cross the Icefall to make it to Camp I at 6,100 meters, one has to climb two thousand vertical feet over the distance of slightly more than a mile. To assist climbers in their negotiation of the route, the Icefall is “threaded” before each climbing season by a team of Sherpas. In March 1996, that team was coordinated by the efforts of Henry Todd and Mal Duff from the United Kingdom, a leader, like Todd, of a commercial expedition.