by Sharon Wood
I put my head down, force my thoughts away from what lies above and bend into the task of unravelling a spool of rope into usable portions for the next day. Grateful for the distraction, I wrestle the kinks and tangles into coils while Barry turns the spool. Suddenly Barry shouts, drops the spool and flattens himself against the face. Trapped in my sluggishness, I freeze in confusion. Then, over the roar of the wind, I hear the telltale sharp cracks of rockfall, as startling as gunshots. A flush of adrenaline snaps my head upward as a barrage of rocks the size of basketballs barrels down the couloir. They explode against the walls and are heading straight for us. There is nowhere to hide. I grab Barry and tuck in beside him beneath our hanging pack. My body flinches as the rocks thud into the face nearby. I watch them hit, bounce, fly and vanish, along with countless irretrievable heartbeats, into the airy abyss below. Numbed and spent, we say nothing and resume our task.
Minutes later, Dwayne pulls in and Kevin drags in soon after. Kevin’s body heaves with each ragged breath as he slumps over his pole and ice axe. He is out of oxygen.
Dwayne, calm and unaware of what has happened minutes before, says, “Well, what are we waiting for?”
In a brief glance between us, Barry and I opt to not tell them about the near miss. There is no room for drama—and in any case I used up my quota over the cartridges. Now, I am stoic and all business.
“Right, then!” Barry says. He hefts his pack onto his back, unclips from the last of the rope and starts up.
I lean back against my pack, slip into the shoulder straps, roll onto my hands and knees and push up to stand. I leave my pole clipped into the anchor, unclip myself and start picking my way up the rock-pitted and wind-strafed face. Ironically, the craters from the rockfall I step into are like stairs, which eases my straining calves. The face steepens as we move up into the outwash of the couloir. We thrust the shafts of our axes into the slope for a sense of security but that is all it provides. Now, with no fixed rope, we are tenpins at the mercy of a rock that finds its mark, or a gust of wind or an avalanche that sweeps us off. But, I reason, we have all survived and thrived in these unforgiving places before. We won’t fall—can’t think about it. Although each move upward takes me closer to what I have feared for years: being benighted on an eight-thousand-metre peak, I don’t entertain this thought because I can’t afford to. Instead, each step upward is a step in numb resignation, a new normal I would never accept on any other mountain.
As if conjured by a malign presence, spectral veils of spindrift envelop us. Pulses of ice and rock, beaten and tumbled into sugary grains, stream down the couloir and hiss as they part around my boot tops. This, I think, is John Lauchlan’s kind of day out. John was a friend, a talented, committed and visionary climber who defined a new generation of bold alpine climbing. He used to say, “Go big or go home,” and he would have bared his teeth to this mountain as if it were a blustering adversary. I can imagine John now, his eyes narrowing behind his pop-bottle-thick frosted aviator glasses and his wiry body leaning hard into the fight. But John went big on a solo climb several years ago and didn’t go home. I feel his spirit with us now.
Fatigue and oxygen starvation make me feel detached from all that is happening, and time is suspended. I have lost all sense of how long we have been climbing when Barry stops. I wake as if from a trance. We are in a small bay below a steep rock wall off to the side of the couloir. It is only when I see an old oxygen bottle, some splintered tent poles and pieces of tattered nylon sticking out of the snow that I understand why we have stopped. I recall our plan to camp for the night and it snaps me back to attention. I nod at Barry and we both start chopping into hard snow to set anchors and get our packs off our backs.
The view between our feet and the valley floor disappears into roiling snow. When I stand up straight and extend my arm, I can touch the face in front of me, which makes it about forty to fifty degrees. With no ledges to be found anywhere, we start to chip a platform into the face that is big enough for a small tent. We have forgotten a shovel, and without it the task will cost us hours. But we find one in the first few minutes of our excavation, which would seem miraculous anywhere else. Nothing surprises us anymore, and we pick it up without comment and keep digging and chopping.
There is only room for two of us to work at the same time, so we take turns resting with Kevin. In his all-or-nothing style, he cranked his oxygen to the full flow rate of eight litres per minute this morning and ran out halfway through the day. Now he sags, folded over his knees, sides heaving—spent. He has given his all to us even though he knows his chances to summit are over. Years later, I will apologize for saying nothing then—I didn’t have it in me. And he will say, “It’s just what I do, Woody. It’s what we all did. The whole team gave our best.”
Kevin and Barry stay longer than I thought they would to make sure we are well dug in. Our teammates will tell us later that they saw them start climbing down at 9 p.m. Dwayne and I watch them briefly as they descend the ground we worked so hard to gain, but we have nothing left for sentiment. We do know that regardless of the night ahead of us, and our dwindling chances, we cannot turn around tomorrow morning without trying. We owe them at least that for their commitment.
We work into darkness. Dwayne climbs into the tent to get the stove going while I stay out to tighten, check and recheck every attachment of the tent to the mountain. I prepare leashes for us both and clip them to an anchor for insurance. A scenario plays through my mind: a hit in the night, our tent swept off the face and us dangling in our harnesses off these anchors. I need to remain outside and occupied rather than give my imagination idle time to spin worst-case scenarios.
Once I climb inside the tent, we radio the rest of the team. Dwayne wheezes and coughs before he speaks. “We’ve just sort of got ourselves thrown in here. We’re kind of cold—pretty breezy still—still a factor as to how things might go tomorrow. Everybody did a fantastic job—put out lots of energy. I hope we get a shot tomorrow.”
Jim says, “You will get a shot tomorrow. Just remember, you’ve got to want it more than it wants you.” We startle as a rush of snow spills over our tent.
“Well,” Dwayne sighs, “I tell you, we put up with a lot of pain today to give it a shot.”
“That’s why you’ll get it.”
Laurie comes on from Camp Four. “How’s Sharon doing?” I am relieved to hear his voice in the mix.
“She’s hot.”
James says, “It’s a pretty long birthday climb for her. We’ll gab later, Dwayne. I hope you feel all the good energy we’re sending up to you.”
Jane comes on from Camp One. “How are you guys up there?”
Dwayne hands me the radio and I tell her, “We could be better.”
Dan says, “You’re supposed to have a plastic thingy over your face right now.”
“We just got the stove going and I don’t want to blow us up. That would be embarrassing.”
“How’s Dwayno?” Dan asks.
“About the same. He’s got cold feet. He can’t decide whether to fill his water bottle to warm them up or have a hot drink.”
“How’s the wind?”
“Real strong.”
“No protection, eh?”
I tell them we have the tent tied down so tight we aren’t going anywhere. “It’s bombproof.” But that vision of us hanging from our harnesses keeps playing through my imagination.
“Are you guys comfortable?” Jim asks.
“It’s all relative, I guess.”
Dan comes on. “You guys have the O’s on?”
Small sharp teeth gnaw inside my temples. “We’re using it when we can. It’s a contest between the oxygen and the stove. The oxygen is working excellent, except Kevin’s bottle gave up a few pitches below the Hornbein.”
Jim asks, “Is that why he was so slow?”
“We were all going slow because the
wind was beating us around and we figured we were carrying thirty kilos each.”
“The main thing is, you did it. You got up there.”
I turn my headlamp on to look at Dwayne lying on his back staring into the void, his face swollen from surface edema. I sigh. “It’s going to take a wonder to make men out of us again.”
Jim reminds us to keep hydrated and get a good rest. He suggests he spot for us the next day through the telescope from out on the glacier near Camp Two. He can help guide us to the safest, most direct route to the summit once we exit the couloir.
I hand the radio to Dwayne and pop another lozenge. Dwayne says, “Yeah that would be helpful, Jim.”
“With any luck, it’ll blow itself out tonight.” Jim’s voice fades to an airy whisper.
A part of me can’t believe we are talking about still going on. By the way I feel and Dwayne looks, I think we’ll need a lot more than just the wind to die down. I can’t imagine how much strength we will need to simply stand up, let alone climb unroped six hundred metres higher over the hardest ground yet to reach the summit.
Laurie must be reading my mind when he comes on from Camp Four. “Even if you get no sleep tonight, with oxygen you’ll be okay. In ’82 we climbed nine hundred metres on our last push to the summit. I know it’s more technical ground, but you’re only six hundred metres from the top. If you’re feeling lousy, crank up your oxygen for five minutes at a time to get a richer flow. It makes a big difference. The fact that you’ve got oxygen might make up for the lack of sleep tonight.”
“Look,” Jim says, “I know you’re really tired and you’ve had a hard day, but don’t let that get you down. You guys are in a real good spot. Be positive about what you’ve accomplished.”
Dwayne says, “Thanks a lot, Jim. We need to hear that. We’re pretty psyched, or we will be as soon as we go to bed with our oxygen masks on.”
Jim says, “Be proud of what you’ve done and if it happens tomorrow, it happens. There’s no sense worrying about it tonight. Just relax and get some brews in you, collect some O’s and tomorrow will take care of itself.”
Dwayne sighs. “Yeah, it had to be done.”
“It had to be done and you did it. You’ve got everybody down here beaming you up as much positive energy as they can.”
Dwayne falls back on his sleeping bag. “Well, we’ll get an early start and even if the wind is up, we’ll see what happens.”
It must be close to midnight by now. When we first discussed our summit bid, “early start” meant 1 a.m. But with our long day up to Camp Six, we still have hours before we’ll be rehydrated.
Recovery is impossible at 8,200 metres above sea level. No one can survive at this altitude for long. We estimate that we have twenty-four hours to get up and get down to a lower altitude before our time is up. Our oxygen will help, but we only have a partial supply for the night and one bottle each for the summit push. Even as acclimatized as we are now, we know that vital functions steadily deteriorate. Death is imminent.
Bile rises in my throat at the thought of food. My stomach is shutting down. We both fear if we eat anything that we will throw up and lose even more energy and fluids, but we need fuel and force down a few raw cashews and some chicken noodle soup. We know we must drink as much as possible. We turn the stove on and off through the night, alternating between its off-gases and water, and oxygen and dehydration. It’s more apparent than ever that we and the stove compete for the same oxygen.
Spindrift avalanches pour over the tent and fill the gap between the outside tent wall and the mountain face. We punch the wall back in a fight for space but the buildup of snow is winning, reducing our space and pushing us closer to the edge of our platform. My consciousness drifts. A faint twinkle of Dwayne and Carlos’s headlamps in the night on Makalu stalk my memory. I sit up and turn my headlamp on to banish the eerie sight. Dwayne lies covered in a fine layer of frozen condensation and spindrift that has pressed through the walls and small openings. I’m relieved when he stirs and the white shroud cracks and slides off. His eyelashes are white with frost. We don’t need a thermometer to know it is minus twenty or thirty degrees.
We talk in abbreviated and disjointed fragments between dozing and waking through the night. Dwayne asks, “Are you going to wear two one-piece layers under your down suit or will that make it too tight?”
“Yeah, I tried that last time I was at Five and I couldn’t move very well. Do you think we should try our one-piece insulated suits over our down suits?” Small details can make the difference between success and failure, right down to a suit that even slightly constricts the thousands of moves we’ll make that day. Once we’re out there and moving, changing our clothing layers won’t be an option.
I say, “Think I’ll wear a mitt on my left hand and a glove on my right. You know, for a combination of dexterity and warmth?”
Time slips before I hear his voice again. “How long do you think it’ll take to get up to the Yellow Band?”
“Maybe an hour?” I top up the pot with more snow. “I don’t think it’s that far, and there’s no changing our minds once we start up.” I repeat the advice Annie gave me: “Trend right at first even though it looks harder. Don’t get sucked into the weakness on the left side of the Yellow Band.”
“Yeah,” he says, “that jibes with what Todd told me. Better not blow it. Guess we’ll solo to the narrows, eh? Whoever gets there first can stop and wait if we need to rope up.”
Sometime later, I wake up gasping. A sickly green flame sputters above our heads. “Are you awake?”
“Sort of. I don’t know what you call this state, but I’m hoping it’s rest,” he murmurs. “I’m thinking we should take all the pitons we’ve got.”
Every time we turn off the stove for a few minutes and turn on our oxygen, the conversation starts to make more sense. I ask, “What time do you think we should turn around?”
“Let’s take it one step at a time.”
“How much rope do you think we should take?”
“I say we take all of it. I coiled about 150 metres or so.”
“What’s your strategy for the O’s?” I ask.
“Turn it on for the first few minutes when we start, to get moving and get warm, then turn it off to save it until we get to the Yellow Band.”
“Dave says it will last ten hours if everything works perfectly,” I say, “which is hardly likely.”
“Yeah,” Dwayne says, “those valves freeze and the flow is inconsistent.”
“Do you think we’ll even be able to get out of this tent in the morning?”
He doesn’t answer.
Chapter 17
Summit Day
May 20: Day 4
The same tacit agreement that has brought us this far, to keep going until we can’t, pushes us out of the tent this morning. Dwayne leaves first at 9 a.m. I sit at the threshold with my top half inside the tent and my feet outside. The door flap whips and slaps at me as I strain, bent over my four layers of insulation, to reach to my boots. Hands that seem not my own fumble to fasten my crampons. A stream of spindrift pours over my legs and I pull back to wait until it passes. I chant to myself, Be calm, be patient.
Aware of the fatal consequences of the smallest oversight, I cinch the straps with meticulous care over the two layers of overboots. One loose crampon could send me on a one-way trip down the North Face. At the very least, a strap come undone could cost me my hands. The glove on my right hand and the mitt on my left hand are working as a combination so far, and I pray neither one will have to come off until the end of the day—or tomorrow. Bare hands for even just seconds can freeze, rendering them useless. No hands—no way to get down.
When I jerk forward and rock to a stand, the radio slips off my lap and skitters toward the edge of the platform. I catch it with my foot. An ache throbs to the pulse in my head when I bend over t
o pick up the radio. I peer up to see Dwayne fade in and out of sight behind sheets of spindrift. He reappears a little higher as if moving in single frames, roughly spliced, like in the old black-and-white films. Thirty metres above him, the strip of snow he follows tapers into the narrowest part of the couloir. Another thirty metres above that, and as if a curtain is lifted, a sudden solid patch of yellow rock looms—the Yellow Band.
Dwayne said he’d take it slowly so I can catch up. Is there any other speed at 8,200 metres? I zip the tent shut, wondering what state it will be in when we return—if we do.
The slope in front of me is pitted with rocks and craters, and the snow varies in consistency from ice to Styrofoam. I convince myself that the odds of a rock hitting me are slim. I kick one foot and then the other, dagger the pick of my axe in the snow and press my other hand against the slope for balance. Anywhere else I could stand up without my hands, but this high, with such poor balance, I can’t. I aim to find a rhythmic flow to my movement but instead I stop and gasp after each step. My lungs fill and empty, but still I feel desperate for air. I cannot close the gap between Dwayne and me.
The couloir deepens, and narrows to a body length. Carabiners and strands of frayed rope dangle from pitons on the steep walls that flank me. The height of the pitons tells of more snow in previous years. Spooky, I think. The place feels haunted. I know men have fallen here—died here. Last year, a team of Australians and New Zealanders led by Peter Hillary attempted the couloir. Peter told me he was climbing up behind his team when suddenly one of his mates clattered past and disappeared out of sight below. Minutes later, Peter watched in horror as another climber cartwheeled past him. Peter and his team went home.
But I think of Tom and Willi, who succeeded with heavier gear. I have read the passages in Tom’s book over again and again looking for information about the route, but he reveals more about his heart and mind than about specific technical details. Tom has given me what I need—a friend and a mentor in spirit—rather than what I wanted. When he heard we were attempting to climb his namesake route, he sent a telegram wishing us well. That means more to me than he can know.