Wednesday 1 May 1996 was my forty-fourth birthday, and Everest Base Camp is a memorable place to spend a birthday. My teammates had organised a party and it was a pleasure to relax and take my mind off the impending attempt to reach the summit.
Two days later, on 3 May, I left Base Camp at 5.30 a.m. to start the long flog up to Camp 2. I climbed with my partner, the Finn Jaakko Kurvinen. We had become fully acclimatised during the previous four weeks and this was my fourth trip up the Icefall. Each ladder and hazard were by then very familiar to me. In some ways it made the climb seem longer, because I knew what was waiting around the next corner, but we reached Camp 1 in three hours, which was ninety minutes faster than the first time I had climbed through the Icefall.
We managed to get to Camp 1 before the sun started to drench the Western Cwm with its hot, penetrating, strength-sapping rays. I was, however, suffering yet again with diarrhoea and I had to make a short stop at the camp.
It brought back unpleasant memories from three weeks before, when I was stuck on my own at Camp 1 while a storm struck the mountain. As I lay in my tent, praying that it would not be blown off the mountain with me inside it, I started to feel very sick. I crawled out of the tent into the raging blizzard. I wanted to vomit at one end, while at the other end extreme diarrhoea was having a very unpleasant effect. With my trousers around my knees, with brown liquid coming from one end and projectile vomiting spraying out on the wind-blown snow from the other, I felt that life was being a little unfair.
Three times I crawled out into the snow, but the weather was getting worse with 100-plus-kilometre-per-hour winds having some disturbing effects on my exposed parts each time I took my trousers down.
I could face it no more and I searched for the largest cooking pot in the tent to solve my sad predicament. I had never appreciated just how much crap the human body can hold, but, by early next morning, I had managed to fill the large cooking pot. The storm had gone and I knew that the first Sherpas would be arriving from Base Camp at about 7 a.m. At 6 a.m. I felt exhausted, but otherwise much better than I had done some hours before. I stuck the pot outside and in the intense cold of the early morning, the contents took only a few minutes to freeze solid. I leaned out and around the side of the tent and a simple tap on the bottom of the pot dislodged a deep, perfectly round, solid brown disc, which I quickly covered with the surrounding snow. I then filled the pot with compacted snow, which
I intended to bring to the boil to clean out the pan. Just as it reached boiling point, the first Sherpas arrived, and there followed a quite difficult moment when I pretended that I didn’t understand their request for boiling water to fill up their tea flasks. To bring an end to what was becoming an increasingly difficult conversation, I pretended to trip, and knocked over the pan of boiling water in the process.
Now, three weeks later, Jaakko and I felt very strong, despite my stomach problems, as we continued upwards. The Western Cwm opened ahead of us and, as I glanced up towards the summit, I kept daydreaming about reaching those lofty heights within the next few days.
The route from our Camp 1, at the top of the Icefall, ran initially for about 100 metres across the top of the cliff formed at the point where the ice of the glacier started its downward plunge. There were two bridges there to be negotiated. In this area the sudden change in the direction of the ice flowing out of the Western Cwm, and the resultant increase in speed of the flow, causes the glacier at this point to buckle, split and implode. Each time I went up there a new crevasse had appeared, or the existing holes in the ice had dramatically changed shape since my previous visit. It was essential to take great care when crossing the bridges in this area.
The route then swung diagonally right across the lower reaches of the Western Cwm, to reach a point under the face of Nuptse. This area was also heavily crevassed, but our path was well-established and the more dangerous points were marked by crossed bamboo poles, each with a red flag on top.
The sun had risen sufficiently for its heat to penetrate this high valley. The rays reflected and bounced around the steep-sided cwm, and our bodies started to warm up rapidly. We stopped to strip off our clothing at regular intervals. We also applied thick layers of sunscreen to fend off the effects of the sun’s rays striking our naked skin.
I was wearing a white floppy hat, which I had bought when I was a spectator at a cricket tournament in Hong Kong. It was ideal protection against the sun, although I did look a bit odd – but then so did many others. The more experienced climbers had their own specially designed headgear, which they wore for practical reasons, rather than to look good in expedition photographs. There were many who wore baseball caps, with handkerchiefs stitched to the back, making them look more like members of the French Foreign Legion than high-altitude climbers.
Some also had water bottles with long straws strapped to the shoulder straps of their rucksacks, which allowed them to drink on the move. The water, however, tended to freeze solid during the colder periods of the climb and to me the system had limited appeal. It is vital to maintain a healthy fluid intake in the hot, energy-sapping microclimate of the Western Cwm. I preferred to use vacuum flasks, even though they weigh more than the lighter plastic bottles – at least they guaranteed that the liquid contained therein would remain unfrozen.
From the foot of the Nuptse face the route ran diagonally to the left in the direction of Camp 2, which was at the base of the giant south-west face of Everest. This is the longest straight stretch on the mountain – the route runs endlessly ahead, like a long, thin Roman road. Every 200 metres there is a bamboo marker. With our heads down we tried to put our minds in neutral, placing one foot in front of the other to bring us closer to our destination. I would look ahead to the next bamboo marker and play a game with myself, trying to resist looking up until I reached the marker. I would then start the game over again. Such is the glamour of high-altitude climbing. It was very common to pass exhausted climbers lying in the snow. Even the fittest could suddenly wilt in the heat of the cwm.
Just before we reached the point where the body was lying to the side of the track, just below Camp 2, the diarrhoea struck again. While I sorted myself out, Jaakko moved ahead. The sun continued to make its presence felt and I suddenly felt very weary. Looking ahead I could see Jaakko, also tiring visibly.
From the body the route turned slightly right, to run parallel to the south-west face for 400 metres, up to Camp 2. I have always found this part of the climb completely exhausting. In those 400 metres that day, I stopped at least ten times. Each stop was a collapse in the snow, with my pack still on, until my mind and spirit were prepared to haul my body to the next point of submission.
We both crept into Camp 2 and collapsed in our tent. But this gave us no relief. The temperature that afternoon was thirty-five degrees Celsius and it was impossible to cool down, inside or outside our shelter. We stripped to our underpants and lay in our tent, which felt exactly like a sauna. Within two or three hours the temperature would be down to at least minus twenty degrees Celsius, perhaps even lower, a variation of more than fifty degrees Celsius in a matter of hours.
Lying there like fish out of water, we saw the two Spaniards returning from an unsuccessful summit attempt on the South Pillar route. They were a cheery pair and I was sorry that they had not been successful, but I couldn’t help but harbour the thought that we could now be the first to succeed on the route that year.
Camp 2 on Everest becomes Advanced Base Camp for all the expeditions as their team members become more acclimatised, and it is almost an exact copy of Everest Base Camp. There are large dining and cook tents and the area is bedecked with prayer flags, all carried by the Sherpas. The only difference is that there are fewer smaller tents, as climbers are forced to share accommodation to ease the logistics. The tents are pitched on several levels and it can take up to fifteen minutes to stroll from one team’s area to another.
It is at Camp 2 that some of the infamous rubbish that litters Mount Everest could be found. Unlike Camp 1, which has no annual fixed location, Camp 2 is always placed in the same area. Here and there, signs of previous expeditions from years gone by were readily visible. Old non-biodegradable trash was most evident, with the odd oxygen cylinder lying about. The Sherpas are now paid a bonus for bringing down the old cylinders, particularly from the South Col, where there had been, not long previously, hundreds to be found. Although there were still piles of rubbish dotted around, the situation was significantly better than it had been in the past, mainly due to legislation imposed by the Nepalese. A deposit now has to be paid by each expedition, which is returned when it is proved that the expedition has brought out from the mountain a pre-determined amount of rubbish.
Next day we sat and waited. The weather was clear, but above us there was a harsh grating noise as the jet stream continued to batter the mountain, as if someone was using a loud hairdryer. When the jet stream flows over the top of Everest, it is not safe to attempt to reach the top. Sooner or later the jet stream will move to the left or right of the summit, where it will continue to flow without any obstruction. This is the time when summit attempts can begin in earnest, before the track of the jet stream moves again, back over the top of the world’s highest mountain.
On 4 May, two other members of our team, Veikka Gustafsson and Bo Belvedere Christensen, arrived at Camp 2. They planned to climb to the summit with Jaakko and me, but they were not intending to use supplementary oxygen.
The four of us lazed around in the afternoon heat, listening to the constant screaming noise of the jet stream buffeting the mountain above us. One of the games we played at Camp 2 that year to pass the time was to spot a geostationary satellite which could be seen with the naked eye when the sun reflected on its surface.
Critical to our plan was the setting up of Camp 4 on our route, but because of the continuing, unsuitable conditions, it had not yet been established. We discussed the various options open to us. It seemed to be sensible to delay for a couple of days, with the possibility of going to the summit at the same time as the IMAX team.
Sunday 5 May was yet another day of inactivity – we spent the day lazing and speculating. The main excitement that day was the arrival at Camp 2 of Göran Kropp, after his extremely valiant attempt to reach the summit despite the high winds of the jet stream.
Göran was an excellent climber, with an ascent of K2 already to his name. He had decided to climb Everest without using any mechanical aids, including aircraft. He had cycled from Sweden via Kathmandu and, more latterly, walked to Base Camp. A Spartan to the end, Göran decided that using the ladders through the Icefall which the rest of us were using was unethical within the rules he had set himself. His route to Camp 1 skirted the left-hand side of the Icefall, passing directly under a number of hanging glaciers. It was a bold, daring alternative to the route the rest of us were taking and, while he pioneered his own route that day, many of us sat in chairs at Base Camp watching his progress and, with a degree of black humour, taking bets on how far he would get before he fell.
Climbing on his own on his summit attempt, Göran got to within a few hundred feet of the top of Everest. One of his interesting public relations ideas was to have an aircraft fly over and film his last few feet to the summit. Yet when Göran arrived in Camp 2 that day, the expression on his face showed more clearly than words what he had recently endured, and it was clear that he had been extremely lucky to survive. Göran would not be so lucky some six years later when he fell to his death while rock-climbing in Washington State in the US.
That same day, the IMAX team of internationally renowned climbers, who were making a film which would be shown on widescreen cinemas around the world, also arrived at Camp 2.
On the Monday the high winds continued, but we were hopeful that a break would come the next day and we checked and prepared our kit. I walked over and chatted with David Breashears, the Everest veteran who was leading the IMAX team. Visiting the other climbers helped to pass the time and in the afternoon the French climber Chantal Mauduit came over to chat. She was attempting to become the first woman to climb Lhotse, which shares the normal route on Everest until the routes split just above Camp 3 on the Lhotse Face. She was a beautiful, delightfully charming character and it was impossible to appreciate that such a charismatic personality would be extinguished within two years.
Most worrying for me was a developing cough which had plagued me earlier in the expedition and had now returned with a vengeance. The ‘Khumbu cough’, as it is called, affects most Everest climbers sooner or later, as a result of having to breathe cold, dry air over a period of time. It was bad luck that year that I had arrived at the mountain with a chest complaint – even before the effects of altitude added to the problem.
I didn’t sleep that night and my cough continued to get worse. I was starting to feel very concerned. I lay there in my sleeping bag and considered my options. If I was going to have any realistic chance of reaching the summit, I would have to return to Base Camp to seek medical help.
Early next morning, I explained this to the others. In the macho sport of mountaineering, backing away from an attempt to reach the summit is a hard decision and I felt that I was letting my partner Jaakko down. Bo and Veikka would be climbing without supplementary oxygen, according to their own plan, which was quite different to the plan Jaakko and I had made, which involved the use of supplementary oxygen.
The others had slept little that night, listening to my constant coughing, and they were very sympathetic. It is hard enough trying to get to sleep at altitude without having to sleep next to, or near, a climber with a rasping cough. It also brings on a degree of hypochondria. Lying there in a sleeping bag, listening to monotonous coughing sounds, it is so easy to imagine oneself coming down with the same complaint – decreasing, or taking away, the chance of reaching the summit.
I quickly packed and left. I travelled light, leaving everything I possibly could at Camp 2. I was now only interested in getting down and back up as soon as possible. My morale was damaged as I trudged down the glacier, despite the light load, with the wretched cough continuing to plague me.
The body lying by the side of the trail just below Camp 2 had been a constant reminder during the previous weeks of the ever lurking dangers. Whoever she or he had been, they were now an anonymous landmark, just one of more than 200 climbers who had died on the mountain since humans first attempted to reach the highest summit on earth. Some have known graves, some have been removed to be disposed of according to their beliefs or religion, and others lie in inaccessible locations, where they will rest forever.
I was forced to stop yet again by a coughing spasm and, as I stood there looking at the anonymous body, I couldn’t help but ponder the fragility of life in the mountains. One second climbers can be excited, vibrant, full of life and dreaming of the achievements ahead, but, in an instant, a slip or stumble can cause them to hurtle to the depths below. Climbers often think about the dangers, but as in so many other circumstances in life, it always happens to someone else. Feeling ill and low and looking at that body brought all of the dangers starkly into focus.
It was a bizarre thought, but it occurred to me that lying for eternity on the mountain might be preferable to ending up in the fridge in the German Embassy, en route to a flight home in the hold of an aircraft. The British Embassy didn’t, at the time, have a cold box to take bodies, so they used the services of other embassies who could store the bodies of foreign nationals before they were flown home, which usually meant using the German fridge.
Climbers don’t have a death wish – they have a life wish. They don’t go to Everest to die. Through climbing they are able to experience more of what life has to offer. They fill, as Kipling put it so well, ‘the unforgiving minute/With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run’. In doing so, climbers sometimes come close to danger, often too close, with disastrous results.
I felt dejected. Everest is not technically difficult, but climbers need to remain healthy if they are to have any chance of getting to the top. Most of us during our time on the mountain become hypochondriacs, concerned that the slightest symptom may turn in to some debilitating disease which will end our dreams of standing on the highest point in the world. On down the Western Cwm I trudged. How different I had felt a few days earlier, when I was going in the opposite direction, full of hope and ambition.
On the way down I met many climbers who were going up to Camp 2, to wait their opportunities to go for the summit. I had got to know many of the climbers from the other teams during our time on the mountain. I had also got to know the Sherpas; during my seventeen years as an officer in the British Army Gurkhas, I had worked in the Nepalese language and it was a unique pleasure to joke and laugh with the Sherpas in their own language. Most of those I met that day were sympathetic to my plight and most feared that they too might have their plans thwarted by illness.
Just below Camp 1, halfway down a steep snow slope, I met Scott Fischer. We swapped banter and I explained that I was descending to get some medicine. Scott said that his chest was also bad, but it would not stop him reaching the summit. I wished him luck and I continued to drag my body downwards, leaving Scott to head upwards, stepping ever nearer to an unfolding tragedy and his death.
It was cold and overcast, which added to my dejection. Dragging one’s body downhill, in such a low mental state, is far more difficult than going steeply up in the opposite direction, full of enthusiasm and ambition. It did seem to demonstrate the theory that, when climbing mountains, mental fitness is as important as physical fitness.
Further down I met Mal Duff, who was on his way up with the second summit group, and we discussed what changes would be made to the order in which climbers would now be going to the summit. We agreed to discuss it later that day on the radio, after my medical condition had been assessed at Base Camp.
It took me far longer to get back to Base Camp that day than it did a few days earlier to complete the same journey in the opposite direction. I went straight to see Caroline Mackenzie, Rob Hall’s doctor, to seek assistance. She was confident that I could still make the summit that year and she gave me several different medicines, along with orders to rest for at least two days before I went back up the mountain.
Many miles to the east, the weather was not being so kind. Born in the Bay of Bengal, a storm was wreaking havoc. How blissfully unaware we were of what was to take place during the next five days.
Base Camp was virtually empty. During my days of convalescence, the only climber I bumped into was Göran Kropp, who was recovering from his ordeal high on the mountain. He still looked completely wrecked – further evidence of just how much his summit attempt had taken out of him. Ever focused, totally committed, Göran felt that he now knew the route to the summit, and he would be able to climb much faster on his next attempt to reach the top.
Solo attempts to reach the summit of Everest normally take place after other teams have been to the top and cleared the route. It had surprised many that Göran had not waited for others to go first. Kicking a route through deep snow is exhausting and team members normally share the task, but Göran knew what was required. It had been only a week before, while sleeping in a crevasse at Camp 3, that he decided that he was ready, so off he went, heading for the top.
If Göran had not survived, then his decision would have probably been examined and criticised. Such is the difference between survival and death. He had also calculated that if he did not reach the summit, he would still have time to have a second attempt before the end of the season on the mountain. Göran acknowledged that he was lucky – he had been so exhausted that reaching Base Camp on the descent had been an ordeal like no other which he had faced on a mountain. Although I did find Göran’s views a little extreme, I admired him greatly.
I didn’t meet the Spaniards who had descended from their attempt on the South Pillar route, and who I presumed were also recovering in their tents, somewhere within the maze of camps. The Yugoslavs were busy monitoring the progress of their team members who were planning to go for the summit on 9 May. But even without most of its inhabitants, there was an air of extreme excitement at Base Camp.
One of the big disadvantages of being one of the few native English-speaking climbers left at Base Camp was that I had to talk to a number of visiting trekkers. Having made the effort to walk across the glacier from Kala Patthar, they all seemed to think this entitled them to meet a climber who would tell them what was going on.
More often than not trekkers are not welcome at Base Camp, although they have every right to be there – the trekking permit they have paid for in Kathmandu is valid up to the base of the Icefall. The lack of spaces to pitch tents is the main problem. There just isn’t enough space, and the walk in and out from Gorak Shep means that quite often trekkers want to stay at Base Camp, instead of completing the round trip in one day. I had come to Base Camp to rest and recuperate and I could have done without the interruptions caused by the visitors.
The climbers on the mountain had left behind their cooks, camp helpers, Base Camp managers, and Nepalese liaison officers and most of these were monitoring the progress of their fellow team members, almost by the hour, as the time for summit attempts drew near.
Several teams had satellite links to internet sites and they had support staff with them whose sole task was to relay information about what was going on to the outside world. The ability in those days to give news almost as it happened, from such a remote area, was remarkable. It was such an advance from the early days of expeditions to the mountain, when news was carried by Sherpa runners from the Khumbu all the way to Kathmandu. On a previous expedition in the Himalaya I had used the Sherpa runners over a period of a couple of months to buy my house in France.
Emerging technology was a welcome addition which allowed teams on the mountain to keep those waiting back home up-to-date with the news on Everest. My enthusiasm for this ‘instant’ method of communication would take a knock in the days ahead.
One of the team members who had come to Everest specifically to record events was the British journalist Audrey Salkeld. I have always enjoyed her writing and it made a pleasant excursion to listen to this very knowledgeable lady.
The liaison officers were, as usual, a mixed bunch. It was mandatory for each expedition to have a liaison officer, provided by the Nepalese government and normally selected from volunteers from within the ranks of the civil service. Many of those who end up doing the job are totally unsuited to the role. They frequently come from the low-lying, hot areas of Nepal, and are not familiar with the cold, harsh reality of life at Base Camp. Expeditions have to provide suitable equipment, or pay the liaison officer an allowance to buy the necessary cold weather clothing. The vast majority take the money but turn up at Base Camp with totally unsuitable clothing, having banked their allowance. Quite often the liaison officers will arrive at Base Camp and stay for a few days before claiming illness and scurrying back down the valley to warmer climes. Sometimes they return to Kathmandu, as my liaison officer did when I was leading a team on Annapurna IV in 1992. On that occasion our liaison officer was with us for less than five per cent of the time we spent on the mountain.
The mountaineering section of the Ministry of Tourism does listen to complaints from expedition leaders about liaison officers, and the individual in question is unlikely to be employed in the role again. There have been signs in the years following 1996 that many of those selected for the job are tougher individuals, more so than many of their predecessors. But in 1996, the standard of liaison officer at Base Camp was still not good, which was going to be a factor in the days ahead.
I rested as much as I could. The thicker air of Base Camp seemed to be helping, but I was also taking every item of medicine I could get my hands on. I was desperate to do whatever it took to get back up the mountain. I had forty-eight hours to rest and then I had to return to Camp 2 to join one of our summit groups or, as I thought, I might lose my chance that year to reach the top of the mountain.
Wednesday 8 May passed fairly quietly. I walked down as far as the South African camp to stretch my legs and scrounge a cup of coffee. Deshun Deysel and Ian Woodall’s brother Philip were pleasant company to pass time with. What still amazed me was Deshun’s continuing loyalty to Ian Woodall, which though commendable, did seem misplaced. She must have become aware by this stage of the expedition that Woodall had never intended to take her on to the mountain.
The South African team of Woodall and O’Dowd, together with the Englishman, Bruce Herrod, were at Camp 2, waiting to shadow the experienced teams when they started out for the summit. Rob Hall in particular had had a very difficult time with Woodall. An argument between the South African and the Adventure Consultants Sherpas a couple of weeks before had resulted in Woodall sending a threatening note to Hall.
I awoke next morning feeling much better, although, retrospectively, my desire to get up the mountain was probably masking any underlying symptoms of my chest complaint. That afternoon thick clouds were forming close to Everest. On the radio I heard that Mal had gone from Camp 2 to the bottom of the Lhotse Face, before turning round as the weather deteriorated. Veikka and Bo had started their summit attempt from Camp 2 and had got to a point on the South Pillar route between Camps 3 and 4, in the gully to the left of the Geneva Spur, before they too had decided to turn round. From Rob Hall’s team I heard that Rob and his team had got to Camp 4 on the South Col, but they would probably return tomorrow, to either Camp 3 or Camp 2.
I also heard the more disturbing noise that the Taiwanese climber, Chen Yu-Nan, had died, although details of what had happened were at first a little sketchy. The Taiwanese were regarded by all who saw them climb to be a disaster waiting to happen. They were slow and ill at ease on the mountain. The only surprise was that they had not already had an accident. Watching them in the Icefall, abseiling down a rope, or jumaring up one, their apparent lack of skill was so obvious that it made one really wonder what on earth they were doing on Everest.
Despite grave misgivings about their technical skills, they were a friendly pair. My very limited knowledge of Mandarin always brought a wide smiling response from Chen Yu-Nan whenever I met him on the route, and I felt very sad that he was now lying dead on the mountain.
It transpired that early on the morning of 9 May, Chen left his tent to go to the toilet. He obviously felt safe; he was not wearing crampons, and hadn’t bothered to secure himself to the mountain while he was squatting in the snow. It is unclear how he slipped and fell twenty metres down the face into a crevasse, from which he was recovered by Sherpas who carried him back up to Camp 3. His injuries did not at first appear to be that serious, and his companion, Makalu Gau, decided to leave Chen behind and to climb up to Camp 4 for his summit attempt. Some of the IMAX Sherpas, who were returning from a load carry, started to help Chen down the mountain, although they too did not immediately think his condition was serious.
Just before 3 p.m. that afternoon, Chen’s condition deteriorated and the IMAX Sherpas radioed this news to Camp 2. Thirty minutes later Chen was dead.
IMAX team members, David Breashears, Ed Viesturs and Robert Schauer, then started up towards Camp 3, in weather which soon deteriorated into a minor blizzard, to bring Chen’s body down. It was a noble act, and having placed the body in a sleeping bag, they left Chen on the glacier close to Camp 2, where his body would freeze solid, which would make it easier to drag him through the Western Cwm and the Icefall and down to Base Camp. From there, a helicopter would take him to Kathmandu and onwards to Taiwan.
I didn’t sleep well that night. Not because of Chen’s death – these things have more impact in retrospect from a distance than they do at the time – I simply didn’t sleep because I was excited to have the opportunity of a second attempt at the summit. I didn’t feel anything like as debilitated as I had when I arrived down at Base Camp two days before, but I did still have a cough.
I awoke keen and ready to go by 5.30 a.m. I didn’t wait to find out how things were going high on the mountain. All I wanted to do was get back up as quickly as possible. I felt strong as I left Base Camp, and I managed to move swiftly up through the Icefall to Camp 1. I stopped briefly and then continued at speed to Camp 2.
With so many people high on the mountain, I only passed a few Sherpas on the way. It was so pleasant to be on the hill again, heading upwards with the hope that I would be on the summit in a few days.
In retrospect, I should not have left Base Camp that day. My illness was bad and, despite Caroline Mackenzie’s assurance, I probably knew deep in my heart that I was in no condition to climb. That is easier to conclude now than it was then. At the time, my enthusiasm and drive overrode any signs that I was not up to it.
I arrived at 9.30 a.m. It was my fastest ascent from Base Camp to Camp 2 and, although I had not been a slouch during the expedition, my fellow team members were still surprised by the time. For the remainder of the morning we lazed around, looking up at the mountain, thinking that we were watching a rehearsal of our own summit successes, which would, we hoped, come soon.
None of us that morning considered that things above us were going to go horribly wrong. We knew that Rob and Scott’s teams had left the South Col the previous night, and we were now waiting to hear that they had reached the summit. Even the news that some people had turned round and were now heading back to the South Col did not cause anxiety amongst the teams waiting at Camp 2.
It was early afternoon on 10 May 1996 when the first alarm bells started to ring at our camp. From our position we could easily see the Hillary Step, and at about 1 p.m. we could clearly see a small group of a half dozen or so climbers queuing to climb this small notch on the route. It was easy to do a rough calculation, which indicated that by this point their oxygen would be running low. The weather was still good and the knowledge that there were so many guides with the teams above us gave the watchers below a false sense that things would be okay.
Reports followed that climbers were reaching the summit late in the afternoon and these did give rise to greater concern, but this was not the first time that the mountain had been climbed so late in the day and there was still some optimism at Camp 2 that all would be well.
The weather from our position still looked okay. We could not, of course, see the clouds rolling in from the east, as the climbers could from their various positions between the summit and the South Col.
At about 4 p.m. the weather high on the mountain suddenly deteriorated. The winds increased to about 120 kilometres per hour and it started to snow. My most vivid memory is of the darkness which covered the mountain long before the sun set. From where we were the summit ridge looked black. At last the alarm bells at Camp 2 rang loud and clear. Small groups formed with everyone looking upwards, hoping and praying that things would be okay.
Messages from Base Camp gave us little clue of exactly what was going on above us. With so many climbers on the mountain there was no one at Base Camp to relay meaningful information to us at the higher camp. If anything, what little information was reaching us was just further con-fusing our picture of what was going on.
And then, at about 6 p.m., we heard the most alarming news – Rob Hall was still near the summit with his client Doug Hansen, who was in a bad condition. A short time later we learned that Doug’s condition was very serious and we sensed that he would have difficulty surviving the night – but Rob could survive if he left Doug, and in such appalling conditions he had to do this soon.
What Rob did that night was honourable and brave, and it ultimately cost him his life. It was not possible to get Doug down the mountain and yet Rob decided to stay with him so that he would not die alone. When Rob made these decisions, he was probably still capable of clear thought and could have survived – he knew the risks, and he knew the consequences – it was an extremely brave act.
Those below all agreed on what Rob had to do. We willed him to leave Doug and to save his own life. It was very clear that there was not much time for Rob to do this before he too would have little chance of getting back down to safety.
There was little sleep, if any, at camp that night. The storm continued to batter the mountain all through the hours of darkness. In the tents it was impossible not to think of just how bad it would be for those still outside the tents at the South Col. At this stage we thought this was only Rob and Doug.